Constructivism(in the translation from Lat. "construction" - construction) originated in Russia in 1917 and became the direction of Soviet art in the 1920s. His ideas matured within the framework of the traditions of pre-revolutionary Russian avant-gardism and merged with the utopia of the society of this era.

Thoughts of pictorial design were perceived as a revolution in the consciousness of the people and the life of the public.

The definition of constructivism was introduced at a meeting of the youth group of the Institute of Artistic Culture in 1921.

The followers of this style were actively involved in various spheres of artistic creation. They contrasted the pompous luxury of the life of the bourgeoisie with utilitarianism and the simplicity of the newest objective forms - in this way they embodied democracy in human relations.

This style was formed at the beginning of the reign of the councils, thanks to the interaction of a number of architects and designers representing avant-garde movements (Suprematism and Futurism).

As a result, the formal-aesthetic search for the followers of this trend - A. Rodchenko, V. Tatlin, E. Lisitsky, significantly increased.

In the 20s. critics have noted the turn of painting towards realism.

The latter, first of all, showed interest in depiction (instead of abstraction) and classical foundations in painting. The demands of ideology explained the emphasis on the classics: the art of the Soviet country enjoyed the best that was achieved by world culture. This is what determined the need for a clear and distinct form of this style.

Constructivist painters

Constructivism imitated the methods of the then technological processes.

Painting realized this principle in accordance with the two-dimensionality of space: the abstractness of forms and structures were located on the surface, like an architect's drawing and machine technology.

The works were free from the content of objects, in particular from the expressiveness of the subjects.

The composition determined the elements of formal technique and their interaction with the surrounding world.

The painters were limited by the basic palette and texture of impersonality. Graphic elements played a key role in this. For example, V. Tatlin embodied in his works, most often in counter-reliefs, the foundations of rationalism, using “non-artistic” material.

Model of the monument to the III International, V. Tatlin New man, E. Lissitzky Books, A. Rodchenko

Simultaneously K. Malevich creates Suprematism, thanks to the use of the simplest forms - traditionally a circle and a square. He believed that the true content of fine art is complete non-objectivity.

Turning to these two directions, M. Larionov from 1909 began to create "built" structures. Brothers N. Gabo and N. Pevzner since 1917 were considered the main adherents of constructivism. The use of modern means (metal and celluloid) led to the formulation of the problem of the movement of light rays and space.

In 1920, the brothers set out the theoretical basis for their pictorial style in the Realist Manifesto. Since 1922, the Soviet government proclaimed "socialist realism", forcing most of the painters to emigrate. One of them was El Lissitzky, who went to teach drawing in Bauhaz.

The ideas of the Dutch constructivists were promoted by the De Stijl movement, which was represented by P. Mondrian and Theo Van Doosburg. The first one used a horizontal-vertical grid when creating his paintings. The second, in turn, introduced dynamic elements by using a diagonal.

F. Kupka in the 1930s. endowed constructivism with a different impulse and gave it a precise definition. He believed that the work of art itself is an abstract reality and consists of many elements generated by the imagination.

In his opinion, the meaning of constructivism lies in the unification of the archetypal form with the archtectonic conditions.

Soviet constructivism and gigantism. Part I.

Constructivism and the Stalinist Empire style.

The best part about constructivism is that this avant-garde method in art and architecture was invented in the USSR. Let me explain what constructivism is - a Soviet avant-garde trend in art, architecture, photography and even literature that developed in the 1920s and 1930s. Characteristic features of constructivism: geometrism, laconic forms, severity and solidity of the external appearance. The main idea of ​​constructivism implied the rejection of pompous forms in favor of simple and laconic, and most importantly, the subordination of all elements to meaning and function.

Vladimir Mayakovsky wrote: “For the first time, not from France, but from Russia, a new word of art - constructivism… flew in.” Although the first harbinger of the birth of constructivism was the Eiffel Tower ball, which combines elements of Art Nouveau and naked constructivism.

Stalin influenced the development of constructivism in the USSR. The entire flowering of this trend occurred in the early years of Stalin's rule. But in the thirties, the party began to sharply criticize the avant-garde trends and subsequently generally declared constructivism to be a bourgeois trend, thereby finally putting an end to it. Constructivism will only revive in the 60s. Constructivism was replaced by the neoclassical style, as it was also called the "Stalinist Empire".

"Stalin's Empire" - a trend in architecture, monumental and decorative art of the USSR from the late 1930s to the mid-50s. This style combines elements of the baroque, empire of the Napoleonic era, late classicism and art deco, it combines pomp, luxury, majesty and monumentality.

Simply put, Stalinist gigantism. The famous Stalinist skyscrapers in Moscow became the symbols of the Stalinist Empire style.

At the beginning of the heyday of the Stalinist Empire, the Soviet delegation participating in the world exhibition in Paris in 1937 faced Nazi Germany in a battle for awards.

Our country presented at the exhibition a huge pavilion made in the Stalinist Empire style: a high-rise building with a giant sculpture of a “worker and collective farmer” at the top of the building.

The most monumental and never completed building, conceived by Stalin. It was this building that was to become the culmination of the entire high-rise construction of the USSR. The Palace of the Soviets was to become the last ninth skyscraper and the tallest building in the world.

In the thirties, a competition was announced for the best project of the Palace of Soviets. The project involved not only Soviet architects, but also foreigners. For example, here is the project of the Italian Armando Brazini:

But the competition was won by a Soviet student of the Italian Boris Iofan, who put together the ideas of other participants and proposed a huge multi-tiered building with an abundance of columns and topped with a giant statue of Lenin. According to the final project, the Palace of the Soviets was supposed to be 420 meters high, which means that it surpassed the 381-meter American Empire State Building, the tallest one from 1931 to 1972.

It was decided to build the Palace of Soviets on a hill above the Moskva River instead of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. On December 5, 1931, the Temple was blown up. After the ruins were dismantled, the preparatory work for the construction began, first of all, the digging of the foundation pit and the construction of the foundation.

For the construction of the skyscraper, a special steel grade was made - DS, the most durable in the USSR at that time. By the beginning, the foundation and first floors were completed. But already in September and October 1941, from the metal structures prepared for installation, they were fused onto anti-tank hedgehogs. And then all the other steel structures had to be dismantled and used to build bridges on the railway.

After the end of the war, all forces and means were thrown into the restoration of the country and never returned to the construction of the Palace of Soviets.

And in the 60s, in the foundation left from the Palace of Soviets, the world's largest outdoor winter swimming pool was created, which was closed only in the 90s after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and in its place the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was restored.

Here are two more Soviet films of 1935 and 1938 in which New Moscow is shown with all its realized and unrealized buildings))))

Written by

Barbara

Creativity, work on the modern idea of ​​world outlook and constant search for answers

Architecture achieved significant success in the 1920s and 1930s. The rapid growth of cities, industry, and the development of transport come into sharp conflict with the planning of old cities that does not meet the new requirements, with their narrow winding streets. The need to resolve the complicated problem of transport services and ensure normal sanitary and living conditions for the population give rise to urban planning projects and new forms of resettlement of people. They are characterized by the desire to soften the social contrasts in cities and to eliminate the excessive concentration of the population. Around big cities in some countries there are garden cities with individual dwelling houses, industrial cities, workers' settlements, etc. with a strictly functional division of the territory. The attention of architects was attracted by the tasks of not only industrial, but also mass housing construction, the development of residential complexes with economical standard apartments, designed for the middle and low-paid category of people. More attention is paid to the design of areas, architectural design of landscapes. A universal classification of streets and the principles of their combination are being developed, networks of city highways are being created, independent of the transition streets and dissecting the city into a number of isolated spaces. In the design of cities of a new type and large industrial enterprises, the principles of the functional-constructive system that arose at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries are increasingly being established. This style in architecture is called constructivism. The herald of a new stage in the development of architecture was the Eiffel Tower (height 312 m), erected from prefabricated steel parts for the Paris World Exhibition in 1889, designed by the engineer Gustave Eiffel, as a sign of entry into a new era of the machine age. Deprived of utilitarian meaning, the openwork tower soars easily and smoothly to the sky, embodying the power of technology. Its dynamic verticality plays an important role in the skyline of the city. The grandiose arch of the base of the tower, as it were, unites the distant vistas of the urban landscape seen through it. This building had a stimulating effect on the further development of architecture.

Eiffel Tower 1889, Gustave Eiffel Paris, France

Archeology Museum 1929-1933 Toronto, Canada

House of Culture named after Rusakov, 1928, K.S. Melnikov, Moscow, Russia

The development of the American city, its face was determined by the multi-storey skyscrapers of New York, Chicago and others. By the beginning of the 20th century, the architects of the so-called Chicago school, which arose at the end of the 19th century, developed projects of skyscrapers with overhanging walls. American cities such as New York maintain a sharp contrast between skyscrapers (the Empire State Building office building, early 1930s, 102 stories high, 407 m high and Rockefeller Center, 72 stories high, 384 m high, 1931– 1947) and many other buildings of various sizes. In the history of Russian constructivism, professional architects have designed all kinds of modular structures of residential units that are connected to each other in large complexes, lifts moving along the outer walls, etc.

Konstantin Melnikov is considered the leading figure of Russian (Soviet) constructivism. Beginning with the construction of Russian pavilions at International exhibitions in the style of traditional wooden architecture, thanks to which he gained international fame, Melnikov moved on to designing very topical buildings of a new (revolutionary) type and purpose - workers' clubs. The Rusakov Club, built by him in 1927-1928, has nothing to do with either the architecture of the previous century or the architecture of the Art Nouveau. Here, purely geometric concrete structures are organized into a kind of structure, the shape of which is determined by its purpose. The last remark applies to almost all modern and 20th century architecture and is defined as functionalism. In the architecture of constructivism, functionalism leads to the creation of dynamic structures consisting of fairly simple formal elements, completely devoid of the usual architectural decor, connected in accordance with the organization of the internal space and the work of the main structures. The language of architectural forms is thus "cleared" of all unnecessary, decorative, non-constructive. It is the language of a new world that has broken with its past. The emerging architectural image clearly conveys the dynamics of artistic processes and life in post-revolutionary Russia, the rapture of modern technical capabilities.

Constructivism is a trend in Soviet art in the 1920s. (in architecture, design and theatrical-decorative arts, posters, book art, artistic design). The supporters of constructivism, putting forward the task of "constructing" the environment that actively guides life processes, sought to comprehend the form-building capabilities of new technology, its logical, expedient designs, as well as the aesthetic possibilities of materials such as metal, glass, wood. Constructivists tried to oppose the ostentatious luxury of everyday life with the simplicity and emphasized utilitarianism of new object forms, in which they saw the reification of democracy and new relations between people (the Vesnin brothers, M. Ya. M. Rodchenko, V.E. Tatlin and others). In relation to foreign art, the term is conditional: in architecture - the current within functionalism, in painting and sculpture - one of the directions of avant-garde. In architecture, the principles of constructivism were formulated in the theoretical speeches of A.A. Vesnin and M. Ya. ) with its clear, rational plan and the structural basis of the building revealed in the external appearance (reinforced concrete frame). In 1924, a creative organization of constructivists, the OSA, was created, whose representatives developed the so-called functional design method, based on a scientific analysis of the functioning of buildings, structures, and town-planning complexes. Along with other groups of Soviet architects, constructivists (the Vesnin brothers, Ginzburg, I. A. Golosov, I. I. Leonidov, A. S. Nikol'skii, M. O. Barshch, V. N. Vladimirov, etc.) were looking for new principles layouts of populated areas, put forward projects for the reconstruction of everyday life, developed new types of public buildings (Palaces of Labor, House of Soviets, workers' clubs, kitchen factories, etc.). At the same time, in their theoretical and practical activities, the constructivists made a number of mistakes (treating an apartment as a "material form", schematism in organizing everyday life in some projects of communal houses, underestimating natural and climatic conditions, underestimating the role of large cities under the influence of desurbanism ideas).

The aesthetics of constructivism largely contributed to the formation of modern artistic design. On the basis of the developments of the constructivists (A. M. Rodchenko, A. M. Gana, and others), new types of dishes, fittings, and furniture, convenient to use and designed for mass production, were created; artists developed designs for fabrics (V.F. Stepanova, L. S. Popova) and practical models of work clothes (Stepanova, V.E. Tatlin). Constructivism played a significant role in the development of poster graphics (photomontages by the Stenberg brothers, G. G. Klutsis, Rodchenko) and book design (using the expressive capabilities of typeface and other typesetting elements in the works of Hahn, L. M. Lissitzky, and others). In the theater, the constructivists replaced traditional sets with "machines" for the work of actors, subordinate to the tasks of stage action (works by Popova, A. A. Vesnin, and others on productions by V. E. Meyerhold, A. Ya. Tairov). Some of the ideas of constructivism were embodied in Western European (W. Baumeister, O. Schlemmer, etc.) fine art.

In relation to foreign art, the term "constructivism" is largely arbitrary: in architecture it denotes a trend within functionalism that sought to emphasize the expression of modern constructions; in painting and sculpture, it is one of the directions of avant-gardeism that used some formal searches of early constructivism (sculptors I. Gabo, A. Pevzner) Constructivism (from Lat. Constructio - construction) is an artistic direction in the art of a number of European countries at the beginning of the 20th century, which proclaimed the basis of an artistic image not composition, but construction. Constructivism found its fullest expression in architecture, design, applied design, theatrical decoration art, printed graphics, and the art of books; expressed in the desire of artists to turn to the design of things, the artistic organization of the material environment. In the artistic culture of Russia in the 1920s, constructivist architects, the Vesnin brothers, M. Ginzburg relied on the possibilities of modern building technology.

They achieved artistic expressiveness with compositional means, juxtaposition of simple, laconic volumes, as well as the aesthetic possibilities of materials such as metal, glass, wood. The artists of this direction (V. Tatlin, A. Rodchenko, L. Popova, E. Lisitsky, V. Stepanova, A. Exter), having joined the movement of industrial art, became the founders of Soviet design, where the external form was directly determined by function, engineering structure and material processing technology. In the design of theatrical performances, the Constructivists have replaced the traditional pictorial decoration with transformable installations - "machines" that change the stage space. The constructivism of printed graphics, book art, and posters are characterized by sparse geometrized forms, their dynamic layout, limited color palette (mainly red and black), widespread use of photography and typesetting typographic elements.

Typical manifestations of constructivism in painting, graphics and sculpture are abstract geometry, the use of collage, photomontage, spatial structures, sometimes dynamic. The ideas of constructivism matured in the previous directions of the Russian avant-garde. His program, formed in the post-revolutionary period, bore the features of a social utopia, since artistic design was conceived as a way of transforming social life and people's consciousness, constructing the environment.

Constructivism. The direction of abstract art that originated in Russia in 1913. Constructivism abandoned traditional ideas about art in the name of imitating the forms and methods of the modern technological process. This was most clearly manifested in sculpture, where the structure was created directly from industrial products. In painting, the same principles were carried out in two-dimensional space: abstract forms and structures were located on a plane like an architectural drawing, resembling elements of machine technology. Although constructivism existed in Russia only in the first post-revolutionary years, its influence is palpable throughout the 20th century. see Gabo, Lissitzky, Mohoy-Nagy, Popova, Rodchenko, Tatlin On the Poetic Current By its principles, theoretical platform, breadth of creative views of its participants and, finally, by the duration of its existence, constructivism could well claim to be considered an independent literary movement ... The poetic principles declared (and implemented) by the constructivists in practice, in contrast to many pseudo-independent poetic groups of that time, really differed in their "faces with an uncommon expression."

In addition, constructivism has put forward many well-known names. And yet it is usually not customary to single out constructivism in a separate poetic direction. Perhaps because it was too utilitarian (in the meaning of "applied") character. In contrast to the tasks of this direction in other areas of art, which put forward the idea of ​​constructing the material environment surrounding a person, to create simple, logical, functionally justified forms (architectural projects of the Vesnin brothers, M. Ginzburg, I. Leonidov; posters, books, theatrical scenography of artists A. Rodchenko, V. Tatlin, L. Lissitzky), in poetry constructivism manifested itself in an orientation towards a rational “construction of material” instead of an intuitively found style. However, another explanation is possible. It has already been said above that one of the "obligatory" conditions for the formation of a new poetic trend was the presence of an "external enemy" - the point of application of the creative efforts of the members of the group, in the struggle against which the formation took place. Constructivists, by and large, had no one to argue with, except themselves. Sluggish attacks on futurism could hardly deceive anyone, since the "construction" of a poetic text goes back to the principles proclaimed by the ideologue of futurism F. Marinetti, who sought to reflect the dynamism of modern machine civilization and technological progress. True, for this purpose, the futurists used slightly different means, more resorting to an experiment with vocabulary and syntax. However, the methods were very similar - the transfer of the center of gravity from the image of a person to the image of his material and technical environment.

The Constructivists, as an independent literary group, first declared themselves in Moscow in the spring of 1922. Its first members were the poets A. Chicherin, I. Selvinsky, and the critic K. Zelinsky (group theoretician). Initially, the Constructivists' program had a narrowly formal orientation: the principle of understanding a literary work as a construction was brought to the fore. In the surrounding reality, technical progress was proclaimed the main thing, the role of the technical intelligentsia was emphasized. Moreover, this was interpreted outside social conditions, outside the class struggle. In particular, it was stated: “Constructivism as an absolutely creative school affirms the universality of poetic technique; if modern schools, separately, scream: sound, rhythm, image, mind, etc., we, emphasizing and, say: And the sound, And the rhythm, And the image, And the mind, And every new possible device in which the real necessity when installing a structure Constructivism is the highest skill, deep, comprehensive knowledge of all the possibilities of the material and the ability to concentrate in it. " But in the future, the constructivists gradually freed themselves from these narrowly delineated aesthetic frameworks and put forward broader justifications for their creative platform. Representatives of modernism took the most active part in the literary and artistic life of the country in those years, and many of them turned out to be by no means unwitting conductors of the political ideology prevailing in that era. For example, here is the opinion of the well-known artist-illustrator from the association of the so-called “production book” O. Chichagova: “In essence, constructivism denies art as a product of bourgeois culture. Constructivism is an ideology that arose in proletarian Russia during the revolution, and how any ideology can be viable and not built on sand only when it creates a consumer for itself; and therefore - the task of constructivism is the organization of communist life through the creation of a constructive person. The means for this are intellectual production - invention and improving production - technology. " That is, a substitution of concepts took place: the methodology of constructivism was now directly dependent on ideological principles. Here the first disagreements arose, in connection with which Chicherin departed from constructivism, and a number of authors grouped around Selvinsky and Zelinsky: B. Agapov, Dir Tumanny (N. Panov), V. Inber, E. Gabrilovich. In 1924, the Constructivist Literary Center (LCC) was organized. Later they were joined by N. Aduev, V. Lugovskoy, A. Kvyatkovsky, V. Asmus, E. Bagritsky, N. Ognev, N. Ushakov, as well as a group of young poets: V. Gusev, G. Kats, I. Koltunov, A. Kudreiko (Zelenyak), K. Mitreykin, L. Lavrov and others, jokingly referred to as "Constromolians". Initially, the meetings of the constructivists took place in turn at the apartments of one of the members of the LCC, and from 1927 they began to gather in the “Herzen House” on Tverskaya Street (no. 25). The LCC Declaration first of all stated that “constructivism is thought and social attitudes ordered into a system, which emphatically reflect the organizational onslaught of the working class,” and further it was said about the need for art for the closest possible participation of constructivists in the construction of socialist culture. Hence arises the intention to saturate art (in particular, poetry) with modern themes. Declaration of the Literary Center of Constructivists (LCC) The main provisions of constructivism.

1. The nature of modern production technology, accelerated, economic and capacious, also influences the ways of ideological representations, subordinating all cultural processes to these internal formal organizational requirements.

Constructivism is an expression of this increased attention to technical and organizational issues.

2. Here, in the USSR, constructivism acquires a broad social and cultural meaning due to the need in a relatively short time to cover the distance separating the proletariat, as a culturally backward class, from modern high technology and the entire developed system of cultural superstructures, which, in an environment of aggravated throughout the world of class struggle, are used by the bourgeoisie, also as technical weapons of struggle.

3. The organizational design of this task is constructivism.

4. Thus, constructivism is thought and social mentality ordered into a system, which emphatically reflect the organizational onslaught of the working class, forced in a peasant country, after the conquest of power, to build an economy and lay the foundation for a new socialist culture.

5. This onslaught in the field of culture is directed primarily at its technique in all areas of knowledge and skill, starting with the simple mastery of literacy.

6. The bearer of the constructivist (ie, assertive-organizational) and cultural movement should be, first of all, the proletariat, and then intermediate social groups under the ideological and political influence of the proletariat.

7. Constructivism, transferred to the field of art, formally turns into a system of maximum exploitation of a theme, or into a system of mutual functional justification of all constituent artistic elements, that is, in general, constructivism is a motivated art.

8. In formal terms, such a requirement rests on the so-called principle of cargo handling, that is, an increase in the load of requirements per unit of material.

9. Right-wing social strata, intellectual and petty-bourgeois groups are adapting the formal requirements of constructivism as aesthetic entrances to sit in them from the onslaught of revolutionary modernity, seeking to gain a foothold in an artistic theme. Then constructivism turns into a special easel genre, that is, an unmotivated demonstration of a technique. This is equally true of painting and poetry. For the left social strata, this requirement of maximum exploitation is naturally merged with the search for a large epochal theme and a close form for it, which, by the logic of the plot, introduces the techniques of prose into the field of poetry.

10. The principle of cargoification as applied to poetry turns into a requirement for the construction of verses in terms of local semantics, that is, the development of the entire texture of the verse from the main semantic content of the topic.

11. The Constructivist Literary Center (LCC), which has made the above-mentioned provisions its banner, is an organizational association of people united by the common goals of communist construction and setting as its task through joint, practical study of the formal, technical and theoretical aspects of constructivism - to give literature and, in particular, poetry, in a modern cultural setting, effective meaning. Constructivists consider it necessary in their literary work to actively identify revolutionary modernity both thematically and in its technical requirements.

To make this topic as effective as possible, constructivists put forward the principle of the word “cargo”, that is, its maximum “condensation”. This is achieved with the help of "local semantics", which consists in the concentration of all the pictorial and expressive means of the verse around the main semantic content of the theme "[in B. Agapov's poem" Typist Topchuk "comparisons, epithets, etc. are taken from the clerical life:" eyebrows as the signature of the director of the trust "; in N. Panov's poem about General Kornilov, the rhythm imitates a drum march, etc.], as well as by "introducing prose techniques into the field of poetry," if this is dictated by the logic of the plot (for example, Selvinsky's "Report", or he has a number of calculations and technical terms in "Pushtorg"). It also sharply criticized "the right-wing social strata, intellectual and petty-bourgeois groups, which adapt the formal requirements of constructivism as aesthetic trenches for sitting out in them from the onslaught of revolutionary modernity." Such a slide from the sphere of art to the sphere of ideology could not but affect the fate of constructivism as a poetic trend.

And although the LCC still claims the leading role, declaring: “Constructivism is replacing futurism both as a literary school and as a nihilistic attitude. Futurism has done its job. He was the gravedigger of bourgeois decadentism in the pre-revolutionary years. In its new guise - LEF, futurism continues its old business - the fight against rotten rump. But the new literature, the new socialist culture will no longer be created by his hands. This new culture is creating its own new style, its new methods, and these are the methods of constructivism, ”but in recent years the program of the constructivists has largely resembled the program of the LEF they criticized.

The constant sharp criticism of the constructivists from the theorists of the Marxist persuasion in 1930 led to the liquidation of the LCC and the formation of the "Literary Brigade M. I", which became part of the Federation of Soviet Writers 'Associations (FOSP), which carried out "the unification of various writers' groups wishing to actively participate in the construction of the USSR and those who believe that our literature is called upon to play one of the responsible roles in this area ”. In 1930, the Constructivist Literary Center, sensing the coming harsh changes, dissolved itself. In the early 1930s, the political situation in the country changed significantly, and, consequently, in art. Innovative trends were at first subjected to sharp criticism, and then were completely banned, as ... bourgeois. As constructivist M. Ginzburg correctly wrote, each era has its own style of art. The romantic-utopian, strict and revolutionary asceticism was replaced by the magnificent forms of the totalitarian baroque and the haughty redundancy of Stalin's neoclassicism. The following fact seems strange - in the USSR a struggle was waged against "right angles", with "bourgeois formalism", with "Leonidism", and palaces in the style of Louis XIV began to be considered completely proletarian. The Constructivists were in disgrace. Those of them, who did not want to "rebuild", eked out a miserable existence until the end of their days (or even were repressed). However, Ilya Golosov, for example, managed to fit into the conjuncture of the 1930s and was able to create truly interesting buildings. The Vesnin brothers also took part in the creative life of the USSR, but they no longer had the same authority as before. According to some reputable scientists in the USSR in 1932-1936. there was a "transitional style", conventionally called "post-constructivism". In the 1960s, when the struggle against "architectural excesses" began, they again remembered the constructivists' achievements. Studying their heritage has become a must for young architects. And since the early 1990s, many of the non-embodied ideas of the 1920s have become reality. An example is the Tri Kita shopping mall on Minskoe Shosse (made in the spirit of the twenties), diversified elite housing in Moscow and other structures of a modern metropolis. constructivism soviet art avant-garde

At the beginning of the XXI century, constructivism again returns to architecture. Now it bears the name Scandinavian, since its roots lie in the suburban housing construction of the Scandinavian countries. Scandinavian constructivism is characterized by an abundance of space and sunlight, functionality and simplicity, naturalness and naturalness. It has a predetermined rhythm of lines and strict geometry. It is characterized by the aesthetics of expediency, the rationality of strictly utilitarian forms. To date, Scandinavian constructivism has taken root most widely in Russia, in St. Petersburg. The architectural concept of Scandinavian constructivism is considered the most organic for country houses near the Northern Capital.

In St. Petersburg, the prevalence of cloudy weather leads to a lack of sunshine. This problem is solved due to the large areas of glazing and volumetric rooms in houses characteristic of Scandinavian constructivism. The rhythm of lines and the emphasized severity of geometry give the houses, made in the style of Scandinavian constructivism, their unique look, and simplicity and naturalness, coupled with the use of natural materials, provide an attractive architectural solution. Such houses fit organically into the suburban landscape and are close in spirit to aristocratic Petersburgers.

2. Constructivism in architecture

Significant successes in the 20-30's. 20th century reached architecture. The rapid growth of cities, industry, and the development of transport come into sharp conflict with the planning of old cities that does not meet the new requirements, with their narrow winding streets. The need to resolve the complicated problem of transport services and ensure normal sanitary and living conditions for the population give rise to urban planning projects and new forms of resettlement of people. They are characterized by the desire to soften the social contrasts in cities and to eliminate the excessive concentration of the population. Around big cities in some countries there are garden cities with individual dwelling houses, industrial cities, workers' settlements, etc. with a strictly functional division of the territory. The attention of architects was attracted by the tasks of not only industrial, but also mass housing construction, the development of residential complexes with economical standard apartments, designed for the middle and low-paid category of people. More attention is paid to the design of areas, architectural design of landscapes. A universal classification of streets and the principles of their combination are being developed, networks of city highways are being created, independent of the transition streets and dissecting the city into a number of isolated spaces. In the design of cities of a new type and large industrial enterprises, the principles of the functional-constructive system, which arose at the turn of the 20th century, are increasingly being established. This style in architecture is called constructivism. In the history of Russian constructivism, professional architects have designed all kinds of modular structures of residential units that are connected to each other in large complexes, elevators moving along the outer walls, etc. Konstantin Melnikov is considered the leading figure of Russian (Soviet) constructivism. Beginning with the construction of Russian pavilions at International exhibitions in the style of traditional wooden architecture, thanks to which he gained international fame, Melnikov moved on to designing very topical buildings of a new (revolutionary) type and purpose - workers' clubs. Club them. Rusakov, built by him in 1927-28, has nothing to do with either the architecture of the previous century, or with the architecture of Art Nouveau. Here, purely geometric concrete structures are organized into a kind of structure, the shape of which is determined by its purpose.

The last remark applies to almost all modern and 20th century architecture and is defined as functionalism. In the architecture of constructivism, functionalism leads to the creation of dynamic structures consisting of fairly simple formal elements, completely devoid of the usual architectural decor, connected in accordance with the organization of the internal space and the work of the main structures. The language of architectural forms is thus "cleared" of all unnecessary, decorative, non-constructive. It is the language of a new world that has broken with its past.

The emerging architectural image clearly conveys the dynamics of artistic processes and life in post-revolutionary Russia, the rapture of modern technical capabilities. The constructivist style architects believed that all elements of the building should take part in creating the architectural image of a modern building, even such as signs, clocks, billboards, loudspeakers, elevator shafts, etc., so all of them should also be designed by the architect. Soviet constructivists focused their efforts on two big tasks: designing an exemplary socialist city and communal apartment buildings for workers - communal houses. Meeting the new needs of the socialist state, the constructivists were engaged in the design and construction of such types of buildings as offices, department stores, sanatoriums, printing houses, research centers, factories and factories, workers' clubs and hydroelectric power plants. Young Soviet architecture of the first post-revolutionary decades really was at the forefront of world architecture, realizing or creating on paper the most daring projects, including the famous Palace of the Soviets, which could not be built on the site of the destroyed Cathedral of Christ the Savior. With the onset of Stalinist totalitarianism in the 30s, Russia is gradually losing its positions in architecture, and so far it has not been possible to restore them. An important milestone in the development of constructivism was the activity of talented architects - brothers Leonid, Viktor and Alexander Vesnin. They came to the realization of the laconic "proletarian" aesthetics, already having solid experience in the design of buildings, in painting and in the design of books. (They started their careers back in the modern era).

For the first time, constructivist architects loudly declared themselves at the competition for the projects of the building of the Palace of Labor in Moscow. The Vesnins' project stood out not only for the rationality of the plan and the correspondence of the external appearance to the aesthetic ideals of our time, but also implied the use of the latest building materials and structures. The next stage was the competitive project of the building of the newspaper "Leningradskaya Pravda" (Moscow branch). The task was extremely difficult - a tiny plot of land - 6 × 6 m on Strastnaya Square was intended for construction. The Vesnins created a miniature, slender six-story building, which included not only an office and editorial rooms, but also a newsstand, a lobby, a reading room (one of the tasks of the constructivists was to group the maximum number of vital rooms in a small area). The closest companion and assistant of the Vesnin brothers was Moisey Yakovlevich Ginzburg, who was an unsurpassed theorist of architecture in the first half of the 20th century. In his book "Style and Era", he reflects on the fact that each style of art adequately corresponds to "its" historical era. The development of new architectural trends, in particular, is associated with the fact that "... continuous mechanization of life" is taking place, and the machine is "... a new element of our life, psychology and aesthetics." Ginzburg and the Vesnin brothers organize the Association of Contemporary Architects (OCA), which includes leading constructivists. Since 1926, the Constructivists began to publish their own magazine - "Contemporary Architecture" (or simply "SA)". The magazine was published for five years. The covers were designed by Alexey Gan. At the end of the 1920s, constructivism began to spread beyond the borders of the Soviet Union, becoming most widespread in Germany and the Netherlands. In the mid-60s - 70s, the traditions and ideas of constructivism found an unexpected continuation in the architecture of the so-called "high-tech", a direction that demonstratively reveals not only the work of architectural structures, but also engineering communications.

3. Constructivism in design and photography

Constructivism is a direction that, first of all, is associated with architecture, however, such a vision would be one-sided and even extremely incorrect, because, before becoming an architectural method, constructivism existed in design, printing, and artistic creation. Constructivism in photography is marked by geometrization of the composition, shooting from dizzying angles with a strong reduction in volumes. Alexander Rodchenko, in particular, was engaged in such experiments.

In graphic forms of creativity, constructivism was characterized by the use of photomontage instead of hand-drawn illustrations, extreme geometrization, and the subordination of composition to rectangular rhythms. The color gamut was also stable: black, red, white, gray with the addition of blue and yellow. In the field of fashion, there were also certain constructivist tendencies - in the wake of the worldwide enthusiasm for straight lines in clothing design, Soviet fashion designers of those years created emphatically geometrized forms. Among fashion designers, Varvara Stepanova stands out, who since 1924, together with Lyubov Popova, has been developing fabric designs for the 1st cotton-printing factory in Moscow, was a professor at the textile faculty of VKHUTEMAS, and has designed models of sports and casual clothing. The most famous photo model of those years was the notorious Lilya Yurievna Brik.

Constructivism is an artistic direction of the 1920s of the twentieth century in architecture, decoration, and theatrical and decorative arts, in design.

The age of booming industry and new technologies has accelerated the passage of time many times over. Artists were the first to feel the need to completely change the world around them. The new man of the twentieth century had to live in a world of clear geometric forms; a world free from past pictorial traditions. A working person, actively participating in social life, had no time left for leisurely contemplation. Speed ​​and manufacturability took the first place. Buildings, furniture, household items were supposed to be convenient not only for the consumer, but also for the machines that produced them. The main criterion in life and art has become universality. The human personality turned out to be subordinated to rigid public interests. Objects surrounding a person have also lost their uniqueness.

The house is a car for living. In this statement, Le Corbusier very clearly formulates the goals and objectives of constructivism. The supporters of constructivism, putting forward the task of "constructing" an environment that actively guides life processes, sought to comprehend the possibilities of new technology, as well as the aesthetic possibilities of materials such as metal, glass, wood. Constructivists strove to oppose ostentatious luxury to the simplicity and emphasized utilitarianism of new objective forms, in which they saw the reification of democracy and new relations between people.

Constructivism occupies a special place in Russian art. The unique political situation, the victory of the revolution, the building of a new world completely coincided with the tasks of constructivism.

In architecture, the principles of constructivism were formulated in the theoretical speeches of A. A. Vesnin and M. Ya. Ginzburg. In 1924, a creative organization of constructivists was created - OSA, whose representatives developed the so-called functional design method, based on a scientific analysis of the functioning of buildings, structures, town-planning complexes.

Along with other groups of Soviet architects, constructivists (the Vesnin brothers, Ginzburg, I. A. Golosov, I. I. Leonidov, A. S. Nikolsky, M. O. Barshch, V. N. Vladimirov and others) were looking for new principles of planning populated places. They put forward projects for the reconstruction of everyday life, developed new types of public buildings (Palaces of Labor, House of Soviets, workers' clubs, kitchen factories, etc.). At the same time, in their theoretical and practical activities, the constructivists made a number of mistakes (treating the apartment as a "material form", schematism in the organization of everyday life in some projects of communal houses, underestimating natural and climatic conditions, underestimating the role of large cities under the influence of desurbanism ideas) ...

The aesthetics of constructivism largely contributed to the formation of modern artistic design. On the basis of the developments of the constructivists (A. M. Rodchenko, A. M. Gana, and others), new types of dishes, fittings, and furniture, convenient to use and designed for mass production, were created; artists developed designs for fabrics (V.F. Stepanova, L. S. Popova) and practical models of work clothes (Stepanova, V.E. Tatlin).

It is safe to say that constructivism reached its peak in Russia in the 1920s. In European architecture, the ideas of constructivism were brought to life by such masters as Le Corbusier, Mies Van der Rohe, Gropius. Pillars, roof gardens, free layouts, striped glazing, unadorned facades - these are the principles Le Corbusier formulated for the new architecture. Reinforced concrete made it possible to solve many design problems, architects were given more freedom and room for imagination.

The works of architects in small forms are very interesting. Metal tubes are becoming one of the favorite materials in design. The famous Le Corbusier couch is truly versatile. It can be placed by the pool, on an open veranda, in the living room, in the bedroom. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe treated furniture like mathematical objects. He claimed that he solves the shape of the next object as an equation. But most importantly, the furniture designed in those distant years is very popular today.

Some of the ideas of constructivism were embodied in Western European (W. Baumeister, O. Schlemmer, etc.) fine art. In relation to foreign art, the term "constructivism" is largely arbitrary: in architecture it denotes a trend within functionalism that sought to emphasize the expression of modern constructions; in painting and sculpture, it is one of the directions of avant-gardeism that used some formal searches of early constructivism (sculptors I. Gabo, A. . Pevzner)