László Moholy-Nagy and the Age of Re/Production
There are six lithographs by Hungarian artist László Moholy-Nagy that divide his practice and serve as a point of departure towards his works in plastic arts, construction and light. The lithographs from the series 1923 Konstruktionen. 6. Kestner-Mappe (Constructions. Kestner Portfolio 6) are reminiscent of his paintings, showing intersecting abstract shapes representing transparency, depth and motion. These six lithographs are relevant to his practice as they are the bridge between his early emotional artworks and his later constructivist plastic and light works. They place Moholy between the world of minimalist abstraction based on formalisms and into abstraction as a way to carrying out conceptual experimentation. That distinction could be surmised as the definition between Suprematism and Constructivism.
In the early 20th century the artistic movements were reticent to cross-pollination of ideas from other groups even though aesthetically there might have been similarities between them. This led to a rise of “-isms” one that Moholy himself addressed in his essay From Pigment to Light.
“The terminology of “isms” is truly bewildering. Without being exactly certain what the words imply, people talk of impressionism, neo-impressionism, pointillism, expressionism, futurism, cubism, purism, suprematism, neoplasticism, dadaism, surrealism — and in addition there are photography, the film, and light displays. Even specialists can no longer keep abreast of this apocalyptic confusion.”
The six lithographs of Konstruktionen all use overlapping blocks of color to create depth, asymmetry to give motion and where certain parts of the different blocks meet is sometimes completely covered by an overlapping color block, or softly muted by a block. This variation between hard and subtle shifts of color where the blocks meet, gives the appearance of three dimensionality, something that is an intrinsic quality of the Constructivist movement. Moholy becomes involved with constructivism after moving to Berlin in 1920. Before 1920 Moholy’s artwork was mainly restricted to paintings, from the expressionistic The Hills of Buda (1918–1919) to the cubist Landscape with Houses (1919). The real aesthetic evolution of his minimalist compositions can compared in Large Emotion Meter (1920) and Z III (1922). Large Emotion Meter employs many of the tropes found in El Lissitzky’s artworks, such as the use of alphanumeric characters orbiting around geometric shapes. Z III on the other hand is completely comprised of geometric shapes. In the most thorough biographical writings published of Moholy, the point of departure for his true alignment with Constructivism is seen as Z III. “ZIII (1922) announces the pervasive influence of Malevich and Russian Constructivism: several kinds of geometric shapes — rectangles, circles, squares and, particularly, straight lines — are painted in flat colors and superimposed on a rather spare field.” It is bold of Kostelanetz to say that Z III specifically is the announcement of Moholy’s constructivist ideals as the style used in Large Emotion Meter is reminiscent of El Lissitzky who was also aligned with Russian Constructivism, however, the influence of Malevich is key in the difference between his practice in 1919 and 1922. The evolution that began with Moholy moving to Berlin and his creation of the Kestner portfolio is made is very much at a balancing point in 1922–1923 when he leans more towards the constructivist style of Malevich. It is surely after 1922 when Moholy becomes comfortable with producing artworks in a style which is derivative of constructivism and suprematism but not imitating any particular artist. This ultimately leads him towards discovering his own style in the use of mechanical apparatuses such as the The Light-Space Modulator (1922–1930) and his photograms. FGM.037 Untitled (1923) is a photogram of particular interest as the composition is reminiscent of Constructions. 6.Kestner-Mappe (1923) which is one of the six lithographs in the Kestner portfolio. The composition and placement of the objects on the plain is incredibly similar and it is possible to consider that the experimentation that Moholy was doing with the lithographs found a more pleasing output as photograms, which is more widely known for and which he produced in great numbers.
The use of color is quite muted throughout the Kestner portfolio series, with only one of the “constructions” having a strong vibrant red, another has a dark black background with overlays of grey and white. [And?] A further dimensionality is added by the use of textures on some of the blocks, which can be interpreted as a diffused or out of focus object. During this period Moholy also experimented with transparency, painting abstract shapes on multiple layers of transparent materials and layering them to create a composition in Transparency (1921). The combination of these techniques imbues within the lithographs a similar quality to the paintings such as K VII (1922) and Composition Q IV (1923) which have similar shapes, color hues and tonal variations to the lithographic constructions. It is, however, interesting to note the titles of the pieces, the lithographs are labeled as “Constructions” while the paintings are generally referred to as both “Constructions” and “Compositions”, an interesting interchangeability between Constructivist and Suprematist terminology. This type of opportunism gained Moholy-Nagy admonishment from critics such as Alfred Kemeny who wrote:
“It is worth noting that Moholy, who thus far has employed Constructivism for objectively unwarranted self-promotion, now, in 1924, makes his appearance as a Suprematist […] Moholy, who is eclectic and derivative, has a similarly insignificant role within the essential outcome of new Constructivist Art as within Suprematism”
As an artist Moholy-Nagy was constantly under the shadow of plagiarism, and his fluid changing of movements from MA to Suprematism and Constructivism, made him a controversial figure within the avant-garde movements in Europe. He does not appear to show particular affinity to any one process over another, instead, he aligns himself to the virtues of the diverse movements that he is a part of. Moholy-Nagy used a huge amount of processes and mediums within his art practice, and yet one of the most prevalent and interesting fascinations of his is the underlying current of the removal of the artist hand with the canvas, be it two or three-dimensional. His porcelain enamel on steel construction Telephone Picture EM (1922) which was created by him providing instructions to a factory supervisor over a telephone using a series of coordinates and factory color charts. This meant that the art object was created by the artist without him being in direct physical contact with the creation materials. This is a further removal from the act of painting, to the act of lithographic reproduction to the act of mechanical reproduction with the intent to create artworks which are aesthetically quite similar.
It is incredibly difficult to actually differentiate the works that Moholy-Nagy creates under the banner of Constructivism or Suprematism, aspects of both can be seen within the objects, prints, photomontages and light installations created by him, but did not seem to serve any other master than that of aesthetic pursuit. Unlike propaganda posters made by El Lissitzky or Alexander Rodchenko, which had an ultimate functionality to provide instruction in the Communist ways to the Soviet people. With Suprematism being more interested in the emotional value of the artwork and Constructivism in the functionality of it.
Works Cited
1. Deborah Wye, Artists and Prints: Masterworks from The Museum of Modern Art, New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2004, p. 83
2. László Moholy-Nagy. “From Pigment to Light” Moholy-Nagy: An Anthology. Ed. Richard Kostelanetz. New York, N.Y.: Da Capo Press, 1970. Page 30.
3. Richard Kostelanetz. “Introduction” Moholy-Nagy: An Anthology. Ed.
4. Richard Kostelanetz. New York, N.Y.: Da Capo Press, 1970. Page 8.
5. Louis Kaplan, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy Autobiographical Writings (Duke University Press, 1995), p. 69
6. Louis Kaplan, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy Autobiographical Writings (Duke University Press, 1995), p. 67
7. Louis Kaplan, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy Autobiographical Writings (Duke University Press, 1995), p. 121
