Radical Art:Russia/East Europe

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

This course investigates experimental art and literature of Russia and Eastern Europe in the first decades of the 20th century in a comparative context. Our aim is to examine the commonalities among the diverse radical groups that identified themselves with “the avant-garde,” to consider how avant-garde artists defined their place in society and negotiated their relationship to politics, and to reflect on the position of experimental artists from this geographic region within broader European trends. We ask: what distinguishes the avant-garde from other modernist trends? Can we speak of a unified international movement known as “the avant-garde,” or are there many avant-gardes? What is the relationship of the avant-garde to nationalism, cosmopolitanism, and internationalism? Where does the avant-garde stand in relation to socialist revolution and leftist politics? We consider these and other questions by interrogating the avant-garde’s relationship to the past, history, and tradition, and by examining the techniques, media, and genres that were pervasive throughout its different factions. For the final students have the option to pursue a creative project that engages avant-garde techniques and strategies studied in the course.