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[FULL RUN OF LEF] LEF: Zhurnal levogo fronta iskusstv [i.e. LEF: A Journal of the Left Front of the Arts]

Item #926

Moscow: Gosizdat, 1923-1925. #1,2,3,4 of 1923; #1(5),2(6), of 1924; #3(7) of 1925. 7 issues. All issues in publishers’ wrappers. Never were in the binding. The spines are preserved, except of issue 3 (7), the rest of the spines are slightly restored on the edges. All in all a set in a very good condition.
A COMPLETE SET OF THE ORIGINAL LEF MAGAZINE.
LEF was the first magazine of the Left Front of the Arts, a wide ranging association of modernist writers, photographers, directors, and designers existing from 1922 until 1929. The core of the Left Front, which also constituted an editorial board of LEF, served as a platform for the key figures of the Soviet avant-garde: Vladimir Mayakovsky (the editor), Nikolay Aseev, Osip Brik, Sergei Tretyakov, Boris Kušner, Boris Arvatov, and Nikolay Chuzhak. The periodical was published from 1923 until 1925 with a total of seven issues printed. The journal’s main objective as set out in its first issue, was “to unite all leftist forces; to inspect its ranks, casting aside the adhered past; to unite the front in order to explode junk, to fight for embracing a new culture.” Distinguished by the letterpress patterns and avant-garde design, all seven issues of the magazine featured covers by one of the founders of constructivism, Alexander Rodchenko (1891-1956). The first-ever Soviet publication to reproduce photomontages, LEF encompassed constructivist sketches, posters, and architectural projects created by some of the most famous modernist figures of the time, including Varvara Stepanova (projects of fabric designs, etc.), Lubov Popova (sketches of the fabric designs; a set design sketch for Zemlya Dibom [i.e. Earth in Turmoil] produced by Meyerhold in 1923, etc.), Anton Lavinsky (a project of Book Kiosk; a plan of The City of Future, etc.), the Vesnin Brothers (a project of The Palace of Labour, a project of the Arkos building, etc.), Alexander Rodchenko (advertisement posters, etc.), Sergey Senkin (a sketch of a poster), Gustav Klutsis (a project of a radio-tribune), etc. The magazine consisted of five main parts: the Programma [i.e. Program] section of manifestos, such as ‘Za chto boretsya LEF?’ [i.e. What does LEF Fight for?] or ‘V kogo vgryzayetsya LEF?’ [i.e. Whom does LEF Wrangle with?]; the longer Praktika [i.e. Practice] and Teoria [i.e. Theory] sections, as well as two brief sections: Kniga [i.e. The Book] and Fakty [i.e. Facts]. The literary content of the magazine was created, aside from the editorial board, by Boris Pasternak, Velimir Khlebnikov, Grigory Vinokur, Mikhail Levidov, Vasily Kamensky, Petr Neznamov, Aleksei Kruchyonykh, Igor Terentiev, Mark Serebryanskiy, Vladimir Blum, Dziga Vertov, Dmitriy Petrovsky, Viktor Shkolvsky, Isaak Babel, and others.
The publication of LEF ceased abruptly in 1925. The magazine was replaced by Novyy LEF [i.e. New LEF], printed in 22 issues from 1927 until 1928. In August, 1928, due to a disagreement over the group’s move towards factual literature, Mayakovsky abandoned the editorship of the periodical, and was substituted by Sergei Tretyakov. The Left Front of the Arts was officially disbanded in 1929 with the emergence of Socialist Realism.
One of the most important avant-garde magazines, LEF had a number of affiliated journals, most notable of which were Ukrainian Yugo-Lef [i.e. The Southern Left Front of Arts] (1924-1925) and Georgian Memartskheneoba [i.e. Leftism] (1927-1928).

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