Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge
El Lissitzky’s propaganda poster from the Civil War – politics expressed in abstract forms.
During the Russian Civil War El Lissitzky made a poster in which the red wedge, the Bolsheviks, pierces the white circle, the White forces. The message is conveyed entirely in abstract forms.
The poster shows how the Constructivists wanted to put the new art in the service of the revolution. It has influenced graphic design long afterwards.
Materials: Lithograph on paper
Manufacture: Printed in Vitebsk during the Russian Civil War.
Only geometric forms: wedge, circle and rectangles.
Red, white and black.
Text set at angles that becomes part of the composition.