David Burliuk

(1882 - 1967)

1452

Velimir Khlebnikov a.o.

Молоко кобылиц

Mare's milk

Moscow: Gileia, 1914

195 x 128 mm. 68 pages

Edition: 1,100

Artistic life in Russia in the years between 1910 and 1914 was seething. Declarations and manifestoes succeeded one another at a rapid rate. Artists founded art groups and switched between groups, quarrelled, made peace, split up and reunited again. Books were the brightest carriers of Russian Futurism. This book was published by the artists group Hylaea. The name Hylaea was used by the ancient Greeks for a land famous as the setting of some of the labours of Hercules. This Hylaea is situated in the south of Russia bordering the Black Sea. In this historic environment, the homestead of the Burliuks, David and his brother Vladimir together with Benedikt Livshits founded the group Hylaea. It was one of the many groups that sympathized with archaeological art, lubok (broad sheets), icons, shop signs and children’s drawings. The crudely executed watercolour by David Burliuk shows in outline an ancient stone goddess. The watercolour by his brother Vladimir looks more like the tail of an airplane. David designed two and Vladimir six additional illustrations. In the end two reproductions of works by Exter were included. The illustrations and watercolours differ in each copy of the book not only in colour but also in sequence between the pages.

References:

Markov 1969, pp. 164-168

Compton 1978, p. 99

Munich 1991, no. 59

Bologna 1993, p. 86

Mainz 1993, p. 29

Munich 1993, p. 74

Getty 1997, no. 574

St. Petersburg, 2000, pp. 5-9

Moma 2002, no. 63

Nijmegen 2004, p. 64

Brussels 2005, no. 20