Self-Portrait : Constructor
Photograph
1924 (made)
1924 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Monochrome photograph (silver gelatin print) of a collage of lithographic and drawn elements added to a photographic image. The photographic image was itself produced by superimposing two separate photographs: The Architects Equipment (showing El Lissitzky's hand holding a compass against graph paper with an arching line) and his Self Portrait, both taken in 1924 while Lissitzky was recovering from tuberculosis in a Swiss sanatorium. The resulting image fuses the artist's head, hand and tools. Large printed letters 'XYZ' appear in the top left hand portion of the image.
Object details
| Category | |
| Object type | |
| Title | Self-Portrait : Constructor (assigned by artist) |
| Materials and techniques | Collage of lithographic and drawn elements added to a photographic image |
| Brief description | Photograph : Self-Portrait: Constructor, Gelatin silver print, El Lissitzky, 1924 |
| Physical description | Monochrome photograph (silver gelatin print) of a collage of lithographic and drawn elements added to a photographic image. The photographic image was itself produced by superimposing two separate photographs: The Architects Equipment (showing El Lissitzky's hand holding a compass against graph paper with an arching line) and his Self Portrait, both taken in 1924 while Lissitzky was recovering from tuberculosis in a Swiss sanatorium. The resulting image fuses the artist's head, hand and tools. Large printed letters 'XYZ' appear in the top left hand portion of the image. |
| Dimensions |
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| Style | |
| Gallery label | Gallery 100, ‘History of photography’, 2011-2012, label text :
El Lissitzky (1890-1941)
‘Self-portrait: Constructor’
1924
Lissitzky presents himself as a designer with the
attributes of his profession: graph paper; a hand
holding a pair of compasses; and typographical
elements of his own letterhead. The montage was
made by contact printing the different negative
elements one after the other onto the same positive
printing-out paper.
Gelatin silver print
Museum no. Ph.142-1985
(07 03 2014) |
| Object history | Provenance: Mikhail Larionov ollection. |
| Subjects depicted | |
| Bibliographic references |
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| Collection | |
| Accession number | PH.142-1985 |
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| Record created | June 27, 2007 |
| Record URL |
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