One British publishing company has chosen ‘permacrisis’ as the word of the year for 2022. In fact, the crisis has been permanent for the time longer than one year. Over the last few decades, crises have become so integrated into our lives that they look like a familiar and permanent backdrop. Crises of all kinds succeed one another: economic, epidemiological, ideological, political ... But in spite of everything, life goes on and the end of a difficult year was brightly coloured by regional conferences, governor’s prizes (14–22), glorious anniversaries and accompanying magnificent...
The news announces new editions of international competitions, as well as presents the winners of international awards of the year 2022.
Project Baikal journal publishes the reports of RAACS academicians at the Jubilee General Meeting of members of the Russian Academy of Architecture and Construction Sciences, which was held from 11 to 13 October 2022 in the Central House of the Architect, Moscow.L. Lyakhovich, academician and head of the Siberian Regional Branch of the RAACS, outlined the history of the Academy in Russia since 1764 up to the present time and highlighted important aspects of the RAACS activities. He emphasized that the activities of its members have greatly determined the strategy for the development...
Project Baikal journal publishes the reports of RAACS academicians at the Jubilee General Meeting of members of the Russian Academy of Architecture and Construction Sciences, which was held from 11 to 13 October 2022 in the Central House of the Architect, Moscow.
Academician A. Kudryavtsev spoke about the periods of development of the RAACS since its establishment. He focused on acquiring autonomy and self-organisation of the Academy, transforming it into a Russian Academy, developing links with higher schools, improving experimental design, forming an urban planning doctrine. Of...
Academician D. V. Busch writes about the 85th anniversary of one of the most famous and prominent architects of modern Russia, A. P. Kudryavtsev, and characterises his diverse and prolific work, as well as the breadth and depth of his knowledge. The exhibition dedicated to A. P. Kudryavtsev’s anniversary and achievements comprises sections corresponding to the most important stages and results of his theoretical and creative work.
The Irkutsk Region Governor’s Award for Achievements in Culture and Art 2022 in the category “Works of Architecture, Urban Planning and Park Art” was awarded to the creative team consisting of Alexey Polikarpochkin, Maria Borisova, Lidia Zakharova, Evgeniya Kuznetsova and Alexandra Kushkova for the restoration of the cultural heritage sites in Irkutsk. The team of architects and restorers has completed more than 60 restoration projects over the last thirty years. Most of the projects have been realized.
In 2022 the Irkutsk Region Governor’s Award for the creative work in the field of culture and art was given to the writer Yury Baranov and the artists Vasily Lisitsin and Yana Lisitsina for their regional educational publishing project “The Tales of Bolshaya Street”. The article reveals the content of the book and describes the concept of illustrative approach.
The Irkutsk Research Institute of Precious and Rare Metals and Diamonds (Irgiredmet) has a 150-year history. The Institute changed its name several times, was under different departments, and was classified as secret. Its main activity is research and development, comprehensive scientific and technical assessment and development of mineral deposits, design, construction and reconstruction of metallurgical enterprises. The building of Irgiredmet is located in the central part of Irkutsk on the Embankment of the Angara River. Initially, the Irkutsk gold-alloy laboratory was located on this...
The article introduces the concept of a complex crisis. Unlike local crises, a complex one is global in nature and affects all significant areas of life – the economy, politics, epidemiology, demography, and so on. The events of the sixteenth century A.D. are given as an example of the complex crisis. It is shown that in the field of architecture and construction, the complex crisis can cause both stagnation and regression, as well as rapid progress and the emergence of bright talents. The assumption is made that the positive results of the crisis are associated with the willingness to...
Not to see a crisis in architecture means not to see or understand the nature of architecture. While the volume of architectural work is increasing, its level is steadily falling. Designing and construction with the participation of architects differs little from ‘anonymous’ design or design without architects. The presence of some bright personalities in architecture does not prove that the whole architecture is healthy and is culturally and socially relevant. The crisis of humanity is the basis for degradation of contemporary architecture.
The state of permanent crisis has become almost a norm for contemporary humanity. However, one cannot deny that for modernist tendencies in art, literature and culture in general, crisis is the most comfortable state: it raises the stakes for innovation, allows radicalism, and demands strong methods and strong personalities. The trend, alas, is not limited to modernism as a period. Architecture, prone to expressive ‘beautiful gestures’ and aimed at acute emotional impact, even today fosters the spread of ontological crisis, while cluttering the mental sphere.
The birth of a new post-crisis architecture, human-scaled and reflecting deep philosophical and ideological foundations of the society, is possible if these foundations are not destroyed. The crises experienced by architecture in the 20th and early 21st centuries are related to the loss of ideological foundations of the society. The disappearance of symbolic details in architecture is a detail of the general crisis of culture.
The present text is a response to the article “The crisis of a detail as a detail of the crisis” by E. Yu. Bagina included in the current issue of the journal. The author expresses his point of view on the important questions raised in the article.
The article deals with the problems of instability in the demand and supply of energy resources in the world during the energy crisis of 2022 against the backdrop of growing military tension in the world in post-pandemic realities. The article considers the long-term forecasts of leading energy agencies published at the end of 2022, as well as various forms of crisis adaptation and new opportunities to remove the carbon footprint of infrastructure facilities, both from direct emissions and through electricity consumption. The authors describe one of the methods to achieve a negative...
The article raises questions about the climate crisis, which manifests itself in global warming, emergencies that pose a danger to cities and towns, buildings, structures, and people’s health. The author presents different points of view on climate change, the role of greenhouse gases and the anthropogenic contribution to global warming. A study was made of the proposed ways of adapting construction and architecture to the situation of global warming, mitigating the negative effects of climate change. The author highlights topical areas of scientific research, such as: the formation of...
The authors consider the consequences of the reduced control over the architectural and urban planning approval of capital construction in Russian cities. The new practice that simplifies the approval procedure will allow to reduce the costs for developers. However, without taking into account the opinion of specialists and citizens, it will provoke mass replication of unattractive cliches, aggressively erasing the traces of architectural identity. In view of the ongoing urbanization in large Russian cities, we can predict the transformation of certain historical buildings into...
The modern media text is considered as one of the markers of the urban identity crisis. Since the 1960s there has been an active social movement for the preservation of cultural monuments in Irkutsk. The importance of historical toponyms for the city identity is generally recognized in the professional and cultural sphere. This provided an opportunity to manifest the theme of toponymic restoration. The wave of partial toponymic restoration in historical Russian cities in the 1990s was completely ignored by the Irkutsk authorities, and there were just a few cases of opportunistic renaming...
The article considers the crisis phenomena in the national history of the XX and XXI centuries and their influence on the development of industrial architecture. The formation of the industrial architecture of Kursk associated with the construction of new and reconstruction of existing facilities is shown using the historical material. Historical documents and facts served as a basis for identifying patterns of development of industrial architecture in a crisis. The development of industrial architecture in a modern city is aimed at solving economic and urban planning problems, taking...
The phenomenon of squatting, which plays an important role in the life of the city in the “era of permanent crisis”, is a kind of response to the crisis and/or an attempt to implement utopia, introduction of a special community model or reflection of the ideas of living ideals, as well as a form and method of creative self-expression and self-organization. It is a dual phenomenon, which is also a space of danger, risk and opportunities for self-development / self-realization.
As you know, the word ‘crisis’ written in Chinese consists of two hieroglyphs. The first one means danger, the second one means opportunity. Crisis is also a window of opportunity.
And the present proves it: we can see that even in times of permanent crisis, the urban environment is changing for the better, not only in capitals but also in regional centres (94), as well as in small towns. On New Year’s Eve the results of the 7th edition of the Competition “Comfortable Environment in Small Towns and Historic Settlements” were summed up. Over the five years of its existence, the...
The project considers the notion of ‘boundary space’ as a link between different thematic-behavioural states of human beings, which initiates the process of learning in dialogue with nature.
Research in architectural history is consistently based on three models of the architectural object: classical, monostructural and polystructural. In order to understand the methods and principles of modeling the architectural object, the authors consider the stages of methodological understanding of the model of the artistic object by outstanding philosophers and art historians, who addressed the problems of aesthetic worldview. It is noted that the contemporary architecture, gravitating toward artistic openness, semantic streamlining, polysemy and vagueness, can also be presented as...
This article presents the results of a systematic analysis of nationwide implementation of BIM technology in the architecture and construction industry. The factors influencing this process are identified and structured. The analysis of these factors is based on five examples. To identify and compare differences in the processes, the authors considered the implementation in developed and developing countries – the USA, Singapore, the UK, Kazakhstan and Russia. In all cases, the first implementation programmes and their results were examined. The article provides a comprehensive...
The article is devoted to the problem of digital cataloging of architectural monuments. The most common ways of storing information about architectural heritage objects are considered, their advantages and disadvantages are identified. The authors compile a list of tools and software necessary to create a digital catalog of historical and cultural monuments. On the example of the city of Khabarovsk, the range of problems existing in this area is outlined and an algorithm for their solution is proposed.
The arch, a favourite form of world architecture, is analysed in terms of its phenomenology, genesis and meanings. There is a thesis about the ambiguity of the arched structure, its initial criticality, which allows us to consider the arch as an architectural symbol of crisis. The popularity of the arch implies that architecture tends to signify states of crisis, to “play” with them, to give any crisis. . . an expressive form.
In the second part of this series devoted to Leonidov’s projects for the southern coast of the Crimea, the author considers the design for Yalta and the cultural and sports facilities on the Darsan hill and the adjacent park. An attempt is made to reconstruct the main buildings on the basis of the architect’s drawings and sketches.
The article is devoted to little-studied aspects of the Russian countryside culture. New materials from the archives of the Russian State Historical Archive are introduced into the scholarly discourse. The author considers different trends in dacha architecture on the basis of projects for the suburbs of St. Petersburg.
Construction of workers’ clubs (Houses and Palaces of Culture) was an important component of the cultural policy of the young Soviet state. Architect A. A. Ol from Leningrad designed the SoyuzZoloto Club, a facility in the constructivist style for Irkutsk, which later became the House of Culture for the V. V. Kuibyshev Plant. On the basis of archival materials, the article examines the problem of adapting a competition design to the real terrain.
The article is devoted to the architectural heritage of Leonid Lamekin to commemorate his 100th anniversary in 2022. The article reviews and analyses the peculiarities of L. A. Lamekin’s creative work during the 13 years spent by the architect in Irkutsk. The most noticeable buildings and complexes constructed by the architect in Irkutsk are characterized. The architectural ensemble created by the architect in the central part of the city became the most remarkable work of the master.
Over time, the recognition of authors of even famous objects is lost in professional circles. With this oblivion, history is gradually lost too. This article aims at restoring the memory of a famous Irkutsk professor, who was less famous as an architect though. The article applies the method of empirical research and the method of exclusion. The research is based on the archival materials of the Irkutsk Regional Organization of the Union of Architects of Russia. A preliminary study of archival materials was carried out to photograph the objects. Some biographical facts and pages of Yu....
The monuments of urban development and architecture of Ani, the medieval capital of Armenia, are presented through the eyes of Russian travellers, writers and artists of the late 18th and early 20th centuries. Their enthusiasm for this heritage stimulated professional scientific interest in the site of Ani, which became a laboratory of Russian medieval studies, archaeological and architectural research in the late 19th century. A review of literary and artistic works devoted to Ani reveals their value as documentary sources that describe the features and condition of the monuments of...