El Lissitzky (1890–1941)

El Lissitzky was born Lasar Markowitsch Lissitzky to a Jewish family in Pochinok, Russia. During his childhood, he lived and studied in Vitebsk (present-day Vitsyebsk, Belarus). At age 13, he began studying at the art school of Yehuda Pen, and by age 15 was teaching students himself. Unable to attend university in Russia because he was Jewish, he left for Germany, where he studied in the architecture department at the Technische Hochschule in Darmstadt from 1909 to 1914. During this period he also traveled to France, Italy, and Belgium. When World War I broke out, he went back to Russia. From 1915 to 1916, he studied at the Riga Technical Institute, which had been evacuated to Moscow, and earned a degree in engineering and architecture. He became an architect, artist, designer, book illustrator, photographer, typographer, and writer. Lissitzky was an important figure of the Russian avant-garde, helping to develop Suprematism with his mentor Kazimir Malevich, and designing numerous exhibition displays and propaganda works for the USSR. His work greatly influenced the Bauhaus and the Constructivist movement, which sought to use abstract art to express progressive social values. With his travels in Europe from 1921 to 1925, and contact with other artists, Lissitzky became a transformational figure, advancing the exchange of forms and ideas. He experimented with production techniques and stylistic devices that would go on to dominate 20th-century graphic design.