Year 2012 was the year of the 120th anniversary of the great avant-garde artist Alexander Rodchenko. To celebrate this event Russian Academy of Graphic Design together with Moscow biennale of Graphic Design “Golden bee” (member of Icograda) launched a commemorative action “Rodchenko 120”. This landmark undertaking was conducted in a form of poster exhibitions with an aim of exploring the influence of Russian avant-garde on the world of art.

Alexander Rodchenko was one of the most versatile Constructivist and Productivist artists to emerge after the Russian revolution. He worked as a painter and graphic designer before turning to photomontage and photography. His photography was socially engaged, formally innovative, and opposed to a painterly aesthetic. Much of the work of 20th century graphic designers is a direct result of Rodchenko’s earlier work in the field. His influence has been pervasive enough that it would be nearly impossible to single out all of the designers whose work he has influenced. For artists of the Russian revolution, Rodchenko’s radical action was full of utopian possibility. It marked the end of easel painting – perhaps even the end of art – along with the end of bourgeois norms and practices. It cleared the way for the beginning of a new Russian life, a new mode of production, a new culture.