Editing Abstract art (section)

==== Russian avant-garde ====
{{Main|Russian avant-garde|Futurism (art)|Constructivism (art)|Marlow Moss|}}

[[File:Black Square.jpg|thumb|left|[[Kazimir Malevich]], ''[[Black Square (painting)|Black Square]]'', 1923, [[The Russian Museum]]]]

Many of the abstract artists in Russia became [[Constructivism (art)|Constructivists]] believing that art was no longer something remote, but life itself. The artist must become a technician, learning to use the tools and materials of modern production. ''Art into life!'' was [[Vladimir Tatlin]]'s slogan, and that of all the future Constructivists. [[Varvara Stepanova]] and Alexandre Exter and others abandoned easel painting and diverted their energies to theatre design and graphic works.
On the other side stood [[Kazimir Malevich]], [[Anton Pevsner]] and [[Naum Gabo]]. They argued that art was essentially a spiritual activity; to create the individual's place in the world, not to organize life in a practical, materialistic sense. During that time, representatives of the Russian avant-garde collaborated with other Eastern European Constructivist artists, including [[Władysław Strzemiński]], [[Katarzyna Kobro]], and [[Henryk Stażewski]].

Many of those who were hostile to the materialist production idea of art left Russia. Anton Pevsner went to France, Gabo went first to Berlin, then to England and finally to America. Kandinsky studied in Moscow then left for the [[Bauhaus]]. By the mid-1920s the revolutionary period (1917 to 1921) when artists had been free to experiment was over; and by the 1930s only [[socialist realism]] was allowed.<ref>Camilla Gray, ''The Russian Experiment in Art, 1863–1922'', Thames and Hudson, 1962</ref>