On Saturday, August 24, in the village of Zvizzhi, Kaluga region, the opening of the ArchKuznitsa festival took place. Participants presented 12 art objects made of metal, revealing the theme proposed by the curators - "Russian cosmism".
Petr Vinogradov and the Pro. Dvizhenie project are holding the ArchKuznitsa festival for the second time. In 2010, the "iron exposition" was located in Ulyanovsk, and now it has occupied the territory of the former machine operator's yard in the village of Zvizzhi near Nikola-Lenivets. The theme was thought up by the curators of the festival, and Nikolai Polissky became the ideological inspirer. Nikola-Lenivetsky Art Park invited the "Arkhkuznitsa", helped with the organization and provided materials - as in Nikola there is not only wood, but also metal.
It should be noted that the theme was born just three weeks before the opening of the festival, therefore, as the organizers admit, they themselves did not fully know what “Russian cosmism” was and how to express it in artistic and abstract forms. Projects were invented on the fly, in the process of implementation. Most of the participants had never worked with metal before, they studied on the spot. In parallel, the Pro. Dvizhenie project organized a series of lectures on the philosophy of Russian cosmism and a series of master classes on working with metal. Everything worked out: 12 metal objects scattered among the state farm ruins just like pieces of an orbital station. As the organizers say, the current "Arkhkuznitsa" is a reflection on the cosmic past of our country.
We present a detailed tour of the festival site with comments from the authors of the objects.
"Star"
Author: Evgeny Zhelvakov. By Peter Vinogradov:
“This is a very rectilinear object - a star falling from the sky to the earth. During the day it is harshly metallic, and at night, thanks to the illumination, it becomes ruby in color - like the Kremlin stars. In this project, we are, of course, ironic. I myself am an imperialist by nature, and as a curator I tried to ensure that our entire festival corresponded to these imperial sentiments. The five-pointed star is a symbol of the Soviet country, which disintegrated before our eyes, it is a memory of the past in which satellites and rockets were launched into space, and each time it was an event for the country."
"Cosmic felt boot"
Ivan Maksimov, Alexey Loptev, Anna Smirnova:
“Before, there was a rocket on the playground in every Soviet courtyard. We also decided to make a rocket, but in the form of a felt boot. We used the ancient Russian archetype, which we decided to launch into space. Russian cosmism is Tsiolkovsky and Fedorov. And they had an interesting and somewhat eccentric idea that you need to resurrect their fathers and send them into space. My father was an architect, my grandfather was a welder, and my great-grandfather was a feller. Metaphorically resurrecting our fathers, we made a space felt boot - an architectural and artistic object created by welding."
"Flying saucer"
Svetlana Mamchur, Vasily Tatarsky:
“There are several versions of the origin of this object. One of them is that the aliens, having visited the earth, copied various objects, including pots and spoons. But not finding use for them, they threw them back to the ground. The black box in the shape of a pan is a message from space that we have not yet opened. But seriously, our exposition is a response to the consumer society. We eat to live, not live to eat."
"DNA"
Nika Petrukhina, Vasily Tatarsky:
“The spiral is the symbol of the universe. The theme of Russian cosmism also touches on the theme of transformations, therefore our object can be viewed as a DNA spiral, which, having been in the universe, was transformed into a complex and abstract form. This is a rather intricate design, the tension angles have been precisely calibrated to achieve balance. All its constituent elements remain at a distance and are not attracted to each other, canceling earthly laws."
"Matryoshka"
Ilya Skuratov, Vladimir Treban:
“We have created a woman, a space matryoshka-capsule, which returned to earth after long wanderings in outer space. This is an artifact. We chose a well-known image, interpreted and geometrized it. The matryoshka is still in the process of assembling, we did not have enough time, working with thin and precise patterns made us nervous. At the moment, the staple and two main parts of the structure are ready - the head with an open fontanelle and the hips. The final should be a solid capsule made of iron - a material that is one of the most durable on earth."
"Telescope"
Arsenia Novikova, Petr Vinogradov, Yuri Getman, Alexander Yushkevich, Ilya Khvan, Ivan Lebedev:
“This is our curatorial experiment. We cut a telescope into the wall of one of the workshops so that it seemed as if it would pierce the building through and through. We wanted to create a very plastic object that, having flown from somewhere in space, would burst into our everyday life. Speaking about space archeology, we must not forget that we ourselves live in conditions of social archeology, on the ruins of the country. Once upon a time in this place tractors drove and cows grazed, today we came and created an art space on the ruins of the past."
"Satellite"
Timofey Shapkin, Anatoly Pryakhin, Alan Dzhibilov, Amir Kardanov:
“In 1957, this satellite flew into space, made a revolution around the earth, and everyone forgot about it. And today he was found, and not anywhere, but in the Kaluga region, in the homeland of Tsiolkovsky. During its flight, the satellite has significantly increased in size, but it has remained the same beautiful regular shape. We assembled it from sheets of bent metal, this is a special technology."
"Turbine"
Anna Andronova, Gulnas Khanzafarova, Sergey Romanov. By Peter Vinogradov:
“We assembled this object from rusted parts and wheels of an old tractor. We have been thinking about the useful and the useless on the scale of space. The result is an installation depicting the wreckage of a fantastic aircraft with a fragment of a wing. This is a dream of flying, a hint of science fiction, diluting the general festival mood of realism."
"Lighthouse"
Lydia Lesnyakova, Denis Knyrko, Anya Smirnova, Alexander Yushkevich:
“This is our reflection on the perception of the universe, space. Each of us perceives the world in his own way. Our object is a prism through which we look at the universe. You can enter inside the pyramid and look at the sky through the mirrors installed at its top. In addition, we made a labyrinth where everyone can find their own route, entrance and exit. It is a symbol of the search for your universe."
"Stella to Russian Cosmism"
Anatoly Pryakhin, Alan Dzhibilov, Amir Kardanov:
“The universal rocket is made of hay. The theme sounded like "Russian cosmism", and we decided to focus on the word "Russian", choosing the most authentic material that reflects the spirit of Russia. At the same time, we wanted the hay to float, so we tried to tear it off the ground. Unfortunately, the forces of gravity took over, and the fragments of our rocket fell to the ground rather chaotically. But at any moment the ship can be assembled and sent to space voyage."
"Antenna"
Andrey Sarom, Alexey Bachinsky:
“This is a staircase to the sky and at the same time an antenna that establishes communication with space. The higher you go, the more difficult the path, the steps of the staircase become narrower, and there is less and less oxygen. But with each step, everything earthly moves away, and a person gradually moves to a new spiritual level, which allows him to reach the sky. Striving for the sky - this is the philosophy of our project. And even if the staircase is made of earthy rusty rubbish, it can also become steps that bring us closer to space."
The results of the festival are commented by the curator Petr Vinogradov:
“In our project, we wanted to return to the undeservedly forgotten topic of space. The festival was held under the banner of "Russian cosmism". I cannot say that everything was successful, so far this is only a hint at the disclosure of a topic that is considered very superficially in art, not counting, of course, Malevich with his "Black Square". Today, the topic of cosmism is actively explored by Nikolai Polissky. Remember his works - "Universal Mind", "Large Hadron Collider", "Beaubourg". They are all a bit alien. Polissky suggested that we also experiment in this area. At first, we wanted to concentrate on space archeology, but then a more specific formulation was found with reference to Russian soil - “Russian cosmism”. The Russian man has always aspired to heaven. This is in our traditions, culture, faith: the resurrection of the soul, the trinity of God. In addition, we wanted to remind you of the Soviet era - the time when a Russian man first flew into space, and every boy dreamed of becoming an astronaut. It was the Russian people who gave humanity the dream of outer space. But today there is no dream left. The plastic world wins.
We had been planning this event for a long time, but we had neither the venue nor the funds to hold it. Nikolai offered to cooperate. The idea arose to turn the territory of "Mehdvor" in Zvizzhi into a permanent zone of carpentry and locksmith shops. And "Arkhkuznitsa" was supposed to be the first pilot project. We announced a competition for a project for the reconstruction and improvement of the territory in Zvizzhi. The competition was not very successful, but according to its results we were able to decide on the composition of the festival participants. Most of them are artists and designers, so this year the project turned out to be more artistic than architectural. Literally three weeks before the opening, a topic was found, lectures and master classes were held, all objects were invented and implemented. The work went on non-stop.
As for the future of "Arkhkuznitsa", this was the second and, most likely, the final festival. We are not planning to hold it in the future. However, there will definitely still be new and interesting projects. Today we are offered to become the curators of the site in Zvizzhi. All this is under discussion. But we liked working with Archpolis, and the platform worked perfectly. Nikolai Polissky invites us to explore other territories, for example Yekaterinburg or Perm, where there is a lot of destroyed industrial, in order to create art spaces in the environment, using existing objects. We intend to distribute the objects created within the framework of Arkhkuznitsa: something will be taken by our partner Hilti, and we will send something to Kaluga. The objects will live, and the territory will develop”.
