‘A group of deranged idiots’ – how the Soviets saw the Avant-Gardists

The Avant-Gardists tells the story of the small group of brilliant, punky outsider artists who, after the Bolshevik coup in 1917, to everyone’s amazement suddenly found themselves holding important posts in government (as if Sid Vicious were made minister of education). They were soon demoted, and by the end of the 1920s persecuted or driven abroad. Yet news of their breathtaking originality spread internationally, playing an important role in transforming not only our understanding of art, but the aesthetics of modern life, from buildings to household objects, textiles to the printed word.

Sjeng Scheijen has written an exhilarating history of the movement, illuminated by new research and insights, and with many comic moments amid the unfolding tragedy. Most enjoyable is the vividness with which he conjures up the personalities in the group, in particular the two great rivals Kazimir Malevich and Vladimir Tatlin. There’s a touch of Laurel and Hardy about the pair: Tatlin, tall, gangly and morose, and Malevich, small, roly-poly and permanently speechifying. Both were always up for a fight and categorically opposed to any compromise. Wassily Kandinsky and Marc Chagall, older and less combative, float slightly above their tussles, while a crowd of young artists, such as El Lissitzky, Alexander Rodchenko and Varvara Stepanova, each brilliant in their own right, passionately support first one, then the other.

Before the Revolution, the Futurists – as they were known; the avant-garde wasn’t a commonly used term then – were a constant source of outrage for the papers, with their painted faces, topless women and men with half their beards shaved off. Their shows attracted few visitors. Yet by 1916, they had already exhibited pieces exploring almost all the 20th century’s artistic breakthroughs: abstraction, installations, performance and conceptual art.