To the page “Protection of historical heritage”
Dr. Sergey Zagraevsky
Where should we sail?
Published in Russian: Заграевский С.В. Куда ж нам плыть? В справочнике «Единый художественный рейтинг», вып. 6. М., 2002.
Attention!
The following text was translated from the Russian original by the computer program
and has not yet been edited.
So it can be used only for general introduction.
More precisely,
"Where we sail" - the so-called Lion Kolodne article published in the
driven them heading "Moscow Komsomolets" 28 December 2001. In no case will not blame Leo Kolodne in
ignorance of Pushkin's poetry: "... Hromada moved and cuts the waves. Sails. Where shall we sail? "-
These lines in his article, presented as an epigraph. Just seemed to him that without
the letter "g" name will sound better - that's removed. Great importance if - just one
letter? And what with her lost not only
the unique sound of Pushkin's lines, but also their emotional coloring, the
article's author does not care - without the letter "g" to receive
modern and even harmonious, but the meaning seems to be the same.
But God is with him, with the
title. I recall the plot article - it
(as in many other oral and written statements of Leo Kolodne) expressed joy and
optimism about the rapid construction in the heart of Moscow. With "plus"
commemorated Christ the Savior Cathedral, complex Okhotny Ryad on Manege,
Seating yard and Fresh retail and entertainment complex on the Garden Ring near
the Kursk railway station. Along the way, with the sign
"minus" in the article appear AA Klimenko, AI Komech and AP
Kudryavtsev - "well-known adherents of preservation of old Moscow",
"frightening the people of inventions", "Stalin's ghost,"
"Flesh and Barkashov Vasiliev.
And the photo attached to the
article - the decrepit walls with crumbling plaster. As such ugliness, he says, do
not carry and can not be built in its place something sverhprezentabelnoe, with
clock security, cameras and underground parking?
And yet, let's look at the
situation calmly and in a businesslike manner, without the fiery denunciations
and turbulent emotions.
So, on the one hand - a huge
number of slums and industrial enterprises in the center of our capital, and in
this Leo Kolodniy absolutely right. Much must be reconstructed, and
many endure.
On the other hand - "the
zealots of conservation", fighting for every historic building, for every
tree in the center - and that they too are absolutely right. Where is the truth?
To understand this, will have to
start from afar. Since
the late nineteenth century.
The fact that the rapid
commercial building in Moscow began precisely at the time - and began a very
haphazard. Take a walk on almost any of the
historic streets of Moscow - two-storey houses everywhere are combined with the
so-called "apartment houses", built in the style of an eclectic - in
the 1890's or modern - in 1900's and 1910's. Common to all the "tenement
houses" was their increased number of floors - up to 7-8 floors. Streets in this case is not
expanded, and obtained such dire "wells", as, for example, Obydenskie
Lanes (about Ostozhenka). And as close to "apartment
houses" were standing two-storey, the obligatory "firewalls"
(blank side walls, saving "tenement house" in case of fire in a
neighboring) very unaesthetic remained in sight. Now they are, however, cover
billboards, but still a spectacle so-so ...
Do not be afraid to say that
this was the first "Battle for Moscow, which had its own"
progressives "and their" adherents of conservation. And last lost - the number of
"false teeth" in the form of huge "tenement houses" among
two or three-story building amounts to many hundreds.
The second "Battle for Moscow" began in the late twenties, when the party and the government
decided to build "a model communist city" in the historical center. "Guardians of
antiquity" and lost it - if Stalin had managed to implement all their
ideas on the spot Zamoskvorechye so beloved Leo Kolodniy, the rays would
diverge three broad prospect scale Kutuzov, built the relevant buildings
"Stalinist baroque. One of these buildings can be
seen on the big Ordynka, on the way from the metro Tretyakovskaya to the
Gallery. Please note that this house is
in the depths - it is there should have been held "red line" one of
the new avenues. What is already there historical
buildings ...
A
hotel "Moscow"? It seems to have become
familiar, and the architect is not just anybody, but Shchusev, and yet, if an
unbiased look at the proximity of its monstrous facade and towers of the
Kremlin - this, I may say so, "an architectural ensemble of" other
than a mockery of the history of Russia, not call. Now it is to be reconstructed
and made more comfortable, but the facade, apparently, will "hang"
over the Kremlin for ever. Maybe someday the descendants of
guess at least delay it to the glass, but so far it is consistent with the
style of Moscow's eclectic, "promoted by Lev Kolodniy and his senior
patrons.
So it stuck in the middle of Moscow "false teeth" of the Stalinist era, forming a more or less slender
(though aesthetically dubious) bands only on Tverskaya, Kutuzov and some
embankments - and then not entirely.
The next "battle"
unfolded in the 60's and 70's. Needless to say, that "the
adherents of the old" lost and it? For examples of the new
"false teeth" not far to seek - that the Palace of Congresses in the Kremlin, and Novy Arbat, and many needy prefabricated houses - and on the
Garden Ring, and inside it.
What remains of Moscow after the three "battles", and that today are struggling members of the
"fourth"?
Do not be afraid to say - from Moscow as a single architectural ensemble, there is nothing left. No one area that could be called
solid, aesthetically unified architectural complex in Moscow no. Well, except that Strogino or
North Chertanovo, only aesthetics there is even more doubtful than Stalin
embankments ...
So will the historical Moscow got nothing to lose?
Is human Lev Kolodniy that Moscow
is perishing, where no building, "and" swim and be more in a given
direction "- ie in the direction specified by devyatyustami thousands of
construction workers in Moscow, which by all means you should load the work,
otherwise they can not even feed half a
million members of their families?
And can "zealots
conservation" AA Klimenko, AI Komech and AP Kudryavtsev fighting for what
is not? But supposedly intelligent
people who occupy a respectable position, and quite unlike the dreamers and
visionaries ...
But if without jokes, then, of
course, the historic Moscow there - if not as a single architectural ensemble,
then as a unique urban environment with its unique atmosphere.
And we are not in vain started a
conversation with the ethical inadmissibility "editing" of Pushkin's
lines. Do not be a literary scholar to
understand: it happens that the loss of one letter makes the poem into chaos. And just do not have to be
arhitekturovedom to understand: any city - the most complex organisms, and
historical, "museum" component plays an important role in it. Let us explain.
First of all, such a trivial
thing as a tourist attraction. Many of the city only this and
live - and in excellent health at the same time feel. It is common knowledge that
tourism enhances the credibility of the country and brings revival of economic
ties, some retirees do not come to stare at the picture of "Ivan the
Terrible kills his son" - in tours and travel business, and many then
there is the desire something to invest in the country, which
they liked.
But the question arises: will
we, for example, tourists enjoy the bus or car journey to Moscow today, despite
the fact that the city, in the words of Leo Kolodne, "beamed lights"?
Hardly. And why? But because the early morning to
late evening on the streets of congestion. Why congestion? Because the center is being
vaunted Lion Kolodniy rapid office building, and with the existing
radial-circular layout of Moscow not unload or third, or fourth, or fifth ring
road - people still go to work at the center.
And if you reduce the business
building in the center, stopping the expansion of existing areas and adjusting
the monuments beyond the offices, but under the museums and mini-hotel? And if not evict Muscovites from
the center of a fuss, and improve their living conditions? Do not drop it at the same
traffic load on the streets, avenues and alleys, and will not be reduced if
congestion?
That being closed one of the
most complicated "vicious circle", which we call the urban
environment. Such "circles" a lot,
even if you do not connect the problems of ecology, electricity, water,
heating, sanitation, and other, no less prosaic things. And it turns out that the issue
of demolition, reconstruction or preservation of any historic building, development
of any vacant lot is required above all a systematic town-planning approach.
The builder and urban planner -
as they say, two big differences. The builder carries out orders,
and town planner - a scientist - developing integrated approaches that take
into account all the problems of the territory, from laying sewer to the
frequency of visits by tourists.
And so, when you read articles
like the one that was published in the "MK", it hurts. Not because of what we Lev
Kolodniy appreciate the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the reconstruction of
the Manege Square and sculpture Shemyakin with different aesthetic positions
(he likes, I do not like). In the end, it's a personal
decision. It is painful is because of the
fact that "the powers that be" do not understand that in the
metropolis of Moscow can not scale at all to do anything - either to build or
preserve or reconstruct or muzeefitsirovat - without a comprehensive,
systematic urban planning approaches.
But such an approach, in turn,
must take into account all the political, macroeconomic, social and aesthetic
trends of our city. In the end, we need to
understand what we want - that Moscow was a city-factory-city warehouse, a
city-office, a city-museum or memorable "garden city"? And if all at once, in what
proportion?
To do this, take a little
obschemoskovskie urban development plans based on the approximate zoning
districts and areas, as is done now. Necessary to attract major
Russian (and possibly the world), scientists, urban planners, determine the
overall prospects for the development of Moscow and discussion with the public
- even before making the most serious issues on city-wide referendums.
Only then will the age-old
debate "Progressives" and "conservatives" will enter into a
constructive direction, and "Battle for Moscow" can finally be won -
not someone from the opposing sides, and Muscovites.
2002.
© Sergey Zagraevsky
To the page “Protection of historical heritage”