Ilya Mukosey and Natalia Voinova, architectural studio "PlanAR"
Architecture and architects can be very different. Someone is closer to the technical, material side of the profession, someone is more artistic and formative, someone appreciates the opportunity to moderate functions, someone puts their mission to influence the life and self-awareness of people in the first place. There are architects-poets and architects-philosophers. And there are even research architects who do not follow generally accepted standards, but seek and discover their paths in the profession and their values. Such architects always manage to find the most unexpected solutions even for the most commonplace problems, and the most unexpected answer to a common question. And you can never predict which one.
The heads of the PlanAR studio Natalia Voinova and Ilya Mukosey are such researchers. They strive not so much for the number and scale of projects as for the quality of the solutions being developed, spending a lot of time and effort on studying the topic and finding the optimal solution. They check and test for compliance with their professional sense of any task or any principle. And they find something that has never occurred to anyone before, but having been shown once, the solution they have found already seems self-evident - it is so effective, interesting and convenient. It is a special talent to make discoveries where no one expected them to be needed. And this happens in every project of the PlanAR studio.
We present an interview with Natalia Voinova and Ilya Mukosey, in which they question and study the idea of the "Standard of Quality" project.
Filming and editing: Sergey Kuzmin
Natalia Voinova and Ilya Mukosey
architectural studio "PlanAR":
Ilya: It seems to me that we still approach the aesthetic side of the matter from the point of view "like it or not like it." And this is determined, of course, by a certain environment in which we exist. A hundred years ago, I liked something else, for example. But still there are no clear criteria.
Natalia: Quality, not quality, is also a rather strange thing. What is the quality? If this quality is in execution, it is a little bit not about architecture. This is about the quality of construction, technology, materials, the adequacy of the customer, including who changed something or did not change in the process - rather about the organization of work. If about the quality of architecture as about aesthetics, then here the concept of "like it or not like it" is rather strange. Someone is closer to something, someone further. But professionally you always understand that there is a thought, there is work behind it. There is a big, long, beautiful story behind this. Then you understand that it is of high quality. Or when it is not at all obvious, it seems inappropriate, inexplicable. Sometimes these houses at the first moment cause surprise, but then you do not find any signs by which you can understand for yourself, start worrying, experience at least some experience near this house. Then this, yes, some kind of random thing may be. Actually, it seems to me that this is a basic thing - to think about how another person will come later, what he will see, that he will understand what he will feel there. In my opinion, good architecture, it is about this first of all, it is about experiences. Maybe about light, about sound, about texture, about volume, about an interesting scenario of movement inside or about interesting geometry. It must be something, otherwise it will be lowered anyway, otherwise it will still be the same canopy.
Ilya: I completely agree with what Natasha said. But in practice, I confess, I probably start to think all the same with functions. I think you also start thinking with functions.
Natalia: Rather, about the analysis of the terms of reference and the site.
Ilya: This is the other side of the question.
Natalia: This again translates into a script, like moving on or around.
Ilya: The most ideal option: when these two things, of course, merge later. There is a visually interesting spatial experience, and a benefit, an effect. In fact, it is also possible to get pleasure from this, both as an author and as a consumer, from how great everything is invented from a functional point of view. Aesthetic quality can also grow out of this. In fact, it seems to me that we have such projects that we ourselves like. They are. And in them all these reflections, both pragmatic and poetic, are somehow mixed, mixed, and bam - it turns out some kind of thing that is good.
Natalia: Therefore, it is difficult to say what is good architecture and what is bad architecture. Because it is a collective profession. And of which I am absolutely sure - if an architect solves one problem, good architecture will not work. If this is just a functional house, then, in principle, an engineer or some standard solutions are enough. And every time, as soon as these components begin to lack, such a large total soup, when everything, everything, everything and everything has grown together, and something new, interesting, expensive has grown out of this, something that can be talked about, thought about, reasoned about, and not just walk by, say: well, yes, a lot of money … and go quietly on. Then, it seems to me, it starts to move towards some quality that you are trying to talk about.
Ilya: The standard is from the field of exact sciences. This is a certain measure of length, weight, or something like that, with which you can compare a specific object, and say: this tape measure is correct, here meter equals meter.
Natalia: And most importantly, this is the road to nowhere. As soon as we define the standard, then we all are not needed, because there is already a standard, you can simply multiply it. There is an ideal residential building, an ideal museum, an ideal concert hall. They can simply be replicated. Further architectural thought is no longer needed. There is already a perfect one. But this is impossible. Society is changing, needs are changing, we are changing. There is no standard. The standard was different at different times, in different regions - different. It is more or less different for each bureau, but it does not exist. An attempt to find a standard, it is such a dead end. Because after that - everything.
Ilya: If we take some classical era. Did she have a standard? On the one hand, it was. This is antiquity with its samples. On the other hand, these houses are all slightly different. It is in these nuances of their beauty and wealth. Every architect who used these templates, not standards at all, but templates, he applied them in his own way, and the more interesting and witty he used them, the better the building was. Therefore, a standard in the truest sense of the word, as a kind of unattainable model, to which we must strive, which we visualize, which has a material expression, such a contraption is harmful to architecture.
Natalia: I do not agree with Ilya 100% on both points. First, in my opinion, I believe that it is absolutely necessary to try to understand what your contemporaries are doing both within the local context and globally, and to write about it and talk about it. And the more you talk and write about it, the closer you can come to a certain conventional standard, not a standard, to a slightly different understanding of architecture as a profession. And for me it is very important to understand what I am doing, to understand that architecture is not just a solution to other people's problems, helping a certain customer, saving a particular place or a piece of a city, or an apartment. Architecture is a little bit about something else. And every time the most interesting thing is to understand - about what. And this takes a lot of time in my case. And this is insanely interesting to me, I still cannot 100% say that architecture is this. Once I tried to draw two scales, that here is an architect, he is some kind of such. No, they are all different, we are all different, where is my place. This is also very, very important. I cannot say that I have an answer, because I only have a path along which I go and try to understand, grope.
Ilya: You can walk on it all your life.
Natalia: And thank God. Once we find the benchmark, there is nowhere to go. Thank God he's not there. And, thank God, there is no exact answer to what an architect should do. Each bureau formulates it differently for itself, each architect formulates it differently. Most architects, they're writing architects trying to analyze. Some interesting architects write about other architects and try to find that methodology, take out of them those techniques, that way of thinking, then in and the denomination they use. And then, in one way or another, use, enrich your architectural language through this.
Ilya: Tablets should not be and do not exist. Because the tablets are a specific record. Indeed, manifestos are periodically written. But if analyzed properly, few architects thoroughly carry out their own manifestos. At least all my life - definitely no one. And this is also a very important point, because the manifesto is such a way, perhaps, to get rid of what has accumulated. Formulate what has come to mind at the moment, set it aside and move on. Perhaps someone else will use this as useful knowledge. Why not? So I am absolutely sure that any thought spoken aloud, it loses something, gains something. It is clear that you cannot express all overtones with any phrase, on the one hand, but on the other hand, other people, each, will understand this phrase in their own way, use them in their own way. That is why dialogue is essential. Or even not a dialogue, but, excuse me for such a word, discourse is necessary. You need to throw new words into it, not new meanings. Those who select and read these words find new meanings in it. And you need to throw new words there, and, indeed, from this soup everyone can scoop up a couple of ladles for themselves.
