Igra v adu (A Game in Hell) : A Futurist Poem Illustrated by Kazimir Malevich, Olga Rozanova and Natalia Goncharova – 1912

This booklet of Russian futurism was produced in Moscow in 1912 in small batch of just 800 copies. Called Igra v adu (A Game in Hell), the narrative poem describes a card game between devils and sinners in Hell.

 

Its 28 pages was illustrated by artists Kazimir Malevich (1878-1935) and Ol’ga Rozanova (1886–1918) and written by Velimir Khlebnikov (1885–1922) and Aleksei Kruchenykh (1886–1968).

Moma says Natalia Goncharova was also a contributor to an earlier edition –  this being the second. She organised exhibitions of contemporary Russian paintings, engaged in public debates, and wrote manifestos about modern art. She contributed to nearly twenty early Futurist books and designed sets for more than thirty plays and ballets, many of which took her to Paris, where she settled in 1919.

Any Russian speakers reading this are welcome (please) to tell us what the booklet says.  For now we’ll focus on the drawings.

 

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