Everyone has long been accustomed to the fact that it is not difficult to run the Central House of Artists in one day, but to comprehend or even learn what is where and what questions are answered is not work for the lazy. Many acquaintances admitted to me at Arch Moscow that it was impossible to understand it in one day, and even in a few days it was tiresome. Inevitably, for an exhibition of this scale, it turns out that its concept and plan, announced at the press conference, and the reality that the viewer faces are very different subjects. Some important things are hidden in the corners, some serious exposures turn out to be a small tablet on the wall. Of course, everyone himself distinguishes the essential from the unessential, but our reports are designed to facilitate this work for observers.
So, the main bridgehead of the second Moscow Biennale of Architecture is the Central House of Artists. The exposition is not that it has become smaller, but somehow more compact; in its non-commercial part, under the Dutch gaze of Bart Goldhoorn, the Arch of Moscow Biennale is stubbornly evolving towards an intelligent, utopian-ethical, and even pseudo-scientific content. Having started two years ago with the topic of improving urban space, the curator of the Biennale this time devoted an exhibition to the transformation of cities - that is, essentially the same, urbanism, which is still not enough in modern Russian practice (not to be confused with theory). But if two years ago the heroes of the exhibition were real projects and implementations, and the motto of their display was: even by building separate houses and quarters, we transform the urban environment around them, now, after the crisis, a lot has changed. Major projects, at least in Moscow, have calmed down, in places degenerating into scandals; so that at the exhibition - among Russians - utopian design and, as a result, youth are in the lead (the NEXT theme fell in love and took deep roots). The most realistic project looks like Perm, which has taken the most advantageous place for a reason. But let's start from the beginning, from the entrance.
