[2] Red Square was part of Malevich's Suprematist art movement (1915-1919), which aimed to create artworks that were universally understood.

[3] Malevich first began exploring the artistic potential of the square in stage curtains for the 1913 Russian Futurist/Cubo-Futurist opera Victory Over the Sun.

Concerned only with form and the purity of shape, particularly that of the square, Malevich primarily considered Suprematism as an exploration of visual language as well as a step in the evolution of religious understanding.

[4] Red Square and two other works by Malevich were restored shortly before the artist's death because the paint had begun flaking.

Describing his Suprematist works as nonobjective, but never abstract, Malevich intended to liberate painting from the burden of recognizable images.

This depiction of the quadrilateral demonstrates how Malevich was beginning to manipulate basic forms, with his compositions determined by the cohesion of space.

[14] On the canvas the quadrilateral was not intended to be an "image" but rather a "living form" with Malevich describing the square in a letter to Alexander Benous as the "single bare and frameless icon of our time".