In 2016, wooden kiosks, benches, rescue towers and rather spacious tents for sunbathers appeared on the beaches and streets of Yevpatoria. Aleksey Komov says that this is just the beginning, the city has a positive attitude towards the design code and investors are happy to follow it, since a comfortable environment attracts more tourists and, of course, serves as a comfortable rest for the townspeople. Probably, this is just the beginning of work, but even now urban inclusions look no worse than some Moscow ones, and some - better. Although they are not at all expensive - there is little money, and in general it is difficult - Alexey admits. But the resort specificity has been taken into account, according to the architect, new objects literally grow from the history of the resort town. That can be recognized by looking at the pictures. Alexey told us in detail about his work and views on Crimea and life. And about my project at the Zodchestvo festival.
Alexey, you have been the chief architect since the end of 2014, and now, since September, you have been an advisor on architectural policy in Evpatoria. As your enthusiasm, hasn't it faded over the past period? In addition, you somehow mentioned that what you manage to do is generally a feat
- True love is a feat, self-sacrifice. I am a fanatic, monogamous, as I said two years ago before the first participation of Crimea at the All-Russian festival Zodchestvo 2014
in an interview with Archi.ru and now I will repeat myself: for me "Crimea is mine".
Those who come to Crimea now and do not feel its "nerve" are doomed to profanity and running in circles until they are completely exhausted, including moral, financial and reputation. Crimea is Solaris both in Lemu and Tarkovsky at the same time … You do not deal with it, but you.
The noosphere is millennia deep - he had everything and many times already, he grinded everyone and everything, remaining Crimea. Therefore, the one-sided extensive development approach to the "Crimean Territory" is definitely ineffective, as it eventually failed on the mainland. Working with the Crimean identity for me personally, which I wish to all my colleagues, requires a filigree approach, I have to get used to the metaphysics of Solaris “without a return ticket”, no matter how the Crimea frightens me with its transcendent irrationality.
Then, back in 2012, our "Kurortograd" was conceived as an educational project by three associates: me as an architect, as well as artist Andrey Yagubsky and art critic Nikolai Vasiliev. We tried to show, using the example of Evpatoria, the uniqueness of the legacy of the Soviet resort environment of Crimea, which was demonstrated by us in the first Crimean pavilion at Zodchestvo 2014. In the process, a large-scale study of Evpatoria grew into a movement and a working laboratory for studying the "genome" of the development of an ancient city with an architectural resource of the environment and territory depth of 2.5 millennia. The cultural landscape of Evpatoria is at the same time physical - it is absolutely man-made on the flat steppe coast. The human principle represents the humanitarian meaning of solving the puzzle of the city, which needs to remember itself: it has already had everything in history, and more than once. To get a complete diagnosis and begin city treatment, it was necessary to "live on both sides of the barricades" of the city structure. The experience and results appeared under my leadership: in 2015 I worked in the status of the chief architect of Evpatoria, now I am an advisor on architectural policy.
In extremely difficult, in general, unique conditions, regulatory archetypes were developed and implemented and objects of a single style of improvement of the resort area from the embankments and beaches to the historical center were developed, which throughout the city indicated in the minds of the townspeople a renewed tradition of landscaping as the # 1 tool of tactical urbanism transforming the environment of the Resort. The work continues today, right now. Looking back over the two-year journey, you acutely feel your personal, that very Crimean nerve: unconditional faith, without unnecessary illusions, my "pragmatic romanticism."
Very beautiful pavilions, so airy … They are imbued with a feeling of Soviet happiness, like all the symbols, and your logo is stylized as, I would say, the 1960s. This is a deliberate preference for the current pseudo-Soviet fashion - all these stylized soda water machines are also in Moscow. People love to remember the Soviet past from the cinema. You even have pictures stylized to match the color of the film "Prisoner of the Caucasus". Is it personal, or is it a general tendency, for example, in Crimea?
- I am an avant-garde traditionalist. This is an assembly of the resort's design code. It is important here not only to capture a specific style or spirit, but to create flexible tools. And for the Old Town, and for the Resort area, and for other places. This is the process of comprehending the Evpatoria style. The fact that I am a researcher allows me to speak the language of the resort town without stuttering.
Incidentally, surprisingly, you are right. The “Crimean resort style” was uniformly and simultaneously designed during the thaw period. Then everything was invented from the first graceful stops and bus stations to fonts on lemonades and city signs.
And "Prisoner", I must say, was filmed in the Crimea, and not in the Caucasus …
Why not come up with a completely different image now instead of retro?
- It's not retro, not at all; there are no direct analogs. This is a respectful attitude towards the Crimean architectural tradition. The Crimean architectural paradigm is that architecture is not the main thing here, it should be in third place. The main thing is "Nature", that same landscape identity. I do not deal with "objects" in Evpatoria, I deal with the environment. Someone sees retro, someone is avant-garde, someone does not see it at all, but enjoys the atmosphere of the city as a whole and the sea. And that's great. I am dissolved in tradition, it is the avant-garde for me today. In this I agree with my friend, colleague and like-minded person Stepan Lipgart. He has already visited me several times.
And Alexander Lekaye and Azat Romanov, we are working on a new image as part of the development of the project"
Crimean Historical Transport System.
They say that you were recently invited to Sevastopol, and how do you like it?
- Yes, it was. For an architect-researcher, Sevastopol is, in principle, a dream city, or, to be more precise, a realized post-war dream of architects and city planners, a phenomenal polis! In fact, the capital of Russian identity and Crimean style. But it is paradoxical: in Yevpatoria there is now much more “true Sevastopol” in the urban environment than in Sevastopol itself, where the environment is catastrophically disorganized.
It turns out that watching the seething in Sevas today is as "exciting" as following the ups and downs of some championships with standings and tables. Everything and everyone is on the defensive against each other, inside and outside. Only the City itself is an orphan, no matter what it has to do with it, in the background, by itself, with its stones.
The Republic of Crimea is quieter, without a championship, without heat and exaltation.
And for me, first of all, the team, interaction with the architectural community, promotion and development of a truly unique urban style and its environment, in addition to, of course, the general plan and operational routine, is important. How these conditions can be met for a "tournament without rules" - the questions are no longer for me.
How is architecture now in general and how are architects living in Crimea?
- Speaking personally on my own: it's not easy. Crimea needs the support of the Russian architectural workshop more than ever, and not "endless talking shops" in the hope of snatching a federal order. It is necessary to be more active, without a fig in your pocket, in fact, to include Crimean specialists in the work; broad analytics under the auspices of the CAP are in great demand, as well as a stake on Crimean youth who have completed training or gained real experience on the mainland. The stage of playful "patting on the shoulder" is long gone.
Architecture everywhere, unfortunately, is a hostage to the momentary benefits of the construction complex, and here in Crimea even more so in its hermetic conditions, but Architecture is able to guide and unite cities, contributing to social, spiritual and psychological needs. And in Crimea, as in a magnifying mirror, everything is extremely convex and obvious.
The development of modern Crimean settlements outside the environment, outside the priorities, outside the laws makes the cities essentially nobody's: it is impossible to store, protect, develop - and it is only possible to continue to parasitize until complete physical and social devastation from season to season.
Two basic values that are categorically impossible to "break on the knee", as is often accepted in our country, and through which the territory influences people who, ideally, are its own products. Natural Crimean priority number one - "landscape identity"! The second is the Cultural priority in the spatial development of the Crimean city, this is the Tradition factor, the anthropomorphic “spirit of the place”: a thousand-year heritage and continuity, a mosaic of styles, a complex architectural code …
You can walk in circles for a long time, pray and chant mantras for future general plans and socio-economic strategies, but if you do not understand the root priorities of the territory, not a single Crimean city will ever become “your own and disinterested”. Especially now, when the dangerous gap between the routine urban operating system of the Crimean municipalities and the strategic horizon without being filled with visual tactics “here and now” is dangerously widening.
It is tactics that links the strategic and operational levels. Not from "fat", as on the mainland, but real tactical urbanism. By the way, at the last Zodchestvo 2015, I curated the exposition, which was called “The Realities of Tactical Urbanism of Crimea”.
In the Crimean resort town, as, for example, in Evpatoria, quick and high-quality implementations based on regulations, improvement rules, such as shady awnings and comfortable benches, can significantly change the psychological atmosphere. High-quality, tangible in time results of the improvement of the environment - for people! - should be set as an urgent management goal, where the social task is to reduce the level of social discomfort. Then the urban consciousness "gives a head start" for the implementation of long and busy infrastructure projects with medium and long-range strategic flights.
What will you show at Zodchestvo 2016? What is the difference between Evpatorium and Territorium? What will the Union of Young Architects of Crimea show?
- The EVPATORIUM is the cornerstone of our Urban Practices course. So, it was possible to unite the architectural youth on the platform of the TERRITORIUM summer school with the Evpatoria theme as a super idea: to come up with and develop real products of the urban environment, of different scales and typologies, and on the basis of the technology of wooden construction and housing construction, which can be seen and touched.
All projects of the EVPATORIUM are real: from the Literary Square to the Eastern Bazaar.
Resolute activism alone, even backed by resources, is not enough, it is a widespread illusion - there is always a need for professionals, “commissioners of development from the machine” with experience who can show, explain how it works, how it works, what is good and what is bad.
An amazing thing: everyone at all times complains about young people; "Guard and horror". That they say she is not what she is, and not the same as before. But I am always confident in her, without whining and lamentations. You just need to be able to patiently charge with mutual faith in the art of architecture, in its incredible drive to create.
In our groups there were architectural youth from Moscow and Crimea, Siberia and Altai, Kazan … Here it is Russia - its artistic and intellectual perky frame. Without false pathos, chattering and falsehood - just a living "architectural rock and roll", a real avant-garde.
Using a live example of work in Evpatoria, we managed to "light up" the guys and, most importantly, to show them in development real work with the territory, and how to make working environment products in an extremely difficult situation. The children return to their universities, to their educational process, infected with the life-giving bacilli of the "direct action architecture".
We plan to build one of the objects with the help of NLK-Domostroenie in the courtyard of the fifth building of Trekhgorka during the festival. Inside the pavilion, we will show interesting Yevpatoria projects of graduate students from Moscow Moscow Architectural Institute and Stroganovka, and Kazan KGASU, and after the festival, the structure will go to Crimea for permanent deployment.
Does NLK-Domostroenie help you in everything, or just do an exhibition at Zodchestvo? How extensive is the range of this collaboration?
- NLK-D has been helping for the second year in the preparation of structures for expositions at Zodchestvo. Also, in a number of Crimean projects, we used their powerful engineering resources. This is a great intellectual collaboration, where Konstantin Blinov and Semyon Goglev should be separately mentioned. They help a lot, from design calculations to the supply of raw materials. In Crimea, it is bad with a well-prepared tree.
"Kuryokhin's Arch" is being built on Tregorka, and then where?
- After the exhibition, the arch will be dismantled and transported to Lenin Park in Evpatoria.
Tell us about the Territorium, what is it?
- The TERRITORIUM itself was born in my head right after last year's Architecture from the retrospective of "Kurortograd". With associates Nikita Asadov, a comrade and an architectural ascetic, whose contribution to the Russian architectural movement will still be appreciated, as well as Konstantin Blinov, an engineering educator, a representative of NLK-Domostroenie, the TERRITORIUM was conjectured and launched in Kazan last November. In 2016 there was Peter, Altai after connecting ArchKovorking and in the person of the tireless Pavel Sonin.
Initially, the idea of the TERRITORIUM was simple: it is by no means an "author's firm", but a union of associations with the function of a tactical assault force. Exhibition, lectures from "machine tool development commissioners", architects with real passionate field experience, which they share during seminars and workshops. Realization of the idea of the Asadov brothers live - "From event to space." It is necessary to go to the regions, attracting talented youth not to the center, but by developing the country's intellectual framework based on the identities of different territorial architectural schools and even styles. This is true patriotism, not waving flags and beating tambourines. A sense of the country, involvement and continuity, otherwise why should everything?
Once in the fall of 2014, our Kurortograd held the very first workshop in Crimea, in Evpatoria, and now it is a real toolkit for uniting young Crimean architects themselves, which can be seen with our own eyes in the exposition of the Union of Young Architects of Crimea, which I am very happy about. The exhibition is also curated by me together with the Simferopol architect Kirill Babeev. It is important for me to participate in the EVOLUTION archschool with Peter Vinogradov, which will also be powerfully represented, closing our common active poles.
You see, there is a small but important number of people who attract young people around them, who create a passionary whirlpool, and implement projects that are necessary for territories and people. But by and large, everyone is disunited, each on his own hummock is a sandpiper, crushed by the psychology of survival of a small shopkeeper, while everyone is also afraid of “non-architects” who easily rake in the heat with trained hands.
To be honest, global unification is inevitable if we remember how and from what the Union of Architects arose back in 1932. The mobilization model of the unification of the “new thirties” is a given, but how and by whom it will be implemented is a question for the upcoming congress. But the Union of Architects cannot be ruined, then everything is instantly covered, and finally.
But I am not a lonely pragmatic romantic, this is my hope and my faith without illusions, and love as a feat, of course.
Photos: Alexey Komov, Alexander Semenchenko, Victoria Serebryanskaya
