Description

This black and white, gelatin silver print features an oblique, semi-aerial view of nine crank handles arranged in two uniform rows. The levers on the handles are all set to the same position. Each handle bears an inscription in Russian, along with the stamped name and logo of the “Dynamo” factory, Moscow. On two of the handles, a wrench grips one of the bolts.

Context and Analysis

Artist Boris Ignatovich was a member of the Russian postrevolutionary avant-garde and one of the pioneers of Soviet photojournalism. He began his career as a journalist and editor, working for several prominent Soviet newspapers and satirical magazines between 1918 and 1925. By 1926, Ignatovich began a career in photography.

Ignatovich photographed power plants, factories, and new industrial projects for the newspaper Bednota and the review Dazhes between 1927 and 1930. In addition to a second career as a cameraman and documentary filmmaker (1930–32), Ignatovich worked with Aleksander Rodchenko (1891–1956), a painter, photographer and a leader of the Russian Constructivist movement, for the journal Dajosch, which provided information on industrialization and the Soviet Cultural Revolution. Ignatovich also became a founding member of the short-lived artists’ union Oktiabr. After serving as a war correspondent during World War II, Ignatovich resumed his work at the Soyuzfoto agency, where he had already developed specific rules and laws of photography, including the theory of collectivism in photojournalism. The collectivism theory gave rise to a group of photographer-comrades that became known as the “Ignatovich Brigade.”

Profoundly influenced by Rodchenko and the political interests of his journalistic experience, Ignatovich became known for gripping photographic sequences. His work often featured dramatically tilted, diagonal compositions; high or low viewpoints; fragmented inscriptions; and sharply detailed views of the iconic characteristics and changing ways of Soviet life during the postrevolutionary era.

True to this aesthetic, Tramway Handles uses scale and perspective to transform its unremarkable subject matter into a hypnotic repetition of pattern and form, and a powerful symbol of Soviet progress. Selective elimination of background or context allows the photographer to convey the magnitude of Soviet industry in the 1930s. The word “Dynamo” is the only clue to the handles’ location in a factory for precision instruments; the whole production process could not possibly fit into Ignatovich’s tightly focused frame. Ignatovich went on to create a psychologically penetrating series featuring the faces and physiques of Dynamo factory workers. Many of these works appeared in critically acclaimed exhibitions in the Soviet Union.

Connections

Ignatovich’s Constructivist aesthetic favored dramatic angles, exaggerated viewpoints, and industrial subjects. A similar aesthetic characterizes other works from the early 1900s, notably works by Margaret Bourke-White (Currier, 1985.6 ), Louis Lozowick (Currier, 1987.38.45.2), and Paul Woolf (Currier, 2011.19, 2011.20), as well as Ignatovich’s own With Board from about 1929 (Currier, 2011.17). Ignatovich’s proficiency at discovering pattern and capturing surface detail, and the emphasis he placed on rhythm and repetition, relate his photographs to those of Paul Outerbridge, Jr. (see Currier, 1984.66). Ignatovich’s work as a filmmaker and movie cameraman was important to his photographic images; this recalls the careers of Helmar Lerski and Lotte Jacobi, photographers represented in the Currier’s permanent collection. An unexpected but compelling comparison is with Claude Monet’s The Seine at Bougival of about 1869 (Currier, 1949.1), a work that attempts, like Ignatovich’s own, to convey the dynamism of modern life through a modern style.

Written by Emily M. Weeks, Ph.D.

Select Bibliography

Boris Ignatovich: Photography 1927–1963, Catalogue of Exhibition Devoted to the 100th anniversary. Exh. cat. Moscow: Art-Rodnik, 2002.

Boris Ignatowitsch: Pionier sowjetischer Photographie. Cologne: Galerie Alex Lachmann, undated (1994).

Mrázková, Daniela. “Ignatovich, Boris.” Grove Art Online, Oxford Art Online, Oxford University Press: http://www.oxfordartonline.com (accessed July 23, 2013).

Nailya Alexander Gallery. Gallery website: http://www.nailyaalexandergallery.com/node/253/artist-description (accessed July 23, 2013).

Shudakov, Grigory. Pioneers of Soviet Photography. London: Thames and Hudson, 1983.

Tupitsyn, Margarita. The Soviet Photograph, 1924–1937. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996.