The creative biography of Ivan Vladislavovich Zholtovsky (1867-1959), a renowned architect and connoisseur of Italian architecture, has repeatedly attracted the attention of researchers, and nevertheless, the master's works are still fraught with many architectural mysteries and paradoxes.
In 1926, Zholtovsky returned from a three-year trip to Italy on the eve of the spread of world art deco fashion and a change in style trends in Europe and the USA. In the USSR, neoclassicism (or rather neo-Renaissance stylization) received support at the highest, state level - Zholtovsky was entrusted with the construction of the State Bank building, 1927-28.1 The master's style was academic (and, one might say, old-fashioned compared to the innovations of the 1910s), but modern, similar to the neoclassical style of the United States, designed to reach the heights of European culture. There were similar motives in the USSR, only Iofan had to surpass the towers of New York, Zholtovsky - the ensembles of Washington. And it is precisely the compositional and plastic comparison with the neoclassicism of the United States that makes it possible to assess the peculiarity of Zholtovsky's manner.
Soviet architecture of the 1930s-1950s was not a single style, and both Art Deco and neoclassicism (historicism), which were awarded at the Palace of Soviets competition, allowed Moscow to compete with the architectural capitals of Europe and the United States. In New York, the competition between the two styles began in the 1920s (these are the works of R. Walker and T. Hastings, K. Gilbert and R. Hood), and Soviet architects used the same style techniques in the 1930s, the colonnades of the Halicarnassus mausoleum, Art Deco ribbed slabs. Monuments of two styles grew side by side, and just as in Chicago the high-rise building of the Stock Exchange was adjacent to the neoclassical Municipality, so in Moscow, for in-person comparison by the customer, the Neopalladian creation of Zholtovsky was erected in 1934 simultaneously and next to the ribbed building of A. Ya. Langman's service station. [fig. one]
The house on Mokhovaya became a key monument in the development of Soviet neo-Palladianism; it is a tuning fork of taste and architectural and construction quality. However, in the buildings of Zholtovsky one can feel not only reliance on the powerful Italian culture, but also familiarity with the experience of the United States. The grandiose City Hall in Chicago (1911) is striking in its scale, the contrast of the order of six floors and orthogonal window openings (or, as in other cases, a mullion on the floor). This is how Zholtovsky thought, this is the style of the house on Mokhovaya Street, the buildings of the State Bank and the Institute of Mining. [fig. 2, 3, 4]
The resolution of the Council for the Construction of the Palace of Soviets (February 28, 1932) stated that the search for Soviet architects should have been "directed to the use of both new and the best techniques of classical architecture, while relying on the achievements of modern architectural and construction techniques."2 And therefore, in the context of winning the ribbed version of Iofan at the Palace of Soviets competition, Zholtovsky needed to emphasize not the Palladian roots of his style, but the overseas ones.3
After the competition for the Palace of Soviets, Zholtovsky (in comparison with L. V. Rudnev or I. A. Golosov) builds a little in Moscow, only a house on Mokhovaya (1933-34). Unlike I. A. Fomin, he does not participate in the competition for the building of the NKTP (1934), and is not noticeable in the work on theaters and administrative centers of the capitals of the union republics. As his mission, he saw a massive retransmission of classical Italian culture, Zholtovsky introduces a fashion for the Renaissance, for the ocher gamut of Tuscany. However, this aesthetics was not generally accepted in the 1930s, it did not affect the style of B. M. Iofan and L. V. Rudnev, I. A. Golosov and I. A. Fomin.
The neo-Renaissance school did not dominate either before the revolution or in the 1930s-1950s.4 So, for example, the style of the students of the Moscow Architectural Institute and the graduate school of the Academy of Architecture in 1935-36 turned out to be close to the experiments of I. A. Golosov. After the war, the neo-Renaissance style was not adopted either for high-rise buildings, or for the metro or pavilions of the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition. The leadership of the Zholtovsky school is felt not due to the number of its creations, but due to the unconditional artistic quality. The Moscow neo-Renaissance school was not numerous in comparison with American neoclassicism, and nevertheless, it was Zholtovsky and his followers who implemented some of the most striking images of the 1930s in the Soviet and world context.
An example for the Moscow neo-Renaissance school is the American architecture of the 1900-10s, the development of Park Avenue in New York, the work of McKim, Mid & White, which made ten copies of Italian palazzo (for example, the Tiffany building in New York, 1906, reproducing the Venetian Palazzo Grimani).5 The architecture of the USA provoked, convinced the client of the artistic effectiveness of his neoclassical choice. And the design of the Palace of Soviets, and residential buildings of increased comfort (since 1932), and then of Moscow high-rise buildings - all this, judging by the results, was accompanied by a demonstration to the customer of an album of foreign analogues. The new goal of Soviet architecture is to return to pre-revolutionary and foreign standards of architectural and construction quality, and this was exactly what was guaranteed in cooperation with Zholtovsky.
The works of the master give the impression of being created before the revolution, and just as the masters of Art Nouveau turned to the medieval heritage of the Russian north and Scandinavia, Zholtovsky recalled the motives of the Italian Renaissance. However, St. Petersburg did not know 9-storey residential buildings 100 meters long. Such housing was built in the 1910s only overseas.6 And if in the 1890s the architects of the Chicago school, observing the true abundance, plastic complexity and size of the original sources, decorated their 15-20 storey buildings entirely, then in the 1920s and 1930s this convinced (first F. Sawyer, and E. Roth, and then Zholtovsky) in the admissibility of saving money and efforts, and in the rate only on certain nodes and accents. All this made the works of Zholtovsky (as well as the neo-Renaissance school in general) quite modern, artistically relevant.
With the increase in the number of storeys, the joining of several windows by the casing was a logical innovation in American architecture (for the first time such a solution, imbued with a neo-Renaissance spirit, was proposed by the architect R. Robertson back in 1894).7 The method of alternating a window with and without a casing was suggested by all the experience of architecture of the 1900-20s, from St. Petersburg Art Nouveau and American neoclassicism to the Italian buildings of the 1920s.8 And therefore, working on the facades of residential buildings on Smolenskaya Square (1940-48) and on Bolshaya Kaluzhskaya Street (1948-50), Zholtovsky subtly nuances the amount of decor, without going over the measure known to him. However, the rhythm and pattern of platbands in the master's works acquired some new sound. [fig. 5, 6]
Using the contrast of the background wall and the richly decided accent, and combining the casing of the two floors, Zholtovsky, however, took his own steps to the top of art. In the decor of residential buildings on Smolenskaya Square. and on Kaluzhskaya st. he recalls the motives of the Quattrocento (architraves of the Scuola di San Marco and the Koleoni Chapel in Bergamo), and thereby greatly enhances the artistic effect. [fig. 7, 8] And if the residential buildings of the 1910s built on Park Avenue in New York, being one and a half to two times taller than the Renaissance palazzo, could no longer become their copies, then Zholtovsky's buildings were closer to Italian prototypes. The grandiose cornices and rusts of Florentine palaces could be used in full size, since the nine-story residential building coincided in height with the three-tiered Italian palazzo.
The perception of a residential building as a kind of integrity, a monolith (inherent in Art Nouveau), combined in the works of Zholtovsky with the idea of "reconstruction" of the Renaissance image for the utilitarian tasks of the Soviet state. Only instead of the village house, which was so favored by the Northern Art Nouveau, Zholtovsky used Italian palazzo as the basis, so the building of the State Bank was “built” into the Palazzo Piccolomini in Pienza.9 Discovered by the masters of Art Nouveau and American neoclassicism, this method was universal, the ancient image was "projected" onto the required number of storeys. And if the neoclassical skyscrapers of E. Roth (or the building of the New York City Council, 1913) were already far from the classics (not details, but images), then Zholtovsky, recalling the bell towers of the Renaissance, for example, when working on the project of the tower of the House of Unions (1954), was methodically close to the founders of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Building in New York (1909).10 Record in height (213 m) from 1909-13, this building apparently took the form of the Venetian Campanile of San Marco.11 [fig. 9, 10, 11]
Zholtovsky and his followers relied not on the invention of beauty, but on its brilliant performance, on the knowledge of the eternal values of Italian art.12 In the 1930s, working with them allowed one to free oneself, go unnoticed, and enter the world of genuine culture. This demand for convincing, artistically accurate stylization brought the master closer to the modern era (and more broadly in the 1900-10s). Attention to the measurements of ancient structures, the accuracy of their execution in new buildings - all this seemed to be common for the master and his colleagues from the United States. However, Zholtovsky allowed within the quotations those changes and mannerisms that the neoclassicists of the United States did not think of. As when creating a theatrical scenery, Zholtovsky allowed himself to joke and be non-trivial within harmony, freely combine, vary motives and even move away from Italian samples.13
Such playfulness, theatricality in the Soviet and world context was distinguished only by Zholtovsky.14 He carries the Renaissance images deliberately past the "palladium" norm. And this is the great paradox of Italian art itself - miniature and grandiose,15 hypertrophied and refined, harmonious - all this in Italy argues in one artistic space, in the drawing, scale and proportions of neighboring buildings held together by time. This was known to Zholtovsky not from books and retellings, but from numerous trips.16
The goal of the master is not just Palladianism, but an authentic Renaissance stylization, using, among other things, Italian motive, plastic deviations from the order canon. This was the fundamental difference between Zholtovsky's neoclassicism and eclecticism and normative neoclassicism of the 1900-10s, domestic and foreign. In the USA, in the 1900s and 1930s, a special kind of neoclassicism acquired the features of the state style. Anonymous in the exact reproduction of measurements of the Renaissance and antiquity, this style was conventional - created at the expense of an enlightened society, it had to be truly antique, and not the author's. In addition, the normality of this style (for example, at McKim, Mid & White) was caused by the high pace and enormous volumes of design and construction. Zholtovsky, unlike Fomin (or the builders of Washington), did not strive to create monumental neo-antique complexes. He was fascinated by two centuries of the Italian Renaissance, from Brunelleschi to Palladio. But before the revolution, and in the era of the proletarian dictatorship of the 1920s and 1930s, the brutal monumentalism of Fomin, Rudnev and Trotsky, in the 1930s clearly bearing the features of totalitarian aesthetics, could seem to be a stronger rival of the avant-garde. However, Zholtovsky took the quattrocento as the basis of his style, took a chance and succeeded, finding his own niche, unique and even lonely in the Soviet and world context.
Zholtovsky's works were playful and individual, so in the house of the Authorized Central Executive Committee in Sochi (1935), the master creates the sharpest intersection of images, baroquely torn pediments of the Aldobrandini villa were adjacent to the three-risalite scheme of the Palladian villa Barbaro, a neo-antique portico and pilasters. And if Italian architects (including A. Brazini, A. Mazzoni, etc.) in the 1930s had already moved away from canonical decorativeness, then Zholtovsky still demonstrated excellent possession of an authentic order, powerful, like F. Juvarra (in the Turin Basilica of Superga) and refined, as in the antique temple of Augustus in Pula.17 In 1936 he created projects for the Institute of Literature and the House of Culture in Nalchik (together with G. P. Golts), in 1937 - a project for a theater in Taganrog.18 Unfortunately, these projects have remained on paper. Nevertheless, the mid-1930s became the culmination of the master's work. Comparison of Zholtovsky's Sochi masterpiece with A. Melon's three-risalit building in Washington (architect A. Brown, 1926) clearly demonstrates the style of the master. Complex beauty of motives and proportions, associative play, rare drawing of details - this is Zholtovsky's architectural style. [fig. 12, 13]
The turn from abstract neo-Palladianism to the free stylization of the Quattrocento, notes the NKVD residential building on Smolenskaya Square (1940-48). [fig. 14, 15] Started before the war, it was full of mysteriously non-trivial solutions - this is an intermittent cornice (for the first time such, a la Palazzo Strozzi, the cornice was used in the building of the State Bank), a knocked down corner balcony and a tower, an unequal step of platbands of a unique pattern (house on Smolenskaya, he combined two images from Ferrara, the balcony of the Palazzo dei Diamanti and the casing of the Palazzo Roverella). And so it could have been carried out even before the revolution.19 So the balcony of the Bologna palazzo Fava (made by Zholtovsky in a house on Dmitriy Ulyanov Street) in the 1910s was used twice by the builders of St. Petersburg.20 [fig. 16] Canonical and counter-canonical, all this, imbued with the Italian spirit, was created taking into account the experience of modernity, its addiction to syncope, the desire to surprise with erudition and fantasy. Zholtovsky's buildings seem to say that the artistry of Italian art is broader than the "palladium" norm. And therefore, such a synthesis of free-thinking and harmony was not afraid of either a large-scale lag behind American neoclassicism, or chronological. Such was the master's excellent knowledge of Italian architecture, such was Zholtovsky's "living classic" in the terminology of SO Khan-Magomedov.
The house on Smolenskaya Square embodied an incredible knowledge of the Italian order canon, and at the same time freedom from it. The tower of the house on Smolenskaya is believed to have been woven from obvious quotes, but one cannot fail to notice the obvious changes introduced by Zholtovsky (distinguishing him from, for example, the authentic neo-Renaissance of the McKim, Mead and White firm).21 This is neither a Florentine lantern, nor a Seville tower - this is a monument to the free transformation of the motive without discarding the image. [fig. 17] The demonstrative non-tectonicity of platbands, variability and lack of relief in them (in contrast to the monumentalism of the 1910s) - all this strengthened the distinct impression of theatricality, bringing the master closer to the modern era. Zholtovsky's houses were as if created for the heroes A. N. Benois and K. A. Somov. And therefore, the remark of V. A. Vesnin about the musketeer in the house on Mokhovaya, perhaps, would have become the best epigraph to all of Zholtovsky's work, such was the artistic task of the master.22
The beauty of Zholtovsky's projects and buildings is especially striking in the conditions of the proletarian dictatorship, in the era of massive demolitions of genuine architectural monuments, the planting of socialist realism and the "taste" of the customer. Zholtovsky did not have this all-pervading simplification or harsh militaristic imagery at all. Nevertheless, he was the first in post-revolutionary Russia to implement the classical order (State Bank), then the largest order in Moscow (house on Mokhovaya), the longest cornice (house on Smolenskaya) and the widest portico (Institute of Mining). It is obvious that these high-quality buildings, as well as the metro and high-rise buildings, performed a compensatory function in the USSR during the years of famine and repression. And if in their projects the era of the 1930s nevertheless managed to be utopianly beautiful, irrational and therefore artistically meaningful, then the post-war years were to a large extent imbued with the spirit of state wealth, typification and economy. Zholtovsky had to convince builders and customers, to have time to draw and inspect at a construction site, and all this at the age of 70-80. This is what impression his erudition and talent made, Zholtovsky conquered with the quality of his architecture, the complex harmony of his art.
Over the course of several decades, Zholtovsky proved his adherence to academicism, but in the post-war period, the differences between the master's buildings and the "normative" neoclassicism became especially noticeable.23 Working on the projects of the Hippodrome (1951), a typical cinema (1952) and the Nemirovich-Danchenko theater (1953), Zholtovsky combines images from different eras - the Renaissance and the Empire style, the motifs of Brunelleschi and Palladio, and thus moves away from the idea of imitating a foreign era. assimilation of the classical heritage”was drawing to a close, and the neo-Renaissance came under attack from the struggle against cosmopolitanism in 1948-53 (in 1950 Zholtovsky was fired from the Moscow Architectural Institute). The portico of the Hippodrome seemed to violate all the postulates of the classics, but having become a triumph of freethinking, it contained solutions that were rare even in Italy. [fig. 18] Thus, the ribbons in the tympanum recall the façade of the Villa Poggio a Caiano. The abacus of the capital of the Hippodrome is sharpened (as in the house of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in Sochi), as in the temple of Vesta at the Roman forum Boarium.
Such style alloys were an innovation of Zholtovsky (for the first time they were most vividly embodied in the Sochi house of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee). The architecture of the Hippodrome and the typical cinema was almost eclectic and showed the free transformation of the image while respecting the neo-Renaissance details. However, the brilliant design of the patterns in the arch is striking and completely inimitable, it redeems everything. And in this case, the similarity of the decorative motif with the work of McKim, Mead and White (Presbyterian Church in Madisson Square, 1906, not preserved), only emphasizes Zholtovsky's skill. The cornices of a typical cinema and the Hippodrome were painted by Zholtovsky in an extremely exquisite and original way. [fig. 19] This can only be found in Italy, on the facade of the Palazzo Guresconsulti in Milan.
Soviet architecture of the 1930-50s was not stylistically monolithic, as the pre-war era contained a significant component of Art Deco. The deliberate triumph of Zholtovsky's works, it seemed, was, on the contrary, close to the standard of the so-called. Stalinist Empire style. The architecture of the 1930s was also supposed to be triumphant. However, it was full of that sharp drama that Zholtovsky's style was completely devoid of. And if the works of Fomin and Shchuko, Rudnev and Trotsky (or Speer and Piacentini) are believed to frankly reflect the gloomy horizons of their time, then Zholtovsky's buffy, abundant majesty distinguished his works precisely in the 1930s. She was a distraction and that is why she gained the support of the authorities. Yet the apolitical, timeless character of Zholtovsky's style is evident. Based on a noble Renaissance tradition, it allowed one to hide in a complex motivational, proportional and plastic game with Italian associations. And therefore, Zholtovsky's approach was close to the utopia of modernity, neo-Renaissance stylization led away into the romantic world of images, as far from reality as the artistry of neo-Russian or northern modernity in the context of rapid scientific and technological progress, the First Russian Revolution of 1905-07, and the path already found by the avant-garde.24
Theatricality of the neo-Renaissance, as in its time and modern, was imbued with the strongest nostalgia for antiquity, for an era of powerful and refined art. For Zholtovsky and his followers, little-known and provincial, unfinished and dilapidated Italian buildings became such a source.25 This search for not monumental, or even expressive, like many in the 1930s, but, on the contrary, modest (using a small order), moderate aesthetics was reinforced by the belief in the totality of the neo-Renaissance city being built. And therefore, the creations of the Zholtovsky school have always been depicted against the background of equally slender buildings, supporting the marks of the cornices and crowned with towers.26 However, carried out in Moscow in a single copy, they did not make an ensemble anywhere. However, the neoclassical development of the cities of the United States was also characterized by a characteristic fragmentariness.
One of the most interesting objects of the post-war period was the building of the Institute of Mining (1951). [fig. 20] Luxurious, playful and monumental in Berninian style, it is designed with an attic like the Palazzo Spada and loggias a la Palazzo Chiericati. And again, before the viewer, it would seem "a combination of the incomprehensible." And although in Tuscany (the ocher color of the buildings of which all the works of the master have acquired), there are no works by either Palladio or Mauro Koducci, images of different centuries and regions of Italy were side by side in Zholtovsky's memory and notebook. Moreover, Palladio also admitted a similar play of baroque and academic lines (for example, in the architecture of the Teatro Olimpico, on the side façade of the loggia del Capitanio).
The uniqueness of Zholtovsky's manner consisted in the work at the intersection of authentic stylization, free theatricality and deliberate eclecticism imbued with the Italian spirit. The master not only opted for the architecture of the 15th and 16th centuries, but combined them in one work, confronted the brutal and graceful (like the rustic and platbands of the Pazzi palazzo), the techniques of Quattrocento and Palladianism.27 Residential buildings on Smolenskaya sq. and at B. Kaluzhskaya st. undoubtedly went back to the Medici Palazzo (15th century), using its cornice and the outgoing relief of the wall. However, Zholtovsky does not use the torn surface of the rustic stone, but the fringed rustic building of Rome and Orvieto (already in the 16th century). And like F. Sawyer, (in New York's Central Savings Bank, 1927) he breaks the rustic frieze and rampart a la Bolognese Palazzo Bocchi (16th century).
Starting from the house on Smolenskaya Square, the creation of such bizarre alloys became a feature of Zholtovsky's manner. The overall composition was held together by the correct proportions, the ocher color of Tuscany, the romantic ratio of the masses and the "living" silhouette close to Art Nouveau.28 This pictorial approach presupposed a reckoning not on the analytical, but on the whole perception.29 His goal was to create a monolithic fairytale ensemble. Images of Italy - metropolitan and provincial, antique and Renaissance, years after travel abroad, combined in Zholtovsky's imagination into a kind of non-existent world of his own. The master's goal was to transfer it from memory to Moscow. Such a city, full of exquisite and monumental architecture, was created by Zholtovsky for four decades. According to V. A. Vesnin, this world is only a dramatization. However convincing and beautiful, it turned out to be more artistically successful than the "serious" classics, it intertwined the Renaissance motifs and architectural ideas of the 1900-10s (Russian modern and American neoclassicism), and formed the noble and beautiful Moscow of Zholtovsky.
1 The term "stylization" in this article is understood non-judgmental, as the use of facade techniques and details of a certain era. This practice was widespread in academic style work. However, the freedom (in the choice and interpretation of the original source) that was appropriate in educational design or when working on a private order was not allowed within the framework of the state, and therefore "normative" neoclassicism of the late 19th and early 20th centuries (starting with the buildings of the Parliament and the University in Vienna and ending with government offices in Washington, train stations, museums and libraries in New York and Chicago). The domestic neo-Renaissance of the 1930-50s, led by Zholtovsky, inherited the emancipation of eclecticism and modernity.
2 Palace of Soviets of the USSR. All-Union competition. M.: "Vsekohudozhnik", 1933. Pp. 56
3 The facade scheme of the house on Mokhovaya with a composite order of 5 floors was the closest not to the house of K. V. Markov (equipped with a 4-storey order and bay windows), and not to the Palladian loggia del Capitanio (a copy of which was the house of M. A. Soloveichik with a four-column portico, architect M. S. Lyalevich, 1911), but to the City Hall in Chicago. The crowning cornice of the house on Mokhovaya was taken from the arsenal of Palladio, but again not from the Vecentian loggia del Capitanio, but from the Venetian church of San Giorgio Maggiore. (see illustrations in the author's article "Facades of Palladian Churches, Their Prototypes and Legacy")
4 At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the idea of authentic neo-Renaissance stylization was extremely rare. This was the case in St. Petersburg (for example, M. I. Wavelberg's bank, 1911, the house of R. G. Vege, 1912), and even in Italy. The massive development of European capitals in the 1890-1900s lacked compositional and plastic authenticity; A. E. Brinkman, P. P. Muratov were looking for it and did not find it in the Roman architecture of that time, Zholtovsky dreamed of it. And, nevertheless, it was Italy that set an example for Zholtovsky - the creators of the neo-Renaissance buildings of the 1890-1900s in the very center of Florence worked so authentically, consciously, contextually in relation to the originals.
5 A four-volume edition of McKim, Mid & White's designs and buildings was published in 1910.
6 The development of American neoclassicism attracted the attention of Russian masters even before the revolution, for example, among the books of G. B. Barkhin there were American journals on architecture of the 1900s bought before the revolution, in particular, these were issues of Architectural Record.
7 Platbands, uniting several windows, appear in the houses of I. Z. Vainshtein (1935), L. Ya. Talalaya (1937) in Moscow, and also B. R. Rubanenko used this technique on the facade of the school on Nevsky Prospect. in Leningrad (1939). At the same time, the solution of windows, united by one profile, in the house of A. K. Burov on Tverskaya Street. (1938) was a response to one of the first New York skyscrapers, the American Trust Social Building, (architect R. Robertson, 1894), and, at the same time, to the Renaissance Palazzo San Marco (on the Roman Piazza Venezia), the Florentine Palazzo Bartolini. The façade of Burov's residential building on B. Polyanka (1940) goes back to the staggered platbands of the palace in Urbino.
8 For example, the studio building (1906) on Lexington Avenue in New York, arch. C. Platt (1861-1933).
9 V. V. Sedov draws attention to this, see Neoclassicism in Moscow architecture of the 1920s. Project Classic. No.20, 2006
10 And although the completion of the tower of the Municipality used classical motives (the church of San Biagio in Montopulciano and the ancient mausoleum of Saint Remy), the image itself remained devoid of romantic rootedness in the past.
11 After the war, the towers of the Novodevichy Convent began to serve as a source of inspiration for "projecting" (for example, in the residential houses of Ya. B. Belopolsky on Lomonosovsky Prospect or B. G. Barkhin on Smolenskaya Embankment). And at the same time, the houses of Ya B Belopolsky (1953) were a kind of response to the Tudor City residential building in New York (1927).
12 To realize the images of the past, even if they existed only on frescoes - this is the purpose of using the Pompeian edicules by G. P. Golts (projects of the Meyerhold Theater, the Chamber Theater), A. V. Vlasov (the building of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions). The facade of the new building of the Union of Architects of the USSR, carried out by A. K. Burov, is known to have embodied the church image from the fresco by Piero della Francesca in Arezzo.
13 In the project of Dneproges (1929), the rhythm of the windows of the Venetian Palazzo Doge was conveyed by Zholtovsky by means of the Florentine rustic.
14 Even before the sale of the house on Smolenskaya Square. in the works of Zholtovsky's followers, the fashion for the variability of the motifs of the platbands begins to be traced. Such are the facades of houses on Leninsky Prospect (architect MG Barkhin, 1939), on Tsvetnoy Boulevard, etc. After the war, the style of the master is guessed in a whole series of residential buildings, this is, first of all, a luxurious house on Mozhaisky Val, as well as houses on the streets of Fadeeva and Karetny Ryad, in the 3rd Voykovsky prospect.
15 So, in comparison with the normative neoclassicism of the United States, the frames of a typical cinema in Moscow are deliberately shallow, a balcony in a house on Smolenskaya Square. and a portal on the side facade of the house on Kaluzhskaya (such a portal was supposed according to the project and in the house on Prospect Mira, not implemented)
16 After the construction of the State Bank building, a Florentine cornice with a wooden filly appeared in a whole series of Moscow buildings in the mid-1930s. This is the residential building of A. K. Burov on Tverskaya Street. (with the motif of arches from the Neapolitan castle of Castel Nuovo), the house of I. Z. Weinstein on the Garden Ring, E. L. Iocheles near the Arbat Square. and MG Barkhin on Leninsky Prospect. And it is the lightning speed with which young architects achieved a high level of harmony that proves the influence of the teacher, they feel Zholtovsky's long-term development of the idea of neo-Renaissance stylization.
17 The elongated proportions of the ancient temple, following Zholtovsky, will acquire the porticoes of the KGB building in Minsk (architect MP Parusnikov, 1947) and the Lenfilm building in Leningrad (late 1940s).
18 Zholtovsky draws into his stylistic system both the images of antiquity (in the project of the House of Culture in Nalchik they were the Gardsky Bridge and the Roman Septisonium), and the images of the Renaissance. For example, the Zholtovsky project (all-Union competition, 1931), awarded at the competition of the Palace of Soviets, will combine the images of the Colosseum, the Pharos lighthouse and the bastions of the Caprarola villa.
19 So the fireplace of the Florentine palazzo Gondi inspired Zholtovsky both in the Soviet years (the buildings of the State Bank and the Moscow Hippodrome), and before the revolution, when working on the interiors of the house of the Racing Society, 1903 (the capital of the entrance portico was a detail of the Vesta temple in Tivoli).
20 House of Zholtovsky on the street. Dmitry Ulyanov connected the cornice of the Florentine Palazzo Medici with the balcony of the Palazzo Fava in Bologna. There is a whole fashion for such receptions, so corner balconies appear in the house of Z. M. Rosenfeld on Prechistenka, as well as in houses on Velozavodskaya street and in Novospassky passage. Note that this balcony was popular in the 1910s (in the decor of the house of K. I. Rozenshtein, architect A. E. Belogrud, 1913 and the house of the Noble Assembly, architects brothers Kosyakovs, 1912), and in the 1930s, at A. A. Olya, in a house on Suvorovsky prospect in Leningrad.
21 Zholtovsky was impressed not just by copying European monuments (an example of which was the construction in New York of the Madison Square Garden amphitheater, 1891 with the tower of the cathedral in Seville, the McKim, Mid and White company or the Metropolitan Life Insurance building a la Venetian kamponila San Marco, 1909), but stylization, that is, free design in the ancient style (an example of this logic is the Spanish Baroque church built for the Panama-Californian exhibition of 1915, architect B. Goodhugh).
22 "You go to the stairs, to the first landing … you feel the infidelity of those around you, it seems to you that a musketeer is peeping out from behind the wall, and you involuntarily think that this staircase was made in the 16th century …" Architecture of the USSR. 1934. No. 6, p. 13
23 In the architecture of the Hippodrome tower, you can see the outlines of the St. Petersburg Admiralty (in 1932, this image was used by the master in the project of the third round of the competition for the Palace of Soviets), and the Moscow Kremlin, the quattrocento platbands are adjacent to the baroque belvedere (collected from the motives of F. Borromini, N. A. Lvov and even the English neoclassicism of the Edwardian era of the 1900s).
24 So in the genre of theatrical scenery, the projects of Zholtovsky in 1953 (a large-panel residential building and the building of the Refrigerator in Sokolniki), decorated with neo-Renaissance cartouches, flags and emblems, were sustained.
25 This interest in little-known rarities spread in the 1930s to Spain as well, as the answer to the Rustas of the Infantado Palace in Guadalajara was the luxurious house of D. D. Bulgakov on Mira Ave. And at the same time, he was close to the Moscow pre-revolutionary tradition, the outlandish architecture of Tsaritsyn, the mansion of M. K. Morozova, arch. V. A. Mazyrina (with shells from the palace in Salamanca). Such details appear in Zholtovsky's project for the Izvestia combine, 1939.
26 Such is, for example, Moscow in the proposals of G. P. Golts (sketches for the solution of embankments in 1935-36), such are his projects for the post-war reconstruction of Kiev, Stalingrad, Smolensk.
27 Analyzing the work of IV Zholtovsky in the context of the stylizations of the masters of Art Nouveau, GI Revzin also notes this amazing eclecticism, “the passism of the world of art is paradoxically anti-historical”. And he gives this explanation, from the point of view of eternity, the architectural forms of different centuries are equal. The task of the architect is only to choose and combine them, to harmonize. And Zholtovsky's works of the Soviet period were clearly imbued with the same pre-revolutionary passéism. See Revzin G. I., Neoclassicism in Russian architecture of the early twentieth century. M.: 1992, pp. 62-63
28 Zholtovsky called this ocher color "luminiferous, radiant" (according to BG Barkhin).
29 Such are, for example, the architectural phantasmagorias of A. I. Noarov, created today and full of Italian images.
Literature
1. Palace of Soviets of the USSR. All-Union competition. - M.: "Vsekohudozhnik", 1933.
2. Zholtovsky IV. Projects and buildings. Entry. article and under. ill. G. D. Oschenkova. - M.: State publishing house of literature on construction and art, 1955.
3. Kutseleva AA, The place of the Moscow metro in the Soviet cultural space. // Architecture of the Stalinist Era: An Experience of Historical Understanding / Comp. and otv. ed. Yu. L. Kosenkova. M.: KomKniga, 2010.
4. Paperny V. Z.. Culture Two. - M.: New literary review, 2006.2nd ed., Revised, add.
5. Revzin GI, Neoclassicism in Russian architecture of the early twentieth century. Moscow: 1992
6. Sedov VV Neoclassicism in the Moscow architecture of the 1920s // "Project Classics". No. XX., 2007
7. Khan-Magomedov S. O. Ivan Zholtovsky. M., 2010
8. McKim, Mead & White. Architecture of McKim, Mead & White in Photographs, Plans and Elevations. - NY.: Dover Books on Architecture, 1990.
annotation
Creative biography of I. V. Zholtovsky, a renowned architect and connoisseur of Italian architecture, has repeatedly attracted the attention of researchers, and, nevertheless, the master's works are still fraught with many architectural mysteries and paradoxes. Compositional and plastic comparison with the neoclassical architecture of the USA allows to evaluate the peculiarity of Zholtovsky's manner in a new way. In the buildings of Zholtovsky, one can feel not only a reliance on the powerful Italian culture, but also an acquaintance with the experience of the United States of the 1900-1920s. The neoclassical style is usually seen as a sign of the Stalinist era. However, in the 1930s, the neoclassical style was officially adopted in the United States, and it was in the order in the 1930s that the center of the capital, Washington, was actively built up. This made Zholtovsky's works quite modern, artistically relevant. Attention to the measurements of ancient structures, the accuracy of their execution in new buildings - all this seemed to be common for the master and his colleagues from the United States. However, Zholtovsky allowed within the quotations those changes and mannerisms that the neoclassicists of the United States did not think of. Zholtovsky's works were playful and individual. Images of Italy - metropolitan and provincial, antique and Renaissance, years after travel abroad, combined in Zholtovsky's imagination into a world of his own invented by him. The master's goal was to transfer it from memory to Moscow. Such a city, full of exquisite and monumental architecture, was created by Zholtovsky for four decades.
