one of 50 copies signed by the artist

An excellent example of of the deluxe edition limited to 50 copies, signed by El Lissitzky. The Dutch edition was published by Theo van Doesburg for De Stijl the same year as the Russian Pro Dva Kvadrata. The original portrait format was converted to landscape format and the typographic text is not below, but to the right of the compositions. The change in language meant the design of the work was altered (Doesburg collaborated with Lissitzky) and they can be seen as two separate but complementary works. For example, the first double page spread with 'Voor Allen' differs vastly from the first leaf of the Russian which has an oversized capital R for 'Po vsem rebiatkami'.

About Two Squrares is Lissitzky's groundbreaking book for children about two squares, black and red, that fly to earth from afar. The red square represents modern Soviet order and the black represents the chaos of pre-Revolutionary Russia. Lissitzky, Malevich and Ermolaeva along with other artists at the UNOVIS workshop in Vitebsk included squares in their official table of Suprematist symbols which one could apply to decorating streets and designing posters, books, textile, porcelain, and other objects. A UNOVIS leaflet of 1919 proclaimed, 'Wear the black square as a mark of the world economy. Draw the red square in your workshops as a mark of the world revolution in the arts.'

Designed two years earlier in Vitebsk but printed in Berlin in Russian and subsequently in Dutch, About Two Sqaures unites the cosmic ideas of Suprematism and the Constructivist techniques of book design. Lissitzky compared a book to an architectural structure that should be built with the aid of typographic machinery. The idea of constructing pages, using letter forms, instead of rows of words, and placing them in space with geometric forms originates in this book. This radical approach to book design marked the beginning of a new graphic art and is important not just in the history of the Russian avant-garde but twentieth century art in general.

This is a remarkably fresh copy of an incredibly scarce work. Lissitzy's Suprematist Tale remains one of the most important avant-garde artist's books of the era.

Dutch edition, one of 50 copies signed by Lissitzky in black ink on the colophon, this copy unnumbered, oblong 4to (21 x 26 cm); 8 unnumbered leaves, illustrations in black and red; publisher's printed wrappers, very minor light foxing to covers and small creases to corners otherwise a fine copy.