Building the Revolution: Soviet Art

The Royal Academy of Arts (London, United Kingdom) presents the exhibition Building the Revolution: Soviet Art and Architecture 1915–1935, which examines Russian avant-garde architecture made during a brief but intense period of design and construction that took place from c.1922 to 1935.

Fired by the Constructivist art that emerged in Russia from c.1915, architects transformed this radical artistic language into three dimensions, creating structures whose innovative style embodied the energy and optimism of the new Soviet Socialist state. The exhibition juxtapose large-scale photographs of extant buildings with relevant Constructivist drawings and paintings, vintage photographs and periodicals. Many of the works have never been shown in the UK before.

The drive to forge a new Socialist society in Russia encouraged synthesis between radical art and rchitecture. This creative reciprocity was reflected in the engagement with architectural ideas and projects of such artists as Kazimir Malevich, Vladimir Tatlin, Liubov Popova, El Lizzitsky, Ivan Kluin and Gustav Klucis, and in designs by such architects as Konstantin Melnikov, Moisei Ginsburg, Ilia Golosov and the Vesnin brothers, as well as Le Corbusier and Erich Mendelsohn, European architects who were draughted in to help shape the new utopia.

Date: until January 22.
Location: Royal Academy of Arts, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London W1J OBD. United Kingdom.
Opening hours: from Saturday to Thursday from 10am to 6pm. Fridays from 10am to 10pm.