Archi.ru:
Evgeny Ass told in an interview to Archi.ru about his desire to organize a course of architectural criticism at the MARCH school: “… in our opinion, this is exactly what we are noticeably lacking today. This is an architectural journalism and criticism course. The fact is that those people who call themselves architectural critics, for the most part, can hardly claim this title. We hope that we will be able to attract a sufficient number of interested persons who, before taking up the pen, would like to get a deeper acquaintance with the subject of modern architecture, its problems and at the same time master the skills of describing and interpreting architecture. " If we develop his thought, it turns out that now we have practically no architectural criticism or critics. Do you agree with this?
Olga Kabanova:
- Evgeny Ass is a well-known perfectionist. I remember when I was not yet what I would consider myself an architectural critic, but simply wrote to one of the newspapers about architecture that is understandable for everyone, Zhenya reproached me that I was writing wrong, because he was inspired by the wind, landscape, light, and so it was image, idea. But if I wrote about light and wind, not a single newspaper would take the text from me. I was writing about architecture at Kommersant in the early 1990s, after working in the magazine Architecture of the USSR, an architectural boom was approaching, but still the topic was not interesting to anyone. If Alexei Tarkhanov, head of the culture department of Kommersant, had not been a Moscow Architectural Institute graduate, then no one would have written about architecture. There was no demand for criticism, because for a Soviet person, Soviet newspapers wrote only about achievements - successfully built complexes, and no architectural criticism, with rare exceptions. Any new building was perceived as inevitable - the fall of a meteorite or a flying saucer: the party and the government gave us this chest in the form of the Moscow Palace of Youth, and nothing can be done about it. What is there to discuss? There was no such criticism as in Europe or Russia before the revolution. Russian pre-revolutionary architectural criticism was, by the way, free, linguistic, although certain things now seem excessive to us, for example, the terrible "watering" of modernity, which destroyed the estate of Moscow. They wrote a lot - before the revolution there was also a construction boom - that new houses are crumbling because they are poorly built, and everything there has been plundered. Here the national tradition can be traced.
Do you need architectural criticism now? Of course, it is necessary, because it is necessary to comprehend what is happening, and society is already ready to talk about architecture. But since people involved in the construction business do not need it, who will pay for it? An architectural community that needs its own table of rank and its exemplary level - but there are no resources. And with the publication of commercial architectural projects, interiors, everything is simple: the author pays for the text.
It turns out that now the key character for the professional press is the construction industry. And society mainly reads the civil press, newspapers, and even if it is ready to accept criticism, there is still no explicit request for it - and therefore there are very few articles of architectural critics there
- In newspapers, and I have been working there for 20 years, everything is simple: the cultural departments are the burden for the publication, because newspapers support themselves through advertising, and cultural institutions do not provide advertising. Unless there are applications that relate to the architectural and construction complex: sometimes there are architectural reviews there. There is only one Grigory Revzin, he managed to make architectural criticism interesting for everyone, although he also went into journalism.
I stopped writing about architecture at the very end of the 1990s, the main reason is the senselessness of this occupation. When I once again cited a quote from Brodsky "And as for the ugliness of proportions, then a person does not depend on them, but more often on the proportions of ugliness" and realized that she fully describes the situation, then I started other things. What is the point of talking about form when all around is violation of elementary laws. They steal everything - especially space. The house climbs over the red line and fills the entire plot, it is higher than the norm in terms of number of storeys, because investors need to return their bribes to the permitting and approving structures. Once upon a time, the previous chief architect of Moscow, Alexander Kuzmin, complained to me that they approve one project at the architectural council, and then see that a completely different one has been implemented. In this situation, it makes no sense to talk about the wind blowing, the play of scales. I hope that now the situation will change (although it seems to me that it is not changing very much), the new Moscow government is doing something according to European standards and wants to bring the city into our century, because it is insanely behind, primarily in terms of the quality of life. But even when you have a new iPad in your hands and you are watching high-tech movies, you cannot rejoice in Luzhkov's architecture with balusters.
In the 1990s, we had some hopes and beginnings. I wrote for Kommersant, Revzin wrote for Nezavisimaya Gazeta, wrote Rustam Rakhmatullin, Irina Korobyina created the Architectural Gallery in reality, and then a television program. We even wanted to establish an award on behalf of architectural critics, not a monetary one, but simply an honorary one. We talked about the need for open tenders and publicity in decision-making. Sobering up came quickly - the wonderfully organized competition for the new building of the Mariinsky Theater did not bring happiness. Our society did not need a competition, and our architects did not seek to share orders.
In the magazine "Architecture of the USSR" I was in the column "Chronicle", there short reviews of new buildings were written by Eugene Ass and Alexander Rappaport, it was a very high level. It seemed that everyone understood everything: solve everything right now, and happiness will immediately come. But it turned out that everything went wrong again.
That is, it turns out that criticism is directly dependent on the situation in society. Perhaps we can say that in Soviet times it was a little more cultured than in the 1990s?
- In the Soviet years, the quality of construction was terrible. The main censor was the construction complex, which also wanted to build cheaply, quickly and badly, which destroyed all the complexities and excesses of projects. The arrival of Turkish builders seemed like a breakthrough. Of course, I love some of the buildings of Brezhnev's modernism, in the quarters built in the 1970s there was a reasonable layout, social problems were solved. But there was almost no architecture as art, a plastic embodiment of the ideal of the time. Although the spirit of the times has been embodied: theft, the regime of malicious economy and “don't give a damn about quality” are read.
Architectural criticism, as a consequence of architecture, is not the work of one person, it is the result of the development of society. At some point, I also realized that as long as there is no public reaction, nothing will happen, and this reaction, thank God, began to appear - whether good or bad, is another question. The wonderful Leningrad residents, discussing the competition for the project of the 2nd stage of the Mariinsky Theater, wrote about Dominique Perrault that he did not take into account the Russian winter with snow, they could not even imagine that someone would calculate the strength of the roof. On the other hand, because of the protests of the residents, they still did not erect a "primus monument" at the Patriarch's Ponds, and it is right when people protect their playground or garden from commercial construction.
What, in your opinion, is the reason for such indifference to architecture (even if it is gradually disappearing). After all, art criticism continues to exist successfully. Or, for example, reviews of opera performances: not everyone loves opera, but at the same time texts appear, critics, albeit few, exist
- There are always enough ambitious and talented people for any profession. We're talking a little about something else. An opera performance exists when opera exists as an art, and when it provides opportunities, material for criticism. There is almost no purely operatic criticism, but there are music critics who deal with classical music in general. Our performing arts remain at a very high level. Also, music critics write a lot about foreign opera productions and performers. In the same way, if it were not for foreign architecture, what would we do with our architectural criticism. And the main reading of the Soviet architect was the Domus magazine in the library, not "Architecture of the USSR".
Criticism exists when there is material to facilitate its development. But in general it is difficult to be a critic, no one likes them, film critics, for example, hate rental offices. My colleague in the department of culture, which reviews cinema, writes mainly about Western films, about great directors: where art itself is traced, and the reflection of mass culture, ideological and public expectations and ideas. No matter how much I love and respect Yevgeny Ass, the problem of Russian architectural criticism is, of course, not only the problem of educating people.
What language should an architectural critic speak with a reader?
- When I came to the "Architecture of the USSR", a professional magazine, it took me more than one year to get into architectural topics and vocabulary, I read a lot, talked a lot with architects. But then I had to appeal to the general reader, write much easier than I can, and forget a lot of what I learned. I wanted to be understood not by architects. At the same time, if musical or literary experiences are professionally reflected, then in architectural criticism I see very little reflection, spatial experiences. Here Ass is quite right about language and interpretation.
When I arrive in Paris, I go to the Palais Royal garden. Why do I feel so good there? Because this rectangle is calmly symmetrical, it is large enough to feel free there, but also chamber enough to feel protected. When a person says to me: “I don't understand anything about architecture,” I answer that everything is simple: when you come to Cathedral Square, you feel great there. And in the square of the old Italian city you are overwhelmed with delight. What is there to understand? You have to feel. Architects are very fond of talking about a building: "in plan" it is … But when a person comes there, he does not understand what is there "in the plan", he does not see this plan. Therefore, it seems to me that the main thing for an architectural critic is not only erudition and education, but the ability to reflect, analyze feelings.
This is a sensual and instinctively understandable sensation for everyone, these arguments about the architecture of happiness that makes us happy. It may not be a brilliant architect at all …
- Or a brilliant architect, which you may not like, but he amazes you, and you do not understand him, and you are angry, and you think … There may be different emotions, but they must be. There are very few cities where everything is harmonious and dramatic.
- Now in Moscow there are social movements advocating a comfortable urban space. There is a chief architect who would like to do everything in our country according to European standards. Everyone has been abroad and knows how everything works there and what they want to get here. However, despite this revival, major critics, including you, almost stopped writing about architecture, and new names do not appear, the same is happening with publications. What is the reason for this decline in architectural journalism?
- I think this is due to the difficult situation in the press in general: without a broad context, nothing will be clear. Now the publications are being closed for political and censorship reasons. Perhaps they will even return to architecture, since it will be very difficult to write about politics. Maybe it even helps architectural criticism in some way. By the way, under Luzhkov there was strict censorship in all Moscow publications: it was impossible to write about the new Moscow architecture, no reflections were allowed. The decline of the architectural press is also associated with the fact that now only shopping centers are being actively built, here it is pure commerce. I rarely write about architecture, but I will definitely write what the new building of the Tretyakov Gallery will be like, the facades of which were made by Sergei Tchoban, because it is interesting and there is something to talk about.
What, in your opinion, is the task of architectural criticism?
- When I switched to a Soviet architectural magazine from an art magazine, my friends felt sorry for me, because architects are idiots. I objected: architects are beautiful, witty, well-dressed people. "Well, you see what they are building!" In post-Soviet times, I was also told that they are idiots, because "you see what they have built!" And if they are not idiots, then they are cynical and unprincipled people. It is very difficult to explain that architects are not the problem.
One society, for example, under the pharaohs, gives birth to the Egyptian pyramids, another, absolutism - baroque. And the task of critics may be to study what is born and why. Architecture is now rarely - "frozen music", and not even "frozen ideology", but often - just outright cynicism. Like art, architecture is a formula, a hieroglyph, a plastic equivalent of the state of society. Including, this is the state of industry, technology; the power of technology, and not just the power of the mayor, public or municipal, the power of the people in democratic countries: technologies, complexes, money are in power. Reading a city is fantastically interesting, and I absolutely love telling people how to read it. After all, we have no other environment than the one where we live.
