"In Shturem fun Geshikhte", by David Koigen – Berlin, 1923 – Cover Design by Joseph Tchaikov

"In Shturem fun Geshikhte", by David Koigen – Berlin, 1923 – Cover Design by Joseph Tchaikov

In shturem fun geshikhte, aroysgerisene bletlakh fun tog-bukh, 1914-1921 [In the whirlwind of history, pages wrested from a diary, 1914-1921], by David Koigen. Translated from German: Z. Kalmanovitsh [Zelig Kalmanovičs]. Berlin: Idisher literarisher farlag, 1923. Yiddish. Cover design by Joseph Tchaikov.
Excerpts from the diary of David Koigen, documenting, firsthand, the events that took place in Eastern Europe during the years 1914-1921: the outbreak of World War I, the October Revolution and the Russian Civil War, the pogroms against the Jews of Ukraine and the author's escape from USSR after the conquest of Ukraine. Front cover illustration by Joseph Tchaikov.
David Koigen (1879-1933), a philosopher and sociologist, was born to a Jewish-Hassidic family in the Volhynian Governorate (today in Ukraine). In 1896, he left home to study in several European cities – Paris, Bern, Zurich and Munich, finally settling in Berlin. During this period, he wrote his most important works. In 1912, he returned to Russia and started teaching at the St. Petersburg University. After the collapse of the Tsarist rule he founded an institute for study of the Russian revolution. In 1918 he decided to leave Russia and immigrated to Kiev and in 1921, after the city fell to the Red Army, he fled the USSR and returned to Berlin, where he died.
This is the first edition of the composition, which was published approximately two years before the German original.
247, [1] pp, approx. 18.5 cm. Good condition. Minor stains and a few tears. Stamps on the first pages and on the last one. The last gathering is loose. Hard cover, with the original paper cover laid down. Minor blemishes to cover edges.

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Joseph Moisevich Tchaikov (1888-1979; also spelled Chaikov) – a Jewish sculptor, graphic designer, painter and theoretician, born in Kiev.

Tchaikov studied in Paris during the years 1910-1914 and participated in the Parisian Salon d'Automne exhibition in 1913. After World War I, he was one of the founders of Kultur Lige in Kiev, taught sculpture and illustrated books – mostly children's books – and in the years after the revolution, also designed propaganda banners and posters. In 1921, the Melukhe-farlag publishing house in Kiev published his treatise "Sculpture" (see item 224), which is considered the first Yiddish book on sculpture and focuses on avant-garde in sculpture and the place of sculpture in Jewish art. During the years 1923-1930 he taught cubist sculpture inspired by Russian futurism in Moscow, at the Vkhutemas – Higher Art and Technical Studios (alongside Alexander Rodchenko and El Lissitzky) and was also appointed the head of the union of Russian sculptors.

During the next decades, Tchaikov continued to work in a variety of artistic styles and media, moving away from the style that characterized his early work. The booklets and books featured in this catalog, published between 1919 and 1923, all represent his part in Constructivism and the Russian avant-garde movement and document his early works of art as a cubo-futurist artist and sculptor. Tchaikov's illustrations and cover designs are influenced by the spirit of the times and historical events – the pogroms, wars and revolution (see, for example, items 227, 229, 231, 232); yet also show the spirit of innovation and hope. See for example, the figure depicted on the cover of the journal "Baginen" (Yiddish: "dawn", "awakening" or "beginning" – see item 225) which is blowing the Shofar on the backdrop of the rising sun, its body upright, muscular, pointing to the east and its face divided, combining old and new.