The most tragic news of the beginning of May, of course, was the news of the death of one of the most famous contemporary Russian architects, Sergei Kiselev. Sergei Borisovich died on May 9 at the age of 57, and this loss became not only irreparable for the professional community, but also deeply shocking - everyone who knew the architect personally could not even suspect that this always energetic and sympathetic person was terminally ill. The obituary for Sergei Kiselev was published, in particular, by Grigory Revzin in the Kommersant newspaper.
The main topic of newspaper publications at the end of April was the updated master plan for the development of Moscow until 2025. After the scandal in the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation, which we wrote about last time, the opponents of the document had a faint hope of a delay, but on May 5 the Moscow City Duma adopted the draft in the third and final reading. Now it's up to the mayor to sign. A crowd of activists gathered under the walls of the Moscow City Duma hoped to disrupt the meeting, but they did not succeed, and the Communist Party faction, the only one in the Moscow legislative assembly that opposed this document, could not prevent the adoption of the general plan. Almost all central newspapers - Vremya Novostey, Novaya Gazeta, Gazeta.ru and Vedomosti - wrote about an event significant for Moscow's urban development.
Perhaps, now the city rights activists can only rely on the amendments, which, according to him, the mayor agrees to accept. Consolation, however, is weak: those of the amendments prepared by the Arhnadzor movement, which were taken into account by the editors of the bill, did not change its essence. The general plan still does not see the historic city, says Boris Pasternak, chief architect of the Center for Historical and Urban Planning Research, in an article on the Arhnadzor website. The movement considers that one of the key problems of the adopted document is that it was not preceded by the competition of ideas and concepts for city development, which was usual for Soviet urban planning practice, therefore it turned out to be uncontested and flawed.
While the capital's deputies were adopting the scandalous master plan, Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov met with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and the main topic of their negotiations was precisely the issues of urban planning. The fact is that the Russian capital will assist Caracas in developing a master plan for the development of this city. How exactly this will be done, the Moscow mayor told reporters in detail. Yuri Luzhkov is quoted by the newspaper "Vzglyad".
Events in Pskov, where the Kremlin was on fire on April 23, have become no less discussed in the last three weeks. The fire started from the roof of the Vlasyevskaya tower of the Pskov Kremlin, in which the Belaya Rus restaurant was located, and then spread to the Rybnitskaya tower, Vremya Novostey reports. The burned-out tents can be restored, experts say, but this will require 22 million rubles. During the investigation into the circumstances of the fire, it turned out that even before this tragic event, the state of the Pskov ensemble was deplorable, although at the beginning of this year it became a candidate for the UNESCO World Heritage List. The newspaper "Pskov province" writes about it. Another fire happened in Omsk, where a residential building on the street. Mayakovsky, one of the first experimental cooperative houses built for Soviet workers in the 1920s and 1930s. This was reported by the Vesti TV channel and the Omsk Bulletin.
New tests await the long-suffering monument of federal significance - the island "New Holland" in St. Petersburg. In June, the city government is going to announce the third investment competition for the island's reconstruction project. During the "renovation", which continued after the victory of Norman Foster's project in the international competition in 2006 and before the bankruptcy of investor Shalva Chigirinsky, the ensemble had already suffered significant losses, including, for example, the shipbuilder Krylov's experimental pool and the building of the radio station during the First World War, which were mistakenly demolished. "Vremya novostei" and the portal "ZAKS.ru". But the main thing is that the implementation of the previous project was based on the temporarily operating regulations for the development of St. Petersburg, while now new rules for land use and development have been adopted, according to which the island fell into the protected zone. So there is no clarity as to what can be built in New Holland. The portal "Gazeta. SPb" tells about this in more detail.
The 30-year-old architect Fyodor Dubinnikov, winner of the Avangard Prize, gave an interesting interview to the Russian Reporter magazine. The young designer's view of the current state of Russian architecture cannot be called optimistic, alas. Another interesting conversation was published in the Expert magazine - the interlocutor of the publication was Vladimir Knyaginin, director of the Center for Strategic Research North-West Foundation, convinced that in the very near future the structure and face of the modern city will radically change.
On the eve of the May holidays in Moscow, two high-profile events took place in the field of restoration - the renovated Ukraine Hotel and the main facade of the Bolshoi Theater were opened. A monument of regional significance, the hotel has barely changed in appearance, except that the tower that collapsed in 2007 was restored. But inside the hall was completely rebuilt, and the pompous interior of Stalin's time was supplemented with a number of new sculptures and canvases, Izvestia writes. The main intrigue of the opening was the Moscow mayor's insistent recommendation to the owners of the hotel to return its historical name to it. “Rossiyskaya Gazeta” reminds that a few years ago the city authorities, for lack of money to upgrade “Ukraine”, thought to redesign the high-rise building into an office center. On the eve of May 9, the opening of the main facade of the Bolshoi Theater took place, which has returned to its historical golden-sand color. The Vremya Novostei newspaper tells in detail about the original plans of the architect Kavos and the still unfinished quadriga of Apollo.
The pre-holiday bustle and numerous city events slowed down any activity in the architectural field, including the exhibition. Only one small but curious exposition "Restoration of Northern Wooden Churches" opened in early May in the vestibule of the Church of the Holy Martyr Tatiana at Moscow State University, reports the portal "Tatyana's Day". In the Russian North, there are now about 300 wooden churches and about the same number of chapels, the portal of the architect Andrei Bode quotes, and almost all of them were abandoned. In the absence of a state program, only a private initiative can save them - the exhibition tells about the experience of such expeditions.
Touching upon the topic of places of worship, one of the main discussions of this year, the draft law on restitution, cannot be ignored. In an interview with Kommersant, Deputy Minister of Economic Development of the Russian Federation Igor Manylov spoke about a new draft federal law, which will be submitted to the State Duma in May. According to the official, now the bill is mainly focused on the mechanism for transferring real estate: the church will have the full right to dispose of buildings and land under it as it wishes, including leasing. Museum and cultural values stored in places of worship remain subject to protection legislation.
Summing up the first half of May, I must say that despite the abundance of weekends and holidays, the architectural community experienced sad news and unexpected blows. The sudden death of Sergei Kiselev was the main one. The defenders of historical Moscow were discouraged by the decision of the Moscow City Duma to adopt, despite numerous protests, an updated general plan. And the fire in the Pskov Kremlin once again demonstrated the deplorable state of the monuments of history and culture in the Russian Federation, even those who claim the status of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
