Iliazd (Ilia Zdanevich)
Georgia (1894—1975)Ilia Zdanevich, better known as Iliazd, began frequenting the Russian avant-garde circles at a very young age. He wrote studies on Natalia Goncharova and Mikhail Larionov, as well as on Filippo Tommaso Marinetti and Italian Futurism, and became an important theorist and promoter of Futurism and Zaum. During the First World War he wrote a number of Zaum poems and, together with Alexei Kruchenykh and other artists, was involved in the Futurist group 41°. After leaving Georgia in 1920, he spent a year in Constantinople before arriving in Paris in 1921, where he became closely associated with Tristan Tzara and other figures of the Dada and Surrealist circles. He played an important role in the organisation of the Soirée du Cœur à Barbe at the Théâtre Michel in 1923, for which he also designed the typography and poster. He continued to write and publish, while devoting himself increasingly to typography and the production of artists’ books. His later work culminated in Poésie de mots inconnus, published in 1949 with contributions by artists including Jean Arp, Georges Braque, Marc Chagall, Alberto Giacometti, Fernand Léger, Henri Matisse, Joan Miró and Pablo Picasso.
