In the Eye of the Storm

Konstantin Akinsha is an independent art historian, curator and journalist. He received the George Polk award for cultural reporting in 1991. Akinsha's curatorial projects include 'Russian Modernism: Cross-Currents of German and Russian Art, 1907–1917' (Neue Galerie, New York, 2015), 'Permanent Revolution: Ukrainian Art Today' (Ludwig Museum, Budapest, 2018) and 'Between Fire and Fire: Ukrainian Art Now' (Semperdepot, Akademie der bildenden Künste, Vienna, 2019). He is the founding director of the Avant-Garde Art Research Project (UK) and the author of several books, including Beautiful Loot: The Soviet Plunder of Europe's Art Treasures (1995). Katia Denysova is a PhD candidate at the Courtauld Institute of Art, London. Her research investigates the influence of socio-political factors on early 20th-century art in Ukraine. She has contributed to the H-SHERA, ArtHist and Dash Arts podcast series, and the journals Arts, Art and the Public Sphere and immediations. Olena Kashuba-Volvach heads the Department of 19th and early 20th-Century Art at the National Art Museum of Ukraine (NAMU). She holds a PhD in art history from the Institute of Art Studies, Folklore and Ethnology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and was the senior research fellow at the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine. She is the author of numerous articles and has published several books, including Oleksandr Bohomazov: A Self-Portrait (2012), The Ukrainian Academy of Art: A Brief History (2015) and Art Pages of the New Generation, 1927–1930 (2016). In 2019–20, Kashuba-Volvach curated the multi-venue exhibition Oleksandr Bohomazov: The Artistic Laboratory.

• ForewordFrancesca Thyssen-BornemiszaAcknowledgmentsIntroductionKonstantin AkinshaI. KyivFrom Kyiv to Paris: The Cosmopolitanism of Alexandra ExterKatia DenysovaThe Beginning: The First Avant-Garde Exhibitions in UkraineOlena Kashuba-VolvachThe Art Section of the Kultur Lige: Yiddish Avant-Garde Art in Kyiv (1918–1922)Hillel KazovskyOleksandr Bohomazov: The Ukrainian Version of FuturismOlena Kashuba-VolvachBoichukismMyroslava M. MudrakBauhaus on the Banks of the DniproOlena Kashuba-VolvachII: KharkivThe Tragic Sensuality of the Kharkiv Avant-GardeTetiana ZhmurkoConstructor Vasyl Yermilov: A Captive of the Material WorldKonstantin AkinshaVisual and Spatial Experiments in Ukrainian Scenography of the 1920sOlena KovalchukIvan Kavaleridze: Searching for the Hero of the New AgeOksana BarshynovaNova heneratsiia (1927–1930)Myroslava M. MudrakIII. OdesaThe Odesa Society of Independent ArtistsOlha BarkovskaFrom Symbolism to Avant-Garde: The Emancipation of Ukrainian Cinema in the 1920sIvan KozlenkoIV. AftermathIn the Shadow of Russia: Ukrainian Art at the XVI Venice Biennale of 1928Olena Kashuba-Volvach & Maryna DrobotiukThe Émigrés from Ukraine: Archipenko, Delaunay and Baranoff-RossinéKatia DenysovaFrom Oblivion to Glory: Spetsfond or The Special Secret HoldingYuliia LytvynetsPlatesAuthors’ BiographiesPicture CreditsIndex

'Generously illustrated... An introduction to an influential period and a diverse group of artists whose works continue to be uncovered, and whose history reverberates today' - Library Journal