VNIITE Experiments in Design workshops, Moscow, 1977–89

Selim O. Khan-Magomedov (1928–2011), a prominent art historian and researcher of the Soviet avant-garde, headed the theory and design history department at VNIITE from 1977 to 1989. There, he led a theory seminar on ‘artistic problems of the object and its spatial environment’, which were weekly sessions located at the intersection of art and design in contemporary practice, with participants also encouraged to rediscover the experimental ideas of the early Soviet avant-garde. In 1978, the department was joined by Alexander Lavrentiev (b. 1954), a designer and grandson of avant-garde artist Alexander Rodchenko, as well as Viacheslav Koleichuk (1941–2018), a kinetic artist and architect. Together, they established the Artistic Form-Making Group and organized a series of seven creative workshops for practicing designers entitled ‘Experiments in Design’. The workshops were held at VNIITE’s Centre for Technical Aesthetics, with the results presented at exhibitions such as ‘Materials, Technology, Structure’, ‘Visual Culture, Visual Thinking: Kinetic and Dynamic Forms in Design’, and ‘The Computer and Visual Culture in Design’.