Annenkov, Yuri (1889-1974) - 1910 Self-Portrait (State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia)

            Russian painter, draughtsman and stage designer. He studied at the University of St Petersburg (later Petrograd) in 1908 and in the private studio of Savely Zeidenberg (1862–1924). In 1909–10 he attended the studio of Yan Tsyonglinsky (1850–1914) in St Petersburg, where he became acquainted with the avant-garde artists Yelena Guro (1877–1913), Mikhail Matyushin and Matvey Vol’demar (1878–1914). In 1911–12 he worked in the studios of Maurice Denis and Félix Vallotton in Paris, then in Switzerland (1913) before returning to St Petersburg. As a painter he was a modernist, and his work developed rapidly towards abstraction, although he did not adhere to any particular branch of it. His works of the time use various devices of stylization and decorativeness, and some of them echo the free associations of Marc Chagall, but fundamentally they remain geometrically based compositions. In 1919–20 he made a series of abstract sculptural assemblages and a great number of abstract collages.

Annenkov became popular as an illustrator, producing elegant drawings for a number of magazines in Petrograd in 1913–17, including Satirikon, Argus, Lukomor’ye and Solntse Rossii. He designed and illustrated many books for Moscow and Petrograd publishing houses in the 1910s and 1920s. In the early 1920s he designed a great number of book covers in the Constructivist style. He illustrated children’s books, especially for the private publishing house Raduga in Petrograd. But his most important illustrations were those for Aleksandr Blok’s revolutionary poem Dvenadtsat’ (‘The Twelve’; St Petersburg, 1918), which were successful improvisations on the poem’s themes, combining stylization and emotion. He also drew and painted a great number of portraits, especially of cultural and political figures. His monumental Portrait of the Red Army Leader L. Trotsky (1923; Moscow, Cent. Mus. Revolution), which has an urban background in Constructivist style, was particularly successful.

From 1913 Annenkov worked as a stage designer. He worked for the Krivoye Zerkalo (Distorting Mirror) Theatre in Petrograd (1914–15) and for the Komissarzhevsky Theatre in Moscow (1914–18). He then worked for a number of theatres in Petrograd, sometimes as designer and producer. He collaborated with Vsevolod Meyerkhold (e.g. Lev Tolstoy’s Pervyy vinokur, ‘First distiller’, Hermitage Theatre, Petrograd, 1919) and with Nikolay Yeureinov. Annenkov’s designs for Bunt mashin (‘Revolt of the machines’, Georg Kaiser adapted by Aleksey Tolstoy, Bol’shoy Dramatic Theatre, Petrograd, 1924) used a Constructivist-inspired mechanized set. Annenkov also designed a number of celebrations and pageants commemorating the Revolution of 1917, including the ambitious re-enactment of the storming of the Winter Palace, which took place in Uritsky (now Dvortsovaya) Square in Petrograd on 7 November 1920 and involved monumental scenery and c. 7000 performers. In 1922–4 he led the revival of the activities of the World of art group and in 1924 worked towards the establishment of the Society of easel painters. The same year he settled in Paris, where he aligned himself with the Ecole de Paris. He continued to design books, stage and film sets in France and Germany, and he exhibited at many joint Russian and French exhibitions. He also became active as an exhibition organizer himself, especially for the USA.

V. Rakitin From Grove Art Online
© 2009 Oxford University Press

Taken on: April 17, 2012

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