Page:Knight (1975) Past, Future and the Problem of Communication in the Work of V V Khlebnikov.djvu/64

56 Chapter Eight:

CUBISM AND KHLEBNIKOV—"OBJECTLESSNESS" AND THE CREATION OF A NEW WORLD.

The basic concept of Russian Futurism was that of the "self—sufficient word". This corresponded to the Cubist idea of the primacy of "the material itself"——paint and form-—over any other "content". A related technique of Khlebnikov's was what Jakobson calls the "realization of the device". This chapter suggests that this and all other manifestations of "objectlessness" or "formalism" expressed an implicitly 'revolutionary' impulse, in the sense that their aim was to change, not reflect, the existing world.