Organic composition with 2 Spheres
Kluin, Ivan Vassilievich
1873 - 1943
Organic composition with 2 Spheres
mixed media on paper
19.5 x 10cm, 25 x 15 in frame
c 1915
Signed lower right
PROVENANCE:
Family of the artist
Private collection, New York.
LITERATURE:
Ivan Kluin, catalogue raisonee, by Svetlana Kliukova, 1993, Soloveichuk, reproduced p.279.
Ivan Kliun was one of the outstanding members of the Russian Avant Garde movement of the early 20thcentury. He was born to a peasant family in Bolshive Gorki hamlet. He served as a bookkeeper, and at the same time studied drawing. During 1902–1907, he attended classes at F.I. Rerberg’s studio in Moscow where he met I.I. Mashkov and K.S. Malevich. This encounter became a major factor in the creative biography of Ivan Kliun. Malevich had a great influence on the further development of the artist, brought him into the circle of the founders of the Russian avant-garde, set him on the path of Cubo-Futurism, and later Suprematism. At the “0.10” exhibition in Petrograd in 1915, Kliun displayed his cubist and abstract sculpture for the first time and in 1916 began to create Suprematist compositions. Kliun was a member of the “Supremus” Society in 1916–1917. After the Suprematist period, he experienced an enthusiasm for French Purism. The artist then turned to Realism, which was not only a concession to the times, but also his inner need. He found himself in complete isolation at the end of his life.
Organic composition with 2 spheres is a fine example of Kliun’s art from around 1916 when the artist was at his most original and productive. He had been encouraged to work on this scale by Malevich and the composition remains harmoniously balanced with pleasing colours and an interesting mixture of rigid and curved objects. This powerful image is a rare survival in perfect condition from one of the leading members of the Russian Avant Garde.
