Editing Kazimir Malevich (section)

==Nationality and ethnicity==
[[File:Malewicz_signature.jpg|thumb|Signature of Kazimierz Malewicz in Polish on the back of his self-portrait entitled "Artist" (1933)]]
Most academic literature and museum collections identify Malevich as a Russian painter, based on his integral role in shaping the Russian avant-garde, centered primarily around Moscow and Petrograd (modern-day St. Petersburg), and the fact that he achieved prominence while living and working in the Russian Empire and later, from 1922 until his death in 1935, the Soviet Union. However, his nationality has been a subject of scholarly dispute.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Matiossian |first=Vartan |date=2023-02-21 |title=The Met Shouldn't Have Reclassified Ivan Aivazovsky as "Ukrainian" |url=http://hyperallergic.com/802391/met-museum-shouldnt-have-reclassified-ivan-aivazovsky-as-ukrainian/ |access-date=2024-04-12 |website=Hyperallergic |language=en-US |archive-date=2 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240402233033/https://hyperallergic.com/802391/met-museum-shouldnt-have-reclassified-ivan-aivazovsky-as-ukrainian/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite news |last=Helmore |first=Edward |date=2023-03-19 |title=As the Met reclassifies Russian art as Ukrainian, not everyone is convinced |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/19/metropolitan-museum-art-reclassifies-russian-art-ukrainian |access-date=2024-04-12 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}}</ref>

=== Polish ===
Malevich's family was one of the millions of [[Poles in Russia|Poles who lived within the Russian Empire]] following the [[Partitions of Poland]]. Kazimir Malevich was born near [[Kiev]]<ref name="nytimes1" /> on lands that had previously been part of the [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]]<ref name="dziennik.com">{{cite web |title=Walczą o polskość Malewicza |url=http://www.dziennik.com/publicystyka/artykul/walcza-o-polskosc-malewicza |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130729214514/http://www.dziennik.com/publicystyka/artykul/walcza-o-polskosc-malewicza |archive-date=2013-07-29 |access-date=8 August 2017 |website=Novy Dziennik}}</ref> of parents who were ethnic [[Polish people|Poles]].<ref name="Schwartz p. 84" /> Both Polish and Russian were native languages of Malevich,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Kazimir Malevich Biography |url=http://www.incorm.eu/Biogs/Malevich.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201230145917/http://www.incorm.eu/Biogs/Malevich.pdf |archive-date=2020-12-30 |website=[[International Chamber of Russian Modernism]]}}</ref> who would sign his artwork in the [[Polish language|Polish]] form of his name as ''Kazimierz Malewicz''.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w9uEHrbEwWE/T7Ol2wGoIYI/AAAAAAAAMmo/ZXf8HuLtawc/s1600/Artysta_podpis_Tiff+4.jpg| title = Polish form of his name: Kazimierz Malewicz| access-date = 3 April 2014| archive-date = 6 March 2014| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20140306220543/http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w9uEHrbEwWE/T7Ol2wGoIYI/AAAAAAAAMmo/ZXf8HuLtawc/s1600/Artysta_podpis_Tiff+4.jpg| url-status = live}}</ref> In a 1926 visa application to travel to France, Malewicz claimed ''Polish'' as his nationality.<ref name="dziennik.com" /> French art historian [[Andrei Nakov]], who re-established Malevich's birth year as 1879 (and not 1878), has argued for restoration of the Polish spelling of Malevich's name.[[File:Девушка с гребнем в волосах.png|thumb|Girl with a Comb in her Hair, 1933, oil on canvas, [[Tretyakov Gallery]]]]In 1985, Polish performance artist Zbigniew Warpechowski performed "Citizenship for a Pure Feeling of Kazimierz Malewicz" as an homage to the great artist and critique of Polish authorities that refused to grant Polish citizenship to Kazimir Malevich.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Zbigniew Warpechowski, Obywatelstwo dla czystego odczucia Kazimierza Malewicza |trans-title=Zbigniew Warpechowski, Citizenship for the pure feeling of Kazimierz Malewicz |url=https://artmuseum.pl/pl/filmoteka/praca/warpechowski-zbigniew-obywatelstwo-dla-czystego-odczucia |website=[[Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw]] |access-date=29 January 2019 |archive-date=29 January 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190129182008/https://artmuseum.pl/pl/filmoteka/praca/warpechowski-zbigniew-obywatelstwo-dla-czystego-odczucia |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2013, Malevich's family in [[New York City]] and fans founded the not-for-profit ''The Rectangular Circle of Friends of Kazimierz Malewicz'', whose dedicated goal is to promote awareness of Kazimir's Polish ethnicity.<ref name="dziennik.com"/>

=== Ukrainian ===
According to Russian scholars Tatiana Mikhienko and {{ill|Irina Vakar|ru|Вакар, Ирина Анатольевна|}}, the secret police file from Malevich's arrest on September 20, 1930 indicates that Malevich declared his nationality as Ukrainian.<ref name="Radio Svododa-2019" /><ref name="Rudzytskyi">{{Cite web |last=Rudzytskyi |first=Artur |title=Istorik: "V nekotorykh anketakh 1920-kh godov v grafe 'natsionalnost' Kazimir Malevich pisal: ukrainets" |script-title=ru:Историк: "В некоторых анкетах 1920–х годов в графе "национальность" Казимир Малевич писал: украинец" |url=http://life.pravda.com.ua/society/2009/04/9/17532/ |access-date=23 February 2019 |website=Ukrainska Pravda |language=ru |archive-date=24 February 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190224173547/https://life.pravda.com.ua/society/2009/04/9/17532/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Scholar Marie Gasper-Hulvat notes that this may have been in part motivated by Malevich's desire to avoid anti-Polish discrimination, since Ukraine was at that time part of the Soviet Union.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gasper-Hulvat |first=Marie |date=2019 |title=State-Sanctioned Trips of Soviet Artists to the West in the Late 1920s: The Unusual Case of Kazimir Malevich |journal=Space Between: Literature & Culture, 1914-1945 |volume=15 |pages=14 |quote=Malevich's experiences between 1926 and 1930 appear to have made him more attuned to the problematics of his ethnic identity within Russia. (...) in the secret police file from his arrest on September 20, 1930, two different questionnaires list his ethnicity as Ukrainian (Vakar and Mikhienko 1: 563, 565), which, as part of the Soviet Union, may have been slightly less problematic than Polish.}}</ref> It is sometimes claimed that he self-identified as a Ukrainian throughout his life.<ref name="Myroslav Shkandrij"/> Similarly, the French art historian [[Gilles Néret]] claimed that Malevich, while at times identifying as Polish "out of tact or mischief" and using the Polish spelling of his name, always emphasized his Ukrainian background.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Néret |first=Gilles |title=Kazimir Malevich (1878-1935) and Suprematism |date=2003 |publisher=Taschen |isbn=3-8228-1961-1 |location=Cologne |language=en}}</ref>{{Rp|page=7}}

Following the [[Russian invasion of Ukraine]] in 2022 there has been more political and cultural pressure to reconsider his Russian nationality and to identify him instead as Ukrainian painter.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Méheut |first=Constant |date=2024-03-08 |title='Decolonizing' Ukrainian Art, One Name-and-Shame Post at a Time |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/08/world/europe/decolonizing-ukrainian-art-oksana-semenik.html |access-date=2024-04-12 |work=[[The New York Times]] |archive-date=12 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240412224140/https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/08/world/europe/decolonizing-ukrainian-art-oksana-semenik.html |url-status=live }}</ref> This push resulted in the [[Metropolitan Museum of Art]] relabeling him as Ukrainian painter, and later Stedelijk Museum labeling him as "Ukrainian painter of Polish origin". The relabeling caused a backlash from Russia, including a statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.<ref name=":3" /> However, the consensus among art historians, including those of Ukrainian origin, is that whereas the discussion (related to the [[Russian imperialism|Russian colonialism]]) clearly needs to take place among all involved parties, it has not yet occurred, and the question concerning the identity of Malevich has not been solved as of 2023.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Davies |first1=Katie Marie |date=1 May 2023 |title=The art of decolonization How Eastern European art became the latest battlefront in countering Russian imperialism |url=https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/04/27/the-art-of-decolonization |work=The Beet |access-date=1 May 2023 |archive-date=1 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230501145357/https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/04/27/the-art-of-decolonization |url-status=live }}</ref>