Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevitch: the Russian Avant-garde in Vitebsk at the Centre Pompidou

Far from the Russian metropolises and their full-blown post-revolutionary struggles, the history of art was being written in an art school in Vitebsk, Belarus. The Vitebsk People’s Art College was founded in 1918 by Marc Chagall when he was appointed Commissar of Plastic Arts for his home town, and quickly became an experimental laboratory where different perspectives on the world could be indulged. It was open to all, regardless of age or resources, an advantage that Chagall had not enjoyed in his youth. This hotbed of the Russian avant-garde counted among its teachers the influential artists El Lissitzky and Kasimir Malevich. From 1922, with the end of the civil war, the Soviet government co-opted the artists to serve the Bolshevik party. Nearly a century later, the Centre Pompidou reopens this fascinating chapter in the history of Russian modernity and, through an unprecedented collection of two hundred and fifty works and documents illuminating the post-revolutionary years, highlights an art school where rethinking the world was strongly encouraged.

Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevitch; the Russian Avant-garde in Vitebsk at the Centre Pompidou until July 16^th, 2018
Place George Pompidou, Paris 4^th
20 minutes from the Hotel Monge

Open daily from 11:00 to 21:00. Late opening on Thursday until 23:00.
www.centrepompidou.fr