Photographer – Alexander Rodchenko Bio
Alexander
Rodchenko is a Russian artist, sculptor, photographer, and graphic designer. He
is one of the founders of constructivism. He was born in St. Petersburg in 1891, and created his works
through the early-mid 20th century. One of the most versatile
constructivist and productivist artists to emerge after the Russian Revolution.
He created photomontages based on poetry by Mayakovski which created
constructivist form. His most used element of design was lines. He likes using
lines such as stairs, grids, or wires in his compositions creating an abstract
constructivism line structure. He used unusual camera positions, severe
foreshortenings of perspective and views of surprising details.
One of the
most significant and first constructivists of his time. Constructivism was
created by him, it had a major impact on architecture, graphic and industrial
design, theatre, film, dance, fashion, and even music. Honoured for his
pioneering work as a photographer. Constructivism is a form of literal
photography – it has no meaning, he did not believe in abstracts, it was more
of concrete and tangible ideas. Rodchenko was important because he showed that
not all art has to have an inner meaning, it can also be literal. He thought
that literal art could also make someone feel something without a meaning
behind it. He created a trend to the arts which was linked to industry,
architecture, and manufacturing. He was inspired by Vladimir Tatin who was
inspired by Picasso’s work. Constructivism was formed from and a part of the
progression from Russian Futurism. Futurism is the opposite of constructivism,
the art being abstract with emphasis on geometric shapes. He led photography in
to more of a modern subject. Now in the modern days, Constructivism has also
extended to two dimensional art such as graphic art posters and books. He gave
people something “nice” to look at, not something to deeply think about.
