OBMOKhU

Society of Young Artists. A group of Russian artists, most of them pupils of Alexander Rodchenko and Vladimir Tatlin in the Vkhutemas, who experimented with spatial constructions and the properties of industrial materials.

Society included about 20 people: N. Denisovsky, M. Jeremic, A. Zamoshkin, K. Johanson, B. Komardenkov, S. Kostin, A. Lentulov, Konstantin Medunetsky, A. Naumov, Perekatov, A. Prusakov, N. Prusakov, A. Rodchenko, S. Svetlov, Stenberg brothers, G. Yakulov.

In 1921, most of the artists aligned themselves with the Constructivists, signed a manifesto condemning non-useful (i.e. 'fine') art as a 'speculative activity', and thereafter devoted themselves to theatrical or industrial design.

Exhibitions

The society organised four separate exhibitions.

1919, exhibition at Stroganovka.

May 1920, First Obmokhu Exhibition in the Vkhutemas by 13 students. These were not socially useful designs, but open spatial constructions making dynamic use of the spiral form.

Second Spring Exhibition of Obmokhu, also known as the Third Exhibition of Obmokhu, opened on 22 May 1921. The sculptures displayed a strong commitment to the materials and forms of contemporary technology. The Stenbergs, for instance, created skeletal forms from materials such as glass, metal and wood, evoking engineering structures such as bridges and cranes, as in Georgy Stenberg's Spatial Construction/KPS 51 NXI. Rodchenko showed a series of hanging constructions based on mathematical forms; they consisted of concentric shapes cut from a single plane of plywood, rotated to create a three-dimensional geometric form that is completely permeated by space, for example Oval Hanging Construction. In 2006, the works were reconstructed from photographs and exhibited in Tretyakov Gallery [1].

1922, for the Congress of the Comintern.