In the White Hall - the lobby of the Central House of Artists, where some chamber expositions are constantly replacing each other, now tablets with copies of sheets stored in the archives of the TsNRPM are hung on the walls. These are mainly graphic reconstruction projects, two photographs and two layouts. A little, but a person who is at least a little familiar with the topic will appreciate the amount of information presented. Reconstructions of almost all of the shown monuments have been published - but not in the same volume and not with these images. The exhibition shows a significant layer of the archive of restoration workshops associated with the memory of S. S. Podyapolsky. I would say that these materials are the "golden fund" of graphic reconstructions and I really want to see them published. And in good quality, so that you can see all the details.
But the essence of the exhibition is, of course, not in the display of materials. Sergei Sergeevich Podyapolsky was an exceptional person. Always restrained, tactful, in a low voice he could draw a line under (almost!) Any dispute and insist on a decision that he considered the only correct one. He was a completely anti-PR man: he did not defend his doctoral degree, although he created a scientific school, did not manage anything major, although he significantly influenced the development of at least two organizations - TsNRPM and Moscow Architectural Institute, did not give interviews, but possessed a strange aura that made him listen to his quiet voice.
S. S. Podyapolsky was both an architect-restorer and a researcher, and his work - both there and there - significantly influenced the development of two "sick" themes of pre-Petrine Russia. These themes, summarizing, can be designated as follows: "Russian North" and "Italians in Russia" (the latter asks for a subtitle - something like "the collapse of Russian identity"). Thanks to the research of Podyapolsky, we know what the temples of Belozerie looked like and we know what role the Renaissance masters played in the formation of Russian architecture in the 16th century.
History in general and the history of architecture in particular, alas, is subject to political preferences - as soon as ideology arises, they begin to rewrite history, and then soon they take up the history of art. Throughout the 20th century, the history of Russian architecture drank ideology in full - it was folk, wooden, perhaps not tin. Only after the war, slowly, not immediately, did it begin to transform from an appendage of ideology into a semblance of science. And, largely thanks to the efforts of the restorers of the TsNRPM L. A. David, B. L. Altshuller, S. S. Pod'yapolsky (and others, of course, and others …), it has become a fairly serious science, based on facts literally dug out of - under layers of bricks and plaster. Over the course of several decades, referring to their own experience and foreign standards, restorers have developed principles for the study and restoration of monuments - at first they dismantled more, then began to preserve more and more, and leave the reconstruction of the original form to the graphics. Why am I all this? To the fact that many participated in this work, and Sergei Podyapolsky summed up the line and formulated these principles - he wrote a textbook, which, strictly speaking, became the basis of the modern Russian school of restoration. By the way, the principles of this school are very strict (unlike, for example, the American school, which was advertised in October at the Zodchestvo festival). Only, unfortunately, for 15 years now, strict principles have not been in vogue, since you have to spend money on them, and then also make mental and mental efforts in order to assess the authenticity of the result. Few of those who have the money are capable of this, at least not yet. But there is a good, and even very, restoration school in our country, and not least thanks to the works of S. S. Podyapolsky.
Sergei Sergeevich played about the same role in the historiography of ancient Russian architecture. First of all, it must be said that he wrote the texts as well as he directed the restoration work - before him it was rare, some people carried out "field" research, others wrote. And, by the way, he taught this universality to his students. The works of S. S. Podyapolsky marked in the history of architecture, it seems to me, a new stage - the stage of analyzing genuine information, without fantasizing and - completely - without ideology, but only based on their own knowledge. You can, of course, say that your own ideas about the material are also akin to ideology, but the point is that these ideas are not external, imposed, but internal, the fruit of reflections. There is in this the sixties (or seventies?) Honesty, the sincerity of people whom the state left alone and allowed to do their own thing, and they did it as well as they could, to the maximum and not looking back at anything. In my eyes, Sergei Sergeevich Podyapolsky is a man who managed to express this intellectual honesty better than many, and convey it to many, and carry it through the nineties, "infect" his students with his convictions.
We can say that now is not the time for idealism, he, they say, has gone into the past along with its representatives and the time is coming for another methodology that will make this go into the past. But after all, the methodology of studying history can be assessed in different ways: one can, for example, assume that approaches change, denying each other and borrowing nothing from their predecessors, one after another, and the subsequent takes little from the previous one, except that it criticizes it in moderation. forces. This view of things means complete freedom of ideas, but it is already very postmodern, it is good for literature, where the methods are the same styles, and it is pleasant when they replace each other, like dresses on a catwalk.
Or you can look at the change in methods in a different way, considering each honest step to be an addition to the existing knowledge - then there is continuity and hope that the work done will not be lost in vain, but will form a common piggy bank and will be useful to someone. This approach is terribly romantic and positivist, history itself has already refuted it a hundred times, offering historians - and they are people too - different tests. But for some reason the approach itself is constantly reviving, so maybe it is not so naive? So it seems to me that the works of S. S. Pod'yapolsky have already entered the collection of knowledge, and a significant part of their results are shown at the exhibition in the Central Academy of Arts. There is something to see for those who are interested in the ancient Russian architecture of the "Moscow period".
The exhibition itself - returning to the exposition - turned out to be very consonant with its hero, it is completely devoid of pomp and very intelligent, in a good way modest - it simply shows a gigantic work and its exceptional influence on two areas - history and restoration. What is typical - the exhibition had no PR at all, just friends were invited to the opening, and few people know about this exhibition (this is a sad consequence of the lack of PR). And the organizers (the scientific secretary of the TsNRPM Natalia Troskina and Associate Professor of the Department of History of Architecture of the Moscow Architectural Institute Sergei Klimenko were involved in the creation of the exhibition) did not even think of calling themselves the fashionable word "curators". The exhibition just does its job, and in this sense it is also terribly romantic, in our times - so simply naive, but it is such a naivety that deserves respect.
The exhibition will run until November 18 (until Tuesday) inclusive and then, probably, will reopen at the Moscow Architectural Institute.
