Hugo Gellert. 1892 – 1985.
Karl Marx' 'Capital' in Lithographs. Series of 62 lithographs. Each sheet 22 3/4 x 15 1/4. White Plains, NY:, 1933. Edition 133 issued privately. Lithographs printed by E. Desjobert, Paris, France. Each plate is signed by the artist. Typography by S.A. Jacobs, New York. Printed on watermarked BFK Rives paper. Covered in burlap, lined in red. This copy dedicated to Elmer Rice, the Pulitzer Price-winning American playwright, and with the original invoice. $17,000 the set.
Primary Accumulation was created, Hugo Gellert wrote, as a "translation into graphic form of the revolutionary concepts of Das Kapital. The set was first published in Paris in 1933 by Desjobert in signed editions of 133 impressions on BFK Rives cream, wove paper. The second edition was published in New York in 1934 by Ray Long and Richard Smith on 'BFK RIVES' watermarked laid paper. This impression of Primary Accumulation is from the second edition of 1934 and represents the thirteenth lithograph in the series. Second edition impressions were not hand signed and no edition was specified. It would be surprising, however, (particularly with the political climate of the times) to learn that this was a large edition. The strong and visually compelling construction of his imagery places Hugo Gellert among the greatest American social artists of the Art Deco era.
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[1]. From Preface to the First German Edition by Karl Marx
[2]. PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: secret of primary accumulation.
[3]. PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: secret of primary accumulation. [2 of 3]
[4] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: secret of primary accumulation. [3 of 3]
[5] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: The expropriation whereby the countryfolk were divorced from the land.
[6] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: The expropriation whereby the countryfolk were divorced from the land.
[7] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: The expropriation whereby the countryfolk were divorced from the land.
[8] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: The expropriation whereby the countryfolk were divorced from the land.
[9] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Savage legislation against the expropriated from the end of the fifteenth century onwards -- Acts of Parliament to force down wages.
[10] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Savage legislation against the expropriated from the end of the fifteenth century onwards -- Acts of Parliament to force down wages.
[11] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Savage legislation against the expropriated from the end of the fifteenth century onwards -- Acts of Parliament to force down wages.
[12] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Origin of the capitalist farmer -- Repercussion of the agrarian revolution on industry -- Creation of the home market for industrial capital.
[13] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Repercussion of the agrarian revolution on industry-- creation of the home market for industrial capital.
[14] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Origin of the industrial capitalist.
[15] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Origin of the industrial capitalist.
[16] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Origin of the industrial capitalist.
[17] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: Origin of the industrial capitalist.
[18] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: origin of the industrial capitalist
[19] PRIMARY ACCUMULATION: historical tendency of capitalist accumulation.
[20] COMMODITIES: The Two Factors of a Commodity.
[21] COMMODITIES: The Two Factors of a Commodity
[22] COMMODITIES: twofold character of the labor embodied in commodities.
[23] COMMODITIES: twofold character of the labor embodied in commodities.
[24] COMMODITIES: The Form of Value, or Exchange-value.
[25] COMMODITIES: The Mystery of the Fetishistic Character of Commodities Exchange.
[26] MONEY, OR THE CIRCULATION OF COMMODITIES.
[27] TRANSFORMATION OF MONEY INTO CAPITAL.
[28] TRANSFORMATION OF MONEY INTO CAPITAL: Purchase and Sale of Labor Power.
[29] THE LABOR PROCESS AND THE PROCESS OF PRODUCING SURPLUS VALUE.
[30] THE PRODUCTION OF SURPLUS VALUE.
[31] THE PRODUCTION OF SURPLUS VALUE.
[32] CONSTANT CAPITAL AND VARIABLE CAPITAL.
[33] RATE OF SURPLUS VALUE: Degree of Exploitation of Labor Power.
[34] THE WORKING DAY: Limits of the Working Day.
[35] THE WORKING DAY: The Greed for Surplus Labor.
[36] THE WORKING DAY: Struggle For a Normal Working day; Laws to Enforce the Extension of the Working Day, Passed From the Middle of the 14th to the End of the 17th Century.
[37] THE WORKING DAY: Struggle for a Normal Working Day Repercussion of the English Factory Acts on Other Countries.
[38] CONCEPT OF RELATIVE SURPLUS VALUE.
[39] COOPERATION.
[40] DIVISION OF LABOR AND MANUFACTURE: twofold origin of manufacture; the detail worker and his implement.
[41] DIVISION OF LABOR AND MANUFACTURE: the capitalist character of manufacture.
[42] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: development of machinery.
[43] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: Development of Machinery.
[44] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: the value transferred by machinery to the product
[45] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: Primary effects of machino-facture upon the worker
[46] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: Prolongation of the Working Day
[47] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: Intensification of Labor
[48] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: The factory
[49] MACHINERY AND LARGE-SCALE INDUSTRY: struggle between the worker and the machine
[50] TRANSFORMATION OF THE VALUE, OR THE PRICE, OF LABOR POWER INTO WAGES
[51] SIMPLE REPRODUCTION
[52] LAW OF CAPITALIST ACCUMULATION
[53] LAW OF CAPITALIST ACCUMULATION: effect of crises on the better-paid part of the working-class
[54] TRANSFORMATION OF SURPLUS VALUE INTO GROUND-RENT: price of land
[55] TRANSFORMATION OF SURPLUS VALUE INTO GROUND-RENT: labor rent; rent in kind
[56] TRANSFORMATION OF SURPLUS VALUE INTO GROUND-RENT: money rent
[57]TRANSFORMATION OF SURPLUS VALUE INTO GROUND-RENT: share farming and small peasants' property
[58]TRANSFORMATION OF SURPLUS VALUE INTO GROUND-RENT: small peasants' property
[59] TRANSFORMATION OF SURPLUS VALUE INTO GROUND-RENT: small peasants' property
[60] HISTORICAL TENDENCY OF CAPITALIST ACCUMULATION
The series was dedicated "To the memory of my very dear brother Ernest Gellert, brave and faithful soldier of the proletariat cause, born at Budapest on January 12, 1896, died in military confinement at Fort Hancock, N.J. on March 8, 1918."
Born in Hungary, Hugo Gellert emigrated to the United States with his family in 1906. From 1909 to 1914 he studied at both the Cooper Union and at the National Academy of Design, receiving three awards for his art. He intended to complete his studies at the Academie Julian, Paris, but the outbreak of World War One forced him to abandon this plan.
In 1916 Hugo Gellert published his first anti-war art in the leftist periodical, The Masses. In 1917 this publication was suppressed by the government and Gellert's brother, a conscientious objector, was arrested by the United States Army. Five months later Ernest Gellert was shot and killed while confined in military prison. Hugo Gellert began work for a new magazine entitled, The Liberator (1918-1922). His first solo exhibition took place at the Keworkian Gallery in 1923.
In 1925 Hugo Gellert became a staff artist for both The New Yorker Magazine and The New York Times. Through these publications millions of Americans became familiar with his politically charged drawings and cartoons. Gellert was appointed head of the first anti-fascist organization in America in 1927. He organized a demonstration in this capacity during this year and both he and his wife were arrested while picketing outside the White House.
Apart from his activities as a staff artist, Hugo Gellert also created a number of important public murals and sets of original lithographs. In this latter category the most famous series are Karl Marx's 'Capital' in Lithographs (1933 & 1934), Comrade Gulliver (1935) and Aesop Said So (1936). The 1930's decade also marked the period when government and administrative interference ceased to threaten Gellert. In 1932 the Museum of Modern Art in New York petitioned to have the art of Hugo Gellert and two of his contemporaries (Ben Shann and William Gropper) removed from its collection. Other contemporary artists came to their defense and threatened to withdraw their work, forcing the Museum to back down. Three years later the art of Hugo Gellert was the subject of a large exhibition at New York's prestigious Whitney Museum.
During the following years, Hugo Gellert received many awards and continued his fight against social injustices. He was commissioned to paint the murals for the Communications Building at the New York World's Fair, 1938. He was a major force in applying pressure on the Mexican Government to release the great artist, Siqueiros, from prison (1960-1964). In 1974, Hugo Gellert was awarded the highest honour of the Republic of Hungary: The Order of the Banner. Finally, in 1982, Hugo Gellert made a fitting appearance as a 'witness' in Warren Beatty's classic film, Reds.
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