[WRAPPERS BY POLINA KHENTOVA] Znamia: vremennik literatury i politiki, no. 1 [The standard: a monthly of literature and politics, no. 1 (of 2 published)]

Rare first issue, one of only two published, of this Berlin journal by the SR (Socialist Revolutionary) Party, edited by Aleksandr Shreider (1895-1930), a former member of the government following the February Revolution who later went into exile. Despite its political aims, the journal also boasts an impressive list of literary contributors and features work by Andrei Belyi, Aleksandr Blok, Sergei Esenin, Ivanov-Razumnik, Nikolai Kliuev, E. G. Lundberg, Il'ia Erenburg and others. Wrappers designed by Polina Khentova (1890s-1933), an artist originally from Vitebsk who participated in the short-lived and little-known "Shomir", a loose association of young Jewish artists that included El Lissitsky and Abram Efros and that attempted to develop a "Jewish national aesthetics" in revolutionary Moscow. Soon after the October Revolution, Khentova joined the artistic section of the Jewish Kultur-Lige in Kiev, where, along with Shomir-affiliated artists such as Lissitsky and Mark Chagall, she once again collaborated in the search for a Jewish art that would combine the visual language of the Russian avant-garde with elements of Jewish folkore. Her work remains largely unknown today. While in Berlin during the early 1920s, she illustrated four children's books, but was largely rejected by the Russian émigré community for her unconventional avant-garde style. Kudriavtsev 906. The journal also appeared in German and Italian. As of June 2020, KVK and OCLC show the holdings at the Goetheanum, Columbia, IISG, Cambridge, Ohio State, and the Hoover Institution, which at times are lacking no. 1 or 2. Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin only appears to hold the German edition. Rare first issue, one of only two published, of this Berlin journal by the SR (Socialist Revolutionary) Party, edited by Aleksandr Shreider (1895-1930), a former member of the government following the February Revolution who later went into exile. Despite its political aims, the journal also boasts an impressive list of literary contributors and features work by Andrei Belyi, Aleksandr Blok, Sergei Esenin, Ivanov-Razumnik, Nikolai Kliuev, E. G. Lundberg, Il'ia Erenburg and others. Wrappers designed by Polina Khentova (1890s-1933), an artist originally from Vitebsk who participated in the short-lived and little-known "Shomir", a loose association of young Jewish artists that included El Lissitsky and Abram Efros and that attempted to develop a "Jewish national aesthetics" in revolutionary Moscow. Soon after the October Revolution, Khentova joined the artistic section of the Jewish Kultur-Lige in Kiev, where, along with Shomir-affiliated artists such as Lissitsky and Mark Chagall, she once again collaborated in the search for a Jewish art that would combine the visual language of the Russian avant-garde with elements of Jewish folkore. Her work remains largely unknown today. While in Berlin during the early 1920s, she illustrated four children's books, but was largely rejected by the Russian émigré community for her unconventional avant-garde style. Kudriavtsev 906. The journal also appeared in German and Italian. As of June 2020, KVK and OCLC show the holdings at the Goetheanum, Columbia, IISG, Cambridge, Ohio State, and the Hoover Institution, which at times are lacking no. 1 or 2. Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin only appears to hold the German edition.