Painter, sculptor, graphic artist, designer and teacher of Latvian origin. Klucis worked mainly in Russia, where he was an important exponent of Constructivism. He studied in Riga and St Petersburg but, in 1917, at the outbreak of the October Revolution, he joined the regiment of Latvian troops. He began sketching Lenin and his fellow-soldiers, showing a certain Cubist influence. In 1920-21, he began experimenting with new materials, making wooden and paper constructions that combined the geometrism of Suprematism with a Constructivist concern for the relation of volumes in space. In 1922, he gave these experiments a practical end and, in 1926, he helped organise the Soviet section at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris. During the 20s, his interest in photomontage increased and, in the 30s, he began working on graphic design and typography for some official periodicals and publications. Gustav Klucis, Design for a poster, 1929 by John E. Bowlt No doubt, Klucis also designed this poster for the cycle "The fight for the Five-Year Plan" which he started in 1929, since the theme is the drive for the greater industrial production elucidated through the comparison of statistics for 1929 and 1930 (e.g. 40.6 million tons of coal produced in 1929. 51.6 produced in 1930). Klucis often restored to this combined imagery of workers, machines, smoke and data - cf. his posters for "Let's Turn the Five-Year Plan into a Four-Year Plan" (1933)
