Cercle et Carré

Revue "Cercle et Carré"
title lettering (1930)

"Cercle et Carré" ( Eng .: Circle and square ) was a cosmopolitan artists' association founded in Paris in 1929 , which only existed for one year, but organized an exhibition worth mentioning. The founders were the draftsman, poet and art critic Michel Seuphor and the painter Joaquín Torres García ., Who , in response to the constant presence of Surrealism , decided to unite artists with a constructivist tendency.

Cercle et Carré promoted the new developments and works in the field of abstract art . During its short existence, the group published three issues of the art magazine of the same name.

The group's only exhibition organized by Seuphor took place in April 1930 at “Galerie 23” on Rue La Boétie in Paris . The logo and the exhibition poster were designed by Pierre Daura . A total of 46 artists took part. On the day of the vernissage, Michel Seuphor recited poems, hiding his face behind a mask by the sculptor German Cueto. Luigi Russolo played on one of the instruments he developed, the so-called Russolophe . The exhibition is considered the first international group exhibition for abstract art.

The group, whose magazine aroused neither public nor criticism and whose exhibition had received little attention, disbanded in the summer of 1930. Reasons for this were, in addition to the differences of opinion between Piet Mondrian and Theo van Doesburg - which prompted van Doesburg to publish the revue " Art concret " (1930) together with Jean Hélion - especially those on the initiative of Vantongerloos in the absence of the sick Seuphor on 15 February 1931 the new Paris group " Abstraction-Création " was founded. Most of the members of the group "Cercle et Carré" took over the group, as well as the ideas that had already been developed, and implemented them with increasing success and influence until it was dissolved in 1937.

Members

Members of the group and participants in the 1930 exhibition included (in chronological order of their years of birth):

Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944), Russian painter Piet Mondrian (1872–1944), Dutch painter Joaquín Torres García (1874–1949), Uruguayan painter Julio González (1876–1942), Spanish sculptor Fernand Léger (1881–1955), French painter Walter Gropius (1883–1969), German architect Luigi Russolo (1885–1947), Italian painter and composer Antoine Pevsner (1884–1962), Russian painter and sculptor Georges Vantongerloo (1886–1965), Belgian painter, sculptor and architect Hans Arp (1886–1966), Alsatian painter and sculptor

Kurt Schwitters (1887–1948), German artist Le Corbusier (1887–1965), Swiss painter and architect Willi Baumeister (1889–1955), German painter and set designer Sophie Taeuber-Arp (1889–1943), Swiss painter and sculptor Enrico Prampolini (1894–1956), Italian painter Marcelle Cahn (1895–1981), French painter Pierre Daura (1896–1976), Catalan painter Jean Gorin (1899–1981), French painter Alberto Sartoris (1901–1998), Italian architect Michel Seuphor (1901–1999), Belgian draftsman, poet and art critic

literature

• Cercle et carré , numbers 1 to 3, Michel Seuphor, 1930, ISBN 2-85893-224-7

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Cercle et Carré in The large art dictionary by PW Hartmann , accessed on August 13, 2007.
2. ↑ ^{a b} Cf. Jean-Louis Ferrier (ed.): L'aventure de l'art au XXe siècle , Hachette, Paris 1991, p. 297
3. ^ Cercle et Carré (Circle and Square) ( Memento of September 4, 2004 in the Internet Archive ) (English) at Tate Online , accessed on September 22, 2012.
4. ^ Briony Fer: On Abstract Art , Yale University Press 2000, p. 57.
5. ^ Cercle et Carré , table of contents of the magazine, issues 1/1930 to 3/1930, at revues-litteraires.com
6. ↑ Cercle et Carré ( Memento of the original from March 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (French) from Maison des Artes , accessed August 13, 2007.