Vkhutemas

Vkhutemas (Russian Вхутемас, acronym Высшие художественно - технические мастерские, to German Higher Artistic-Technical Institute ) was an existing 1920-1927 State Art School in Moscow. She had committed to the ideas of the Russian avant-garde. From 1927 to 1930, she was listed as Vkhutein (Russian Вхутеин of Высший художественно - технический институт; German Higher Artistic- Technical Institute ). In the wake of the suppression of the avant-garde by the socialist realism was dissolved in 1930.

History

With the constitution of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic ( RSFSR ) in 1918, academies or art and crafts schools were in State Free Art Workshops short Svomas (Russian Свободные художественные мастерские ) converted. This free art workshops were formed in St. Petersburg, Kazan, Saratov, Odessa, Kharkov and Vitebsk.

Already on December 19, 1920 created by decree of the Soviet government from the merger of the two Svomas the State Higher Artistic- Technical Workshops ( Vkhutemas ) as " artistic technical-industrial institution of higher learning ." In Moscow emerged from the Stroganov Art and Technology School, the First State Free Art Workshops and from the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, the Second State Free Art Workshops.

On March 4, 1927, she was renamed Vkhutein. In 1930 the establishment was closed. The department of painting and sculpture was merged with the corresponding Petersburg Institute of proletarian means for performing arts ( since 1932 Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture ). The architecture department went into the new Higher Architecture and Construction Institute (since 1933: Moscow Architecture Institute ).

Art Historical Significance

The special feature of these new workshops was the connection of Fine Arts - painting and sculpture - with the so-called production arts - architecture, printing, metal and wood processing, textiles and ceramics.

The Artistic and Technical Workshops were similar in objective, scope and organization of the existing in the same period Bauhaus. You should join the craft tradition with modern technologies and prepare for the integration of the arts into production. The Vkhutemas were accordingly divided into eight faculties: Architecture, painting, sculpture, wood and metal working, set design, printmaking, textiles and ceramics. A single introductory course for students of all disciplines, as it existed at the Bauhaus from 1919, but was not introduced until 1923. This basic course belonged to the second major innovation in the post-revolutionary education of artists.

Right at the beginning of the Vkhutemas, 1920-1923, three different and competing training concepts were formed out within the Faculty of Architecture:

• The traditionally oriented academic workshops providing instruction hardly differed substantially from the previous academy training.
• The United Left workshops ( Obmas ), who began to work to Nikolai Ladowskis psychoanalytic method.
• The Workshop of the Experimental Architecture, which was based on Ilya Golossows theories of the structure of architectural organisms.

Staff

As a teacher had many important Russian artists of the time to the Vkhutemas, particularly from the direction of Russian Constructivism. They include Alexander Rodchenko, Varvara Stepanova, Vladimir Tatlin, Alexander Vesnin, Liubov Popova, Naum Gabo, El Lissitzky, Nikolai Alexandrovich Ladovski, Konstantin Melnikov, Pavel Florensky, Moiseja Ginsburg, Ilia Scholtowski, Alexei Shchusev, Wassily Kandinsky, Alexandra Exter, Ilya Golossov, Viktor Petrov, Alexander Vasilyevich Kuprin, Ivan Vasilyevich Lamzow Victor Balichin, Gustav Klucis.