Exhibitions: Alexander Alexeev’s book illustrations displayed in Moscow

The exhibition of Alexander Alexeev’s book illustrations (1901-1982) from the collection of Boris Friedman opened on August 26, 2011 at the State Literary Museum in Moscow.

The exhibition opens up a unique opportunity to get acquainted to the works of this artist, which so far have been little-studied in Russia. Graphic artist, book illustrator, author of animated films, produced following a pinscreen animation technology, Alexeev turned to various techniques, brought them to perfection and experimented with them.

Alexeev admitted that his work as a stage designer contributed to his liking for graphics, printmaking, what urged him toward book illustration, and then brought him into film industry. By himself Alexeev mastered techniques of etching and starting from 1925 with support of surrealist-writer Philippe Soupault and publisher Jacques Schiffrin he started to receive orders for book illustration. In all over 50 editions featuring Alexeev’s illustrations had come out in France. 30 of them were made between 1920 and 1950. While working on these books Alexeev turned to various printmaking techniques – woodcut (xylography), aquatint, etching, and lithography.

After the arrival of his first animated film based on the pinscreen technology, Alexeev used this method for creating series of illustrations for Boris Pasternak’s “Doctor Zhivago” (1959) and Feodor Dostoevsky’s “The Gambler” (1967).