On May 23, the Third Moscow Architecture Biennale began its work under the motto "Identities". According to Bart Goldhoorn, curator of the Biennale, a multifaceted study of this topic "will lead to a discussion that can go beyond the preferences and intuition of one author and find the basis for the development of Russian architecture." Architectural critic Nikolai Malinin writes that even when entering the building of the Central House of Artists, visitors feel an identity with the national material - wood. There are exhibitions "ArchFarms" and Archiwood, and in the Muzeon Park there is a wooden pavilion "School". Nikolay Malinin talks about the main projects of the Biennale, saying that “this exhibition is the main holiday of our architecture. The holiday is not as a success or a triumph, but as something pleasantly regular, like the New Year. " But the architectural critic Grigory Revzin does not think so: "90% of the exhibition is building materials … The architecture here is on the side of the heat, and the heat is small and badly burnt." He writes that most exhibitions look cheap and of poor quality, while each of them, with appropriate funding, could be an event. The architectural critic singles out only four of the variety of exhibitions: "Complexity" by Levon Airapetov, Archiwood by Nikolai Malinin, Anatoly Belov's exhibition dedicated to an architectural competition at Skolkovo, and an exhibition of neoclassical architecture by Maxim Atayants. Grigory Revzin considers the latter to be the only serious project of Arch-Moscow. Architect Kirill Ass has compiled his rating of the most interesting events of the Biennale in the Big City magazine. Among them is the project "Identification", which is designed to reflect the identity of twenty leading Moscow architects, the project "Our Faith: Trends", dedicated to the three main (in the opinion of the curator of the Biennale) architectural trends of modernity, conventionally called "Complexity", "Historicism" and "Simplicity" … Kirill Ass also highlighted the exhibitions of 10 Swiss Architects, “The Kremlin. The Future That Didn't Happen”(in the Museum of Architecture) and Yuri Palmin's photo projects, of which only VDNKh's photographs remained at the exhibition. The Biennale will run until June 7.
And St. Petersburg is thinking about the development of the city. So, the governor of St. Petersburg Georgy Poltavchenko outlined the development paths of the northern capital, speaking with a report to the Legislative Assembly. On the one hand, it is planned to preserve the historical center, and on the other, to develop and redesign it. The most priority project today is the neighborhood renovation program, designed for tens of years. The first to fall under the program will be the territory bounded by Konyushennaya Square and the Field of Mars, as well as a quarter in the area of New Holland and the second stage of the Mariinsky Theater. Sergei Achildiev, a columnist for the 100TV channel, hopes that the program for preserving the historic quarters of St. Petersburg will be implemented, but he doubts that investors, in their desire to get the maximum profit, will abandon the idea of building in the city center.
The project of an elite residential complex "Embankment of Europe" and Boris Eifman's dance theater on the Petrogradskaya side, opposite the Spit of Vasilyevsky Island, may remain unrealized. The head of the Committee for Economic Development Yevgeny Yelin made a proposal to abandon the project. He believes that the appearance of a residential complex will spoil the view of the Rostral Columns and close the Prince Vladimir Cathedral, and proposes to create a park on this territory. According to one version, the idea to abandon the controversial project appeared in connection with the upcoming session of UNESCO, which will open in St. Petersburg at the end of June. Such a "PR move" is able to divert the attention of the session members from other pressing problems of the city. Another version refers to the alleged conflict of interests between the investor of the project, CJSC VTB-Development and Gazprom, which already owns a number of facilities near the territory of Naberezhnaya Evropy. According to the third version, Georgy Poltavchenko thus puts things in order in the city after the reign of Valentina Matvienko. Meanwhile, the investor has already held an architectural competition and received all the approvals. The competition was won by architects Yevgeny Gerasimov and Sergei Tchoban, who proposed to build a complex with a height of eight floors. It was assumed that the project worth 47 billion rubles will be fully completed in 2016. Currently, the demolition of the buildings of the State Institute of Applied Chemistry is nearing completion on the territory of the Embankment of Europe.
Despite the fact that in St. Petersburg many projects are "hanging" or are canceled altogether, there is no need to talk about a construction collapse, says Vyacheslav Semenenko, chairman of the construction committee of the St. Petersburg government. Although there are indeed difficulties for participants in the construction market. So, in recent years, the government has canceled many investment projects for the sake of creating green public areas. In addition, today the terms of building permits are not being extended and land planning projects (PTP) are not approved. Vyacheslav Semenenko said that in recent years PPTs have been adopted, providing for the construction of 40 million square meters. m of housing, in total in St. Petersburg 112 million square meters. m of housing. He is confident that a significant part of the AML will have to be revised.
Danish architect, urban design consultant Jan Gale will help Moscow develop a number of large-scale projects, the Izvestia newspaper writes. He will take part in the creation of concepts for the improvement of the central administrative district, the development of the metropolitan agglomeration and urban cycling infrastructure. The first step in his work in Moscow will be to determine the preferred type of riding: using a bicycle as a means of transportation on weekdays or only on weekends for relaxation. Then Ian Gale will formulate a concept for the development of cycling infrastructure and propose a timeline for its implementation. He sees the main problem of the capital in the wrong alignment of priorities - cars have an advantage in the city. And according to the urbanist, Moscow should become a city comfortable for people with a developed network of public spaces.
The list of monuments in Moscow may be replenished with another 60 historical buildings. Among these houses are the Narkomfin House on Novinsky Boulevard, the plane house on Donskoy Street, and an outbuilding of the mid-19th century next to the Church of the Resurrection in Kadashi. By the end of 2012 "Mosrestavratsia" will order a historical and cultural examination of these objects, on the basis of which the "tolerable" commission will decide whether to include these buildings in the register of cultural monuments. The city allocates almost 9 million rubles for work on all 60 objects.
About the exhibition-installation “Communal avant-garde. Social Utopia in the Architecture of the 1920s – 1930s”writes Izvestia. Artist Vladislav Efimov and photographer Sergei Leontiev introduce visitors to the industrial social cities Uralmash (Yekaterinburg) and Avtozavod (Nizhny Novgorod), based on the combination of the Russian avant-garde and "Stalinist style". The exhibition will run at the Multimedia Art Museum on Ostozhenka until June 10.
