About the work
A Russian Futurist opera created collectively by Alexei Kruchonykh (libretto), Velimir Khlebnikov (prologue), Mikhail Matyushin (music) and Kazimir Malevich (sets, costumes, lighting). The plan took shape in July 1913 at the "First All-Russian Congress of Futurists", held at Matyushin's dacha near Uusikirkko; the only performances followed on 3 and 5 December 1913 at the Luna Park Theatre in Saint Petersburg.
Plot
A traveller through all ages reports on a futuristic 35th-century world in which fighters capture and defeat the sun, overthrowing the old, romantic idea of beauty and reason. The second act shows the resulting sunless society, where the freedom won brings confusion rather than deliverance. Kruchonykh's text is largely written in "zaum", a sound-based artificial language detached from fixed word meaning.
Cultural significance
The performances provoked one of the greatest theatrical scandals of their time. Malevich's stage curtain, a square split diagonally into black and white, is considered the first version of his 1915 painting "Black Square"; he later traced the origin of Suprematism back to this design. The opera stands among the earliest attempts at a total artwork that radically detaches painting, music and language from representation and fixed meaning.