Tarkhanov, Mikhail Paste paper.

N.p., ca 1933. 
25,1x33,5 cm. 

Light wear, creased. 

Extremely rare Russian abstract handmade paste paper from the 1930s.

Russian artist Mikhail Tarkhanov (1888-1962), a master of endpapers and bookbinding, created this unique piece using a special technique of surface painting onto paper with a paste mixture. Paste papers, the oldest decorated papers used by bookbinders, are practically unknown in Russia.
Mikhail Tarkhanov studied at the Stroganov School for Technical Drawing (which later became VKhUTEMAS) under the tutelage of Vladimir Favorsky and Wassily Kandinsky. Abstract art was banned in the USSR from the beginning of the 1930s onwards. However, Tarkhanov continued to produce official works alongside his abstract compositions. At times, book design served as the sole avenue for creating in an avant-garde style, akin to how writers turned to translation as a means of literary expression in the USSR.
Some of Tarkhanov's works are housed in the Getty Center.
This endpaper comes from Tarkhanov's private collection.