Constructivist architecture
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Constructivist architecture was a
Definition
Constructivist architecture emerged from the wider
A split occurred in 1922 when Pevsner and Gabo emigrated. The movement then developed along socially
A revolution in architecture
The first and most famous Constructivist architectural project was the 1919 proposal for the headquarters of the
Another famous early Constructivist project was the Lenin Tribune by
ASNOVA and rationalism
Immediately after the Russian Civil War, the USSR was too impoverished to commission any major new building projects. Nonetheless, the Soviet avant-garde school Vkhutemas started an architectural wing in 1921, which was led by the architect Nikolai Ladovsky, which was called ASNOVA (association of new architects). The teaching methods were both functional and fantastic, reflecting an interest in Gestalt psychology, leading to daring experiments with form such as Simbirchev's glass-clad suspended restaurant.[6] Among the architects affiliated to the ASNOVA (Association of New Architects) were El Lissitzky, Konstantin Melnikov, Vladimir Krinsky and the young Berthold Lubetkin.[7]
Projects from 1923 to 1935 like Lissitzky and Mart Stam's Wolkenbügel horizontal skyscrapers and Konstantin Melnikov's temporary pavilions showed the originality and ambition of this new group. Melnikov would design the Soviet Pavilion at the Paris Exposition of Decorative Arts of 1925, which popularised the new style, with its rooms designed by Rodchenko and its jagged, mechanical form.[5] Another glimpse of a Constructivist lived environment is visible in the popular science fiction film Aelita, which had interiors and exteriors modelled in angular, geometric fashion by Aleksandra Ekster. The state-run Mosselprom department store of 1924 was also an early modernist building for the new consumerism of the New Economic Policy, as was the Vesnin brothers' Mostorg store, built three years later. Modern offices for the mass press were also popular, such as the Izvestia headquarters.[8] This was built in 1926–7 and designed by Grigori Barkhin[9]
OSA
A colder and more technological Constructivist style was introduced by the 1923/4 glass office project by the
Collective housing projects that were built included
The everyday and the utopian
The new forms of the Constructivists began to symbolise the project for a new everyday life of the Soviet Union, then in the mixed economy of the New Economic Policy.[11] State buildings were constructed like the huge Derzhprom complex in Kharkiv[12] (designed by Serafimov, Folger and Kravets, 1926–1928) which was noted by Reyner Banham in his Theory and Design in the First Machine Age as being, along with the Dessau Bauhaus, the largest scale Modernist work of the 1920s.[13] Other notable works included the aluminum parabola and glazed staircase of Mikhail Barsch and Mikhail Sinyavsky's 1929 Moscow Planetarium.
The popularity of the new aesthetic led to traditionalist architects adopting Constructivism, as in Ivan Zholtovsky's 1926 MOGES power station or Alexey Shchusev's Narkomzem offices, both in Moscow.[14] Similarly, the engineer Vladimir Shukhov's Shukhov Tower was often seen as an avant-garde work and was, according to Walter Benjamin in his Moscow Diary, 'unlike any similar structure in the West'.[15] Shukhov also collaborated with Melnikov on the Bakhmetevsky Bus Garage and Novo-Ryazanskaya Street Garage.[5] Many of these buildings are shown in Sergei Eisenstein's film The General Line, which also featured a specially built mock-up Constructivist collective farm designed by Andrey Burov.
A central aim of the Constructivists was instilling the avant-garde in everyday life. From 1927 they worked on projects for Workers' Clubs, communal leisure facilities usually built in factory districts. Among the most famous of these are the Kauchuk, Svoboda and Rusakov clubs by Konstantin Melnikov, the club of the Likachev works by the Vesnin brothers, and Ilya Golosov's Zuev Workers' Club.
At the same time as this foray into the everyday, outlandish projects were designed such as
There were also projects for
The Sotsgorod and town planning
Despite the ambitiousness of many Constructivist proposals for reconstructed cities, there were fairly few examples of coherent Constructivist town planning. However, the Narvskaya Zastava district of
Many of the Constructivists hoped to see their ambitions realised during the 'Cultural Revolution' that accompanied the first five-year plan. At this point the Constructivists were divided between urbanists and disurbanists who favoured a garden city or linear city model. The Linear City was propagandised by the head of the Finance Commissariat Nikolay Milyutin in his book Sozgorod, aka Sotsgorod (1930). This was taken to a more extreme level by the OSA theorist Mikhail Okhitovich. His disurbanism proposed a system of one-person or one-family buildings connected by linear transport networks, spread over a huge area that traversed the boundaries between the urban and agricultural, in which it resembled a socialist equivalent of Frank Lloyd Wright's Broadacre City. The disurbanists and urbanists proposed projects for new cities such as Magnitogorsk were often rejected in favour of the more pragmatic German architects fleeing Nazism, such as 'May Brigade' (Ernst May, Mart Stam, Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky), the 'Bauhaus Brigade' led by Hannes Meyer, and Bruno Taut.
The city-planning of
The end of constructivism
The 1932 competition for the
By the end of the 1920s Constructivism was the country's dominant architecture, and surprisingly many buildings of this period survive. Initially the reaction was towards an
After this brief synthesis, Neo-Classical reaction was totally dominant until 1955. Rationalist buildings were still common in industrial architecture, but extinct in urban projects. Last isolated constructivist buildings were launched in 1933–1935, such as
Legacy
Due in part to its political commitment—and its replacement by
High Tech architecture also owes a debt to Constructivism, most obviously in Richard Rogers' Lloyd's building. Zaha Hadid's early projects were adaptations of Malevich's Architektons, and the influence of Chernikhov is clear on her drawings. Deconstructivism evokes the dynamism of Constructivism, though without the social aspect, as in the work of Coop Himmelb(l)au. In the late 1970s Rem Koolhaas wrote a parable on the political trajectory of Constructivism called The Story of the Pool, in which Constructivists escape from the USSR in a self-powering Modernist swimming pool, only to die, after being criticised for much the same reasons as they were under Stalinism, soon after their arrival in the USA. Meanwhile, many of the original Constructivist buildings are poorly preserved or in danger of imminent demolition.[20]
Gallery
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Collective Housing design (Nikolai Ladovsky, 1920)
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Mosselprom building(David Kogan, 1923–4)
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Izvestia Building, Moscow (Grigori & Mikhail Barkhin, 1926)
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Svoboda Factory Club (Melnikov, 1927)
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Kauchuk Factory Club (Melnikov, 1927)
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Flats, Zamoskvorechye, Moscow (late 1920s)
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Melnikov House in Moscow. It was at the top of UNESCO's list of "Endangered Buildings". There is an international campaign to save it.
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Hotel Iset (Yekaterinburg, Chekists Village)
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De Volharding, mixed-use building by Jan Buijs (The Hague, 1927–28)
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The Peoples Commissariat For Communication Lines (Ivan Fomin, 1929)
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Narkomfin Building, apartment house (Moisei Ginzburg, 1930)
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Narkomfin Building, apartment house (Moisei Ginzburg, 1930)
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Narkomfin Building before its restoration in 2020 (Moisei Ginzburg, 1930)
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MPS Building, Moscow (Ivan Fomin, 1930s)
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Maxim Gorky Theatre,Rostov-na-Donu, 1935
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Red Carnation Factory, St Petersburg (Yakov Chernikhov)
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Textile Institute, Moscow (1930–8)
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Regional administration building, 1930–1932. Novosibirsk.
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Krasny Prospekt 11. Novosibirsk
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Club of Slovak Artists, Bratislava, Slovakia, 1926
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Former hospital Bezručova by Alois Balán and Jiří Grossmann, Bratislava (Slovakia), 1939
Constructivist buildings and other modernist projects in the former USSR
Moscow
- Mosselprom building(1925) by Nikolai Strukov
- Bakhmetevsky Bus Garage (1927) by Konstantin Melnikov and Vladimir Shukhov
- Kauchuk Factory Club (1929) by Konstantin Melnikov
- Svoboda Factory Club (1929) by Konstantin Melnikov
- Novo-Ryazanskaya Street Garage (1929) by Konstantin Melnikov and Vladimir Shukhov
- Melnikov House (1929) by Konstantin Melnikov
- Narkomfin Building (1930) by Moisei Ginzburgand Ignaty Milinis
- Rusakov Workers' Club (1929) by Konstantin Melnikov
- Zuev Workers' Club (1929) by Ilya Golosov
- Tsentrosoyuz building (1936) by Le Corbusier and Nikolai Kolli
- Gosplan Garage (1936) by Konstantin Melnikov
- ZiL House of Culture (1937) by Vesnin brothers
Leningrad (Saint-Petersburg)
- Stadium for metal workers "Red Profintern" (1927) by [Aleksandr Nikolsky] and [Lazar Khidekel]
- Red Flag Textile Factory(1929) by [Erich Mendelsohn]
- Bolshoy Dom in Leningrad (1932) by Noi Trotsky, Alexander Gegello and Andrey Ol.
- Kirov District House of Soviets (1935) by Noi Trotsky
- Moscow District House of Soviets (1935) by Igor Fomin, Igor Daugul and Boris Serebrovsky
- 1st House of Lensovet (1934) by Evgeny Levinson and Igor Fomin
- Club for the shipyard workers in Leningrad. by [Aleksandr Nikolsky] and [Lazar Khidekel]
- Pumping station. Vasilyeostrovskaya pumping station near the harbor in Leningrad. Construction (1929-1930)by [Lazar Khidekel]
- Dubrovskiy Electro Power Station S.M. Kirov and Residential settlement Doubrovskaya HPP. Planning and construction of the first in the Soviet Union socialist town - sotsrogodok for workers and specialists (1931-1933) by [Lazar Khidekel]
Minsk
- Government House, Minsk (and similar Oblispolkom in Mogilev) by Iosif Langbard
Kharkiv
- Derzhprom (1928) by Sergey Serafimov, Samuil Kravets and Marc Folger
- House of Projects (1932) by Sergey Serafimov and Maria Sandberg-Serafimova
- Post Office (1929) by Arkady Mordvinov
Zaporizhzhia
- DnieproGES (1932) by Viktor Vesnin and Nikolai Kolli
Sverdlovsk (Ekaterinburg)
- Builders Club (1929) by Yakov Kornfeld
- House of Printing (1930) by Vladimir Sigov
- 'Gorodok chekistov' (1933) by Ivan Antonov, Veniamin Sokolov and Arseny Tumbasov
- House of Communications (1933) by Kasyan Solomonov
Kuybyshev (Samara)
- House of Red Army (1930) by Pyotr Scherbachov
- Factory kitchen (1933) by Evgenya Maksimova
- House of Industry (1933) by Vasily Sukhov
Novosibirsk
- Prombank Dormitory (1927) by I. A. Burlakov
- Polyclinic No. 1 (1928) by P. Shyokin
- Business House (1928) by D. F. Fridman and I. A. Burlakov
- Aeroflot House (1930s)
- State Bank (1930) by Andrey Kryachkov
- Rabochaya Pyatiletka (1930)
- Krayispolkom (Regional Administration Building, 1932) by Boris Gordeev and Sergey Turgenev
- Soyuzzoloto House (1932) by Boris Gordeyev and A. I. Bobrov
- NKVD House (Serebrennikovskaya Street 16) (1932) by Ivan Voronov and Boris Gordeyev
- Novosibirsk Chemical Engineering Technical School (1932) by A. I. Bobrov
- Kuzbassugol Building Complex (1933) by D. A. Ageyev, B. A. Bitkin and Boris Gordeyev
- House of Kraysnabsbyt (1934) by Boris Gordeev and Sergey Turgenev
- Dinamo Residential Complex (1936) by Boris Gordeyev, S. P. Turgenev, V. N. Nikitin
- NKVD House (Serebrennikovskaya Street 23) (1936) by Sergey Turgenev, Ivan Voronov and Boris Gordeyev
Non-implemented projects
- Palace of the Soviets Project
- Tatlin's Tower project by Vladimir Tatlin
- NarkomtiazhpromProject
References
- ^ "Constructivism". Tate Modern. Retrieved 9 April 2020.
- ^ Hunt, Ronald (1 October 1967). "THE CONSTRUCTIVIST ETHOS: RUSSIA 1913–1932 (PART II)". Artforum. Retrieved 24 February 2024.
- ^ Lord Foster fires up campaign to save Shukhov Tower: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/apr/15/radio-tower-campaign-russia-foster
- ISBN 0-00-686129-6.
- ^ a b c d
Frampton, Kenneth (2004). Modern architecture — a critical history (Paperback) (Third ed.). World of Art. p. 376 pages. ISBN 0-500-20257-5.
- ^ see the picture here: "17 - Costruttivismo". Archived from the original on 15 April 2008. Retrieved 7 April 2007.
- ^
Cooke, Catherine (1990). Architectural Drawings of the Russian Avant Garde (Hardback). Harry N. Abrams, Inc. p. 143 pages. ISBN 0-8109-6000-1.
- ^ "Izvestia Building Moscow by Grigory Barkhin". galinsky.com. Retrieved 15 August 2015.
- ^ a b S.N Khan-Magomedov, Pioneers of Soviet Architecture (1988).
- ^ quoted in Art and Revolution ed Campbell/Lynton, Hayward Gallery London 1971
- ^ See the discussion in Victor Buchli's, An Archeology of Socialism (2000)
- Freedom Square, Kharkiv
- ^ Reyner Banham, Theory and Design in the First Machine Age (Architectural Press, 1971), p297.
- ^ "Narkomzem (Agriculture Ministry) Moscow by Aleksey Shchusev". galinsky.com. Retrieved 15 August 2015.
- ^ Benjamin, Walter, Moscow Diary
- ^ Chto Delat/What is to be Done issue on Narvskaya Zastava: http://www.chtodelat.org/images/pdfs/Chtodelat_07.pdf[permanent dead link] and also St Petersburg Wandering Camera on Simonov's school: http://www.enlight.ru/camera/354/index_e.html
- ^ Catherine Cooke, The Avant-Garde.
- ^ Archive photo: "17 - Costruttivismo". Archived from the original on 15 April 2008. Retrieved 7 April 2007.
- ^ Illustrated here: "17 - Costruttivismo". Archived from the original on 15 April 2008. Retrieved 7 April 2007.
- ^ See interview with film director Isa Willinger here: http://awayfromallsuns.de/de/on_constructivism/ Archived 5 November 2013 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Reportaje | Cuatro generaciones viviendo entre pétalos y arquitecturas racionales".
Bibliography
- Reyner Banham, Theory and Design in the First Machine Age (Architectural Press, 1972)
- Victor Buchli, An Archaeology of Socialism (Berg, 2002)
- Campbell/Lynton (eds.), Art and Revolution (Hayward Gallery, London 1971)
- Catherine Cooke, Architectural Drawings of the Russian Avant-Garde (MOMA, 1990)
- Catherine Cooke, The Avant Garde (AD magazine, 1988)
- Catherine Cooke, "Fantasy and Construction: Iakov Chernikhov" (AD magazine, vol. 59 no. 7–8, London 1989)
- Catherine Cooke & Igor Kazus, Soviet Architectural Competitions (Phaidon, 1992)
- Kenneth Frampton, Modern Architecture: a Critical Introduction (Thames & Hudson, 1980)
- Moisei Ginzburg, Style and Epoch (MIT, 1981)
- S. Khan-Magomedov, Alexander Vesnin and Russian Constructivism (Thames & Hudson 1986)
- S. Khan-Magomedov, Pioneers of Soviet Architecture (Thames & Hudson 1988), ISBN 978-0-500-34102-5
- S. Khan-Magomedov. 100 Masterpieces of Soviet Avant-garde Architecture
Russian Academy of Architecture. M., Editorial URSS, 2005
- S. Khan-Magomedov. Lazar Khidekel (Creators of Russian Classical Avant-garde series)
M., 2008
- ISBN 978-1-885254-00-9
- El Lissitzky, The Reconstruction of Architecture in the Soviet Union (Vienna, 1930)
- Karl Schlögel, Moscow (Reaktion, 2005)
- Karel Teige, The Minimum Dwelling (MIT, 2002)
External links
- Constructivist architecture on YouTube
- Documentary on Moscow's Constructivist buildings Archived 27 September 2013 at the Wayback Machine
- Heritage at Risk: Preservation of 20th Century Architecture and World Heritage — April 2006 Conference by the Moscow Architectural Preservation Society (MAPS)
- Archive Constructivist Photos and Designs at polito.it
- The Moscow Times' Guide to Constructivist buildings
- Guardian article on preserving Constructivist buildings
- Constructivism in Architecture at Kmtspace
- Campaign for the Preservation of the Narkomfin Building
- Constructivist designs at the Russian Utopia Depository
- Constructivism and Postconstructivism at St Petersburg's Wandering Camera
- Short film on the heavily Constructivist-influenced buildings that Berthold Lubetkin designed for Dudley Zoo in the 1930s on YouTube
- Czech Constructivism - Villa Victor Kriz
- Commie vs. Capitalist: Architecture - slideshow by Life magazine