Artist · 5 prints
Vladimir Mayakovsky Prints
About Vladimir Mayakovsky
Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893–1930) was a Russian poet, playwright and artist, born in Bagdadi, Georgia, then part of the Russian Empire, and died in Moscow. After his father's death in 1906 the family moved to Moscow, where he studied art, including painting classes at the Stroganov School. He became the loudest voice of Russian Futurism, a movement that wanted to tear up old art and start again, and co-signed its 1912 manifesto, A Slap in the Face of Public Taste.
Vladimir Mayakovsky welcomed the 1917 Revolution and put his art to work for it. From late 1919 to early 1922 he wrote and drew for the ROSTA Windows, posters made by the Russian Telegraph Agency and hung in shop windows. They were often painted by hand with cardboard stencils, pairing bold, simple cartoons with his punchy verses. He also wrote long poems such as A Cloud in Trousers (1915) and plays such as The Bedbug (1929). His ROSTA posters are a lasting record of how art and propaganda met in the early Soviet years.
Vladimir Mayakovsky prints: reproductions of the Russian and early Soviet propaganda posters Vladimir Mayakovsky drew between 1914 and 1921. The collection includes To the Polish Front, Under the Rifle! At Once! (1920), The elephant and the pug (1920), The Cry of Ukrainians and Russians Is One (1920), Every absence from work is a joy to the enemy (1921), and a First World War poster mocking Austrian troops in the Carpathians (1914).
This selection centres on his ROSTA-period work: flat, cartoon-like figures in a few strong colours, paired with short rhyming slogans in Russian. The subjects are the Polish–Soviet war, work discipline and class struggle, treated with humour as often as with anger.
The bold colour and graphic shapes suit a study, office, kitchen or entryway, and the posters hang well in groups on a gallery wall. All prints are museum-quality reproductions, available unframed or framed with acrylic glazing, with free shipping and import duties covered.
