ALEXANDER RODCHENKO
Portrait Vladimir Mayakovsky, 1924
© VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2018 / Courtesy Kicken Berlin
Biography
After attending the School of Art in Kazan Alexander (Mikhailovich) Rodchenko studied at the Stroganov Institute for Applied Arts in Moscow in 1915. He soon met Kasimir Malevich and Vladimir Tatlin and became a leading force of Constructivism and the Russian avant-garde. In 1920 he began teaching the metalwork class at VKhUTEMAS (Higher Art and Technical Studios), the Russian Bauhaus equivalent. Rodchenko increasingly used the photo-collage technique in his graphic works after 1922 and in 1924 began to photograph himself. He advocated a new aesthetic in photography characterized by extreme angles and diagonal, dynamic composition. Around 1930 he began working as a photo reporter for magazines and together with Varvara F. Stepanova designed and published the journal USSR under Construction. Rodchenko returned to painting in the 1940s.
