Malevich
Suprematism
"Suprematism" is the second of the two essays which together comprise The
Non-Objective World, Malevich's major treatise published in Germany in
1927.
By 1912, Kasimir Malevich (1878-1935) had absorbed the impulses emanating
from western Europe and was already an artist of distinction. In
December 1915, at the "0.10" exhibition in Moscow, he launched
Suprematism, his new visual language of flat geometric forms. After the
October Revolution he was a leading force among Russian artists devoted to
complete abstraction: Tatlin, Lissitzky, Rodchenko, Popova, Gabo, and
others. !}. charismatic teacher in Moscow and Vitebsk, where Lissitzky
became a disciple, he had a major role until the mid-1920s, when abstract art
came under increasing conservative pressures. Other artists emigrated
(Kandinsky, Gabo, Chagall, Exter) but Malevich remained in Russia, without
making a pact with the antirevolutionary esthetic of the post-Lenin Party. He
seems to have continued his art in isolation until his death in 1935, with the
notable exception of the trip to Germany in 1927.
Malevich came to Berlin in 1927 for an exhibition of his paintings at the
Grosse Berliner Kunstausstellung. He brought with him the manuscript of his
The Non-Objective World, which was translated into German by A. von
Riesen and published by Albert Langen, Munich, as volume eleven of the
Bauhaus books. Die Gegenstandslose Welt was presumably written over n
span of years. It speaks with Malevich's own voice, and yet suits the orienta·
tion of the de Stijl, Purist, and other movements of the 1920s which shared
a faith in the world of modern technology in opposition to Dada and
Surrealism.
I have included the second part of the treatise (the first is called
"Introduction to the Theory of the Additional Element in Painting") because
it is the clearest exposition of his ideas. The first part is actually an applica·
tion of the principles enunciated in the second, and though ideally both
should be read together, it was essential, for this anthology, to find the text
that most completely exposed Malevich's esthetic principles.
The entire text was translated by Howard Dearstyne from the German (the
Russian manuscript has not been uncovered) and, accompanied by many
illustrations and an introduction by L. Hilbersheimer, was published by Paul
Theobald and Company, Chicago, in 1959. I am grateful to Paul Theobald
and Company for authorizing me to reproduce "Suprematism."
116
Suprematism
Under Suprematism I understand the supremacy of pure feeling in creative
art.
quite apart from the environment in which it is called forth.
The so-called "materialization" of a feeling in the conscious mind
really means a materialization of the refl,ection of that feeling through
the medium of some realistic conception.Such a realistic conception
is without value in suprematist art....And not only in suprematist
art but in art generally, because the enduring, true value of a work of
art (to whatever school it may belong) resides solely in the feeling
expressed.
Academic naturalism, the naturalism of the Impressionists,
Cezanneism, Cubism, etc.-all these, in a way, are nothing more than
dialectic methods which, as such, in no sense deter-mine the true value
of an art work.
An objective representation, having is someHence,
to the Suprematist, the appropriate means of representation
is always the one which gives fullest possible expression to feeling as
such and which ignores the familiar appearance of objects.
Objectivity, in itself, is meaningless to him; the concepts of the conscious
mind are worthless.
Feeling is the determining factor . . .
It reaches a "desert" in which nothing can be perceived but feeling.
Everything which determined the objective-ideal structure of life
and of "art"-ideas, concepts, and images-all this the artist has cast
aside in order to heed pure feeling.
The art of the past which stood, at least ostensibly, in the service of
religion and the state, will take on new life in the pure (unapplied)
art of Suprematism, which will build up a new world-the world of
feeling....
When, in the year 1913, in my desperate attempt to free art from
the ballast of objectivity, I took refuge in the square form and exhibited
a picture which consisted of nothing more than a black square on
117
To the Suprematist the visual phenomena of the objective world are,
in themselves, meaningless;; the significant thing is feeliag, as such,
objectivity as its aim:,
1 hing which, as such, has nothing to do with art, and yet the use of
objective forms in an art work does not preclude the possibility of its
Iicing•ot�high artistic value.
and thus art arrives at nonobjective
representation-at Suprematism.
118 Modern Artists on Art
a white field, the critics and, along with them, the public sighed,
"Everything which we loved is lost. We are in a desert. . . . Before us
is nothing but a black square on a white background!"
"Withering" words were sought to drive off the symbol of the
"desert" so that one might behold on the "dead square" the beloved
likeness of "reality" ("true objectivity" and a spiritual feeling).
The square seemed incomprehensible and dangerous to the critics
and the public . . . and this, of course, was to be expected.
The ascent to the heights of nonobjective art is arduous and painful
. . . but it is nevertheless rewarding. The familiar recedes ever further
and further. into the background. . . . The contours of the objective
world fade more and more and so it goes, step by step, until finally
the world-"everything we loved and by which we have lived" becomes
lost to sight.
No more "likeness of reality," no idealistic images-nothing but a
desert!
But this desert is filled with the spirit of nonobjective sensation
which pervades everything.
Even I was gripped by a kind of timidity bordering on fear when it
came to leaving "the world of will and idea," in which I had lived and
worked and in the reality of which I had believed.
But a blissful sense of liberating nonobjectivity drew me forth into
the "desert," where nothing is real except feeling . . . and so feeling
became the substance of my life.
This was no "empty square" which I had exhibited but rather the
feeling of nonobjectivity.
I realized that the "thing" and the "concept" were substituted for
feeling and understood the falsity of the world of will and idea.
Is a milk bottle, then, the symbol of milk?
Suprematism is the rediscovery of pure art which, in the course of
time, had become obscured by the accumulation of "things."
It appears to me that, for the critics and the public, the painting of
Raphael, Rubens, Rembrandt, etc., has become nothing more than a
conglomeration of countless "things," which conceal its true valuethe
feeling which gave rise to it.The virtuosity of the objective representation
is the only thing admired.
If it were possible to extract from the works of the great masters the
feeling expressed in them-the actual artistic value, that is-and to
hide this away, the public, along with the critics and the art scholars,
would never even miss it.
So it is not at all strange that my square seemed empty to the public.
If one insists on judging an art work on the basis of the virtuosity
of the objective representation-the verisimilitude of the illusionand
thinks he sees in the objective representation itself a symbol of the
inducing emotion, he will never partake of the gladdening content of
a work of art.
Malevich 119
The general public is still convinced today that art is bound to perish
if it gives up the imitation of "dearly-loved reality" and so it
observes with dismay how the hated element of pure feeling-abstraction-makes
more and more headway....
Art no longer cares to serve the state and religion, it no longer
wishes to illustrate the history of manners, it wants to have nothing
further to do with the object, as such, and believes that it can exist, in
and for itself, without "things" (that is, the "time-tested wellspring of
life").
But the nature and meaning of artistic creation continue to be misunderstood,
as does the nature of creative work in general, because
feeling, after all, is always and everywhere the one and only source of
every creation.
The emotions which are kindled in the human being are stronger
than the human being himself ...they must at all costs find an outlet-they
must take on overt form-they must be communicated or
put to work.
It was nothing other than a yearning for speed ...for flight ...
which, seeking an outward shape, brought about the birth of the airplane.For
the airplane was not contrived in order to carry business
letters from Berlin to Moscow, but in obedience to the irresistible
drive of this yearning for speed to take on external form.
The "hungry stomach" and the intellect which serves this must
�lways have the last word, of course, when it comes to determining the
origin and purpose of existing values ...but that is a subject in itself.
And the state of affairs is exactly the same in art as in creative technology....In
painting (I mean here, naturally, the accepted "artistic"
painting) one can discover behind a technically correct portrait of Mr.
Miller or an ingenious representation of the flower girl at Potsdamer
Platz not a trace of the true essence of art-no evidence whatever of
feeling.Painting is the dictatorship of a method of representation, the
purpose of which is to depict Mr. Miller, his environment and his
ideas.
The black square on the white field was the first form in which
nonobjective feeling came to be expressed.The square =feeling, the
white field =the void beyond this feeling.
Yet the general public saw in the nonobjectivity of the representation
the demise of art and failed to grasp the evident fact that feeling
had here assumed external form.
The suprematist square and the forms proceeding out of it can be
likened to the primitive marks (symbols) of aboriginal man which represented,
in their combinations, not ornament but a feeling of rhythm.
Suprematism did not bring into being a new world of feeling but
rather, an altogether new and direct form of representation of the
world of feeling.
120 Modern Artists on Art
The square changes and creates new forms, the elements of which
can be classified in one way or another depending upon the feeling
which gave rise to them.
hen we examine an antique column, we are no longer interested
in the fitness of its construction to perform its technical task in the
building but recognize in it the material expression of a pure feeling.
We no longer see in it a structural necessity but view it as a work of
art in its own right.
"Practical life," like a homeless vagabond, forces its way into every
artistic form and believes itself to be the genesis and reason for existence
of this form. But the vagabond doesn't tarry long in one place
and once he is gone (when to make an art work serve "practical purposes"
no longer seems practical) the work recovers its full value.
Antique works of art are kept in museums and carefully guarded,
not to preserve them for practical use but in order that their eternal
artistry may be enjoyed.
difference between the new, nonobjective ("useless") art and
the art of the past lies in the fact that the full artistic value of the latter
comes to light (becomes recognized) only after life, in search of
some new expedient, has forsaken it, whereas the unapplied artistic
element of the new art outstrips life and shuts the door on "practical
utility."
An antique temple is not beautiful because it once served as the
haven of a certain social order or of the religion associated with this,
but rather because its form sprang from a pure feeling for plastic relationships.
The artistic feeling which was given material expression in
the building of the temple is for us eternally valid and vital but as for
the social order which once encompassed it-this is dead.
Life and its manifestations have hitherto been considered from two
different standpoints-the material and the religious. It would seem
that a consideration of life from the standpoint of art ought to become
a third and equally valid point of view. But in practice, art (as a second-rate
power) is relegated to the service of those who view the
world and life from one or the other of the first two standpoints.This
state of affairs is curiously inconsistent with the fact that art always
and under all circumstances plays the decisive role in the creative life
and that art values alone are absolute and endure forever. With the
most primitive of means (charcoal, hog bristles, modeling sticks,
catgut, and steel strings) the artist creates something which the most
ingenious and efficient technology will never be able to create.
The adherents of "utility" think they have the right to regard art as
the apotheosis of life (the utilitarian life, that is).
And so there the new nonobjective art stands-the expression o�
pure feeling, seeking no practical values, no ideas, no "promised
land."
w
The
Malevich 121
In the midst of this apotheosis stands "Mr. Miller"-or rather, the
portrait of Mr.Miller (that is, a copy of a "copy" of life).
The mask of life hides the true countenance of art. Art is not to us
what it could be.
And moreover, the efficiently mechanized world could truly serve a
purpose if only it would see to it that we (every one of us) gained the
�reatest possible amount of "free time" to enable us to meet the only
obligation to nature which mankind has taken upon itself-namely to
neate art.
Those who promote the construction of useful things, things which
serve a purpose, and who combat art or seek to enslave it, should bear
in mind the fact that there is no such thing as a constructed object
which is useful.Has the experience of centuries not demonstrated that
Every object which we see in the museums clearly supports the fact
that not one single, solitary thing is really useful, that is, convenient,
And if it once seemed usefuI
this is only because nothing more useful was then known. . . .
Do we have the slightest reason to assume that the things which
appear useful and convenient to us today will not be obsolete tomorrow
. . . ? And shouldn't it give us pause
The Suprematists have deliberately given up objective representa-
1·ion of their surroundings in order to reach the summit of the true
"unmasked" art and from this vantage point to view life through the
prism of pure artistic feeling.
Nothing in the objective world is as "secure and unshakeable" as it
appears to our conscious minds. We should accept nothing as predetermined-as
constituted for eternity. Every "firmly established,"
familiar thing can be shifted about and brought under a new and, primarily,
unfamiliar order. Why then should it not be possible to bring
about an artistic order?
The various complementary and conflicting feelings-or rather,
images and ideas-which, as reflections of these feelings, take shape
in our imaginations, struggle incessantly with each other: the awareness
of God against that of the Devil; the sensation of hunger versus
a feeling for the beautiful.
The awareness of God strives to vanquish the awareness of the
I )evil-and the flesh at the same time. It tries to "make credible" the
l'vanescence of earthly goods and the everlasting glory of God.
And art, too, is condemned, except when it serves the worship of
( ;od-the Church. . . .
-Out of the awareness of God arose religion-and out of religion
the Church.
"useful" things don't long remain useful?
lor otherwise it would not be in a museum!
that the oldest works of art
arc as impressive today in their beauty and spontaneity as they were
111any thousands of years ago?
122 Modern Artists on Art
-Out of the sensation of hunger developed concepts of utilityand
out of these concepts trade and industry.
Both the Church and industry tried to monopolize those artistic
abilities which, being creative, are constantly finding expression,
in order to provide effective bait for their products (for the idealmaterial
as well as for the purely material). In this way, as the saying
goes, "the pill of utility is sugar-coated."
The aggregated reflections of feelings in the individual's consciousness-feelings
of the most varied kinds-determine his "view of life."
Since the feelings affecting him change, the most remarkable alterations
in this "view of life" can be observed; the atheist becomes
pious, the God-fearing, godless, etc. . . . The human being can be
likened, in a way, to a radio receiver which picks up and converts a
whole series of different waves of feeling, the sum-total of which
determines the above-mentioned view of life.
Judgments concerning the values of life therefore fluctuate widely.
Only art values defy the shifting drift of opinion, so that, for example,
pictures of God or the saints, insofar as the artistic feeling incorporated
in them is apparent, can be placed by atheists in their collections
without compunction (and, in fact, actually are collected by them).
Thus do we have, again and again, the opportunity of convincing ourselves
that the guidance of our conscious minds-"creation" with a
purpose-always calls into being relative values (which is to say, valueless
"values") and that nothing but the expression of the pure feeling
of the subconscious or superconscious (nothing, that is, other than
artistic creation) can give tangible form to absolute values.Actual utility
(in the higher sense of the term) could therefore be achieved only
if the subconscious or superconscious were accorded the privilege of
directing creation.
Our life is a theater piece, in which nonobjective feeling is portrayed
by objective imagery.
A bishop is nothing but an actor who seeks with words and gestures,
on an appropriately "dressed" stage, to convey a religious feeling,
or rather the reflection of a feeling in religious form. The office
clerk, the blacksmith, the soldier, the accountant, the general ...these
are all characters out of one stage play or another, portrayed by various
people, who become so carried away that they confuse the play
and their parts in it with life itself. We almost never get to see the
actual human face and if we ask someone who he is, he answers, "an
engineer," "a farmer," etc., or, in other words, he gives the title of the
role played by him in one or another affective drama.
The title of the role is also set down next to his full name, and cer·
tified in his passport, thus removing any doubt concerning the sur·
prising fact that the owner of the passport is the engineer Ivan and not
the painter Kasimir.
In the last analysis, what each individual knows about himself is
Malevich 123
precious little, because the "actual human face" cannot be discerned
hehind the mask, which is mistaken for the "actual face."
The philosophy of Suprematism has every reason to view both the
mask and the "actual face" with skepticism, since it disputes the reality
of human faces (human forms) altogether.
Artists have always been partial to the use of the human face in
their representations, for they have seen in it (the versatile, mobile,
expressive mimic) the best vehicle with which to convey their feelings.
The Suprematists have nevertheless abandoned the representation of
the human face (and of natural objects in general) and have found
new symbols with which to render direct feelings (rather than externalized
reflections of feelings), for the Suprematist does not observe
and does not touch-he feels.
We have seen how art, at the turn of the century, divested itself of
the ballast of religious and political ideas which had been imposed
upon it and came into its own-attained, that is, the form suited to its
intrinsic nature and became, along with the two already mentioned, a
third independent and equ�lly valid "point of view." The public is
still, indeed, as much convinced as ever that the artist creates superfluous,
impractical things. It never considers that these superfluous
things endure and retain their vitality for thousands of years, whereas
necessary, practical things survive only briefly.
It does not dawn on the public that it fails to recognize the real, true
value of things.This is also the reason for the chronic failure of everything
utilitarian. A true, absolute order in human society could only
he achieved if mankind were willing to base this order on lasting
values. Obviously, then, the artistic factor would have to be accepted
in every respect as the decisive one. As long as this is not the case,
the uncertainty of a "provisional order" will obtain, instead of
the longed-for tranquillity of an absolute order, because the provisional
order is gauged by current utilitarian understanding and this
measuring-stick is variable in the highest degree.
In the light of this, all art works which, at present, are a part of
"practical life" or to which practical life has laid claim, are in some
sense devaluated. Only when they are freed from the encumbrance of
practical utility (that is, when they are placed in museums) will their
truly artistic, absolute value be recognized.
The sensations of sitting, standing, or running are, first and foremost,
plastic sensations and they are responsible for the development
of corresponding "objects of use" and largely determine their form.
A chair, bed, and table are not matters of utility but rather, the
forms taken by plastic sensations, so the generally held view that all
objects of daily use result from practical considerations is based upon
false premises.
124 Modern Artists on Art
We have ample opportunity to become convinced that we are nevor
in a position for recognizing any real utility in things and that we sl1111l
never succeed in constructing a really practical object. We can evl·
dently only feel the essence of absolute utility but, since a feeling 11
always nonobjective, any attempt to grasp the utility of the objectlvt
is Utopian.The endeavor to confine feeling within concepts of th•
conscious mind or, indeed, to replace it with conscious concepts 1111d
to give it concrete, utilitarian form, has resulted in the development ur
all those useless, "practical things" which become ridiculous in 1111
time at all.
It cannot be stressed too often that
The new art of Suprematism, which has produced new forms 1rnJ
form relationships by giving external expression to pictorial feellr1M1
will become a new architecture: it will transfer these forms from tl1t
surface of canvas to space.
The suprematist element, whether in painting or in architecture, 11
Every social idea, however great and important it may be, st111111
from the sensation of hunger; every art work, regardless of how 111n•ll
and insignificant it may seem, originates in pictorial or plastic fec:lln•,
It is high time for us to realize that the problems of art lie far L\l,itrl
from those of the stomach or the intellect.
Now that art, thanks to Suprematism, has come into its own-rh1U
is, attained its pure, unapplied form-and has recognized the inf111ll·
bility of nonobjective feeling, it is attempting to set up a gemrlnt
world order, a new philosophy of life.It recognizes the nonobjectlvltr
of the world and is no longer concerned with providing illustrntfo111
of the history of manners.
Nonobjective feeling has, in fact, always been the only ponlMt
source of art, so that in this respect Suprematism is contributing nuth·
ing new but nevertheless the art of the past, because of its use of objw•
tive subject matter, harbored unintentionally a whole series of feell11..
which were alien to it.
But a tree remains a tree even when an owl builds a nest in 11 lml
low of it.
Suprematism has opened up new possibilities to creative art, 11lrt�f
by virtue of the abandonment of so-called "practical considerat/111111"
a plastic feeling rendered on canvas can -be carried over intu 1/11ll'f,
The artist (the painter) is no longer bound to the canvas (the 11lctl1Pf
plane) and can transfer his.compositions from canvas to space,
free of every tendency which is social or otherwise materialistit;.
absolute, true values arisl� 111Jl1
from artistic, subconscious, or superconscious creation.