SOVIET COMMERCIAL DESIGN OF THE TWENTIES
M. Anikst [Editor]
M. Anikst [Editor]: SOVIET COMMERCIAL DESIGN OF THE TWENTIES. New York: Abbeville, 1987. Second printing, first paperback edition. Slim quarto. Thick printed wrappers. 144 pp. 211 color illustrations and 323 black and white illustrations. Vintage price sticker on front free endpaper. Interior unmarked and very clean. Out-of-print. A nearly fine copy of this classic edition.
9.25 x 11.5 softcover book with 144 pages with 323 illustrations (211 in full color). Compiled by a Russian Graphic Designer, this collection presents many rare and unusual pieces (many reproduced here for the first time), as well as the classics by Soviet Avant-Garde designers. Amazing survey of art in the USSR from the height of the Constructivist Era. Highly recommended.
Includes works by Alexandr Rodchenko, El Lissitzky, Alexei Gan, Varvara Stepanova, the Stenberg Brothers, Wassily Kandinsky, Gustav Klutsis, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Natan Altman, Salomon Telingater, Liubov Popova, Yurii Annenkov, and others. Includes posters, book jackets, candey wrappers, emblems, cigarette and matchbox designs, political propaganda, advertising, cinema posters, the new typography, and much more. This is an essential volume for any designer or historian of the Constructivist Movement.
In a country where illiteracy was endemic, visual communication played a critical role in the conversion of the masses to the new social order. Graphic design, particularly as applied in the political placard, was a highly useful instrument for agitation, as it was both direct and economical. The symbiotic relationship of revolution and the graphic arts would result in revolutionary new forms, including the film poster.