Kubism

Tartu: Arlekiin, 1920 Octavo, wrappers, 20pp. Fine abstract cover design by unattributed artist., a two-color linocut. The first appearance of Kulbin s work on cubism (1915) in Estonian, and probably a seminal work influencing the course of modernism in Estonia for the coming decade, especially in Tartu where abstraction was championed in the early years of the Pallas Art School. Nikolai Kulbin (1868-1917) was a painter, art theorist and driving force in Russian modernism as a futurist. Translated into Estonian by A. Kivikas. This has a striking two-color linocut cover, without attribution, and is likely to have been done by one of the artists in Tartu --- Ado Vabbe (1892-1961] has a gouache work from 1919 which looks very close to this and it can be surmised to be of the same hand. Vabbe was one of the strongest Estonian abstractionists and continued in this vein long after public support had waned from the early years of experimentation in search of a national art form. Notwithstanding that, constructivist abstraction peristed in Estonia up to 1940. One library holding in North America.