The form and content of the early Soviet book: a study through the country's publishing industry institutions of the 1920s and 1930s

我的博士研究是关于苏联艺术家，包括那些来自建构主义阵营以外的人，在西方学术界通常被视为独一无二的创新者，他们是如何接近苏联早期书籍设计的主题的。我将探讨不同理论和文体背景的艺术家如何在这本早期苏联书籍的形式和内容之间的相互关系问题上做出贡献，考虑到它作为启蒙工具、煽动工具和苏联政权在海外声誉的推动者的多重功能。这项调查将通过对与中国蓬勃发展的出版业相关的主要机构的研究来进行。这些活动将包括莫斯科和彼得格勒/列宁格勒主要出版社内的编辑工作，包括国家出版社(Gosizdat)、世界文学(VSemirneia Wen Atura)和学术界；全联盟对外文化关系协会(VOKS)出版分会的国际活动；高等艺术与技术工作室(VKhuTEMAS)及其继任者VKhuTEIN在莫斯科和列宁格勒教授平面艺术和书籍设计。其中一位艺术家的作品将根据这项研究进行重新评估，其中一位艺术家是弗拉基米尔·法沃斯基(Vladimir Favorskii)，他是苏联木刻版画家、书籍艺术家和VKhUTEMAS的多学科教授，在西方学术中几乎完全被忽视，他在整个20世纪20年代与书籍相关的活动在许多方面都比人们通常认为的更接近建构主义者。

My PhD research is an inquiry into how Soviet artists, including those from outside the Constructivist camp, generally seen in Western scholarship as its exclusive innovators, have approached the topic of early Soviet book design. I will explore how the artists of varied theoretical and stylistic affiliations contributed to the issue of interrelation between form and content within the early Soviet book, in view of its multiple function as a tool of enlightenment, an instrument of agitation and a promoter of the Soviet regime's reputation abroad. The investigation will be carried out through a study of major institutions related to the country's burgeoning publishing industry. These will include the editorial processes within major publishing houses of Moscow and Petrograd/Leningrad, including The State Publishing House (Gosizdat), World Literature (Vsemirnaia literatura) and Academia; the international activity of the publishing branch of the All-Union Society for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries (VOKS); and the teaching of graphic art and book design at The Higher Art and Technical Studios (VKhuTEMAS) and its successor, VKhuTEIN, both in Moscow and Leningrad.One of the artists, whose work will be reassessed in light of this research, is Vladimir Favorskii, a Soviet wood engraver, book artist and professor of the VKhUTEMAS's polygraphic faculty, who has been almost entirely overlooked in Western scholarship, and whose book-related activity throughout the 1920s was in many ways a lot closer to that of the Constructivists, than has generally been considered.