THE CASE of ICHERI SHEHER, BAKU Introduction

Copyright © 2007 by the author(s). Published here under license by CECI. The following is the established format for referencing this article: Ivanov A.. 2007. To maintain invisible? The case of Icheri Sheher, Baku. City & Time 3 (3): 1. [online] URL: http://www.ct.ceci- br.org TO MAINTAIN INVISIBLE? THE CASE OF ICHERI SHEHER, BAKU Andrey Ivanov♣ Abstract Actual conservation charters not reflect practically the “soul of place” phenomenon that is important for appropriateness and feasibility of the conservation programs in the sites of urban heritage. Some attempts made by the author to raise the interest to the soul of place issue in the historic cities of former USSR countries are show that a possibility of its considering exists despite the resistance of convention conservation practice. The Integrated Area Management Action Plan (IAMAP) for Icheri Sheher, the World Heritage site in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, included in the list of the World heritage in danger due to the vigorous redevelopment, was elaborated by international expert team with the author participation in 2006-2007 according to universal rules of the international urban conservation consulting. The mental opportunity of creation of “another project” for this place more targeted to the genius loci’s understanding and preservation is discussed. The development of methods of the soul of place investigation and the categories needed is in the very beginning only. Anyway it is stressed that the soul of place issue must become a significant useful component of urban conservation methodology and practice. Key-words: The soul of place, genius loci, conservation methodology, heritage understanding and management All the lanes are blind deaf-mute here, doors are not numbered and without mail boxes; even local mosques are in silence here for a long time, streets and houses are anxious about something invisible and unvoiced, which will, probably, appear and will be uttered one day behind this corner, beyond that turn, under that glazed balcony covered by the grape foliage… But when will it be – and where will you be that time? Afanasy Mamedov (Mamedov A., 2002). Introduction This article discusses how conservation charters and practice reflect the “soul of place” phenomenon in the sites of urban heritage, and in particular: was this phenomenon considered in the conservation charters; may an outer expert not deeply rooted in the object feel and define its “soul”; ♣ Deputy editor-in-chief, of the “Architecturny Vestnik” magazine, Moscow, Russia (www.archvestnik.ru), co-director of the Work Program “Architecture and Tourism” II Region UIA. 1 could this issue become a significant component of conservation methodology and practice in principle? I will try to answer these questions using contemporary cases of urban conservation (or so called “reconstruction”) in post-soviet cities. I’d like to stress in particularly the case of Icheri Sheher – the World Heritage site1 in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, where I worked on the elaboration of the Integrated Area Management Action Plan in 2006-2007 (IAMAP, 2007). I consider this case very instructive to think on the contradictions in the quadrangle “normative chartered approaches – chaotic and corrupted urban reality – conservation experts often outer for heritage sites – atmospheric and vulnerable soul of place” in the aspect of the weakness and oblivion of its last (fourth) corner. IMAGE - 01: Mental “quadrangle” of contemporary urban restoration. Various topics I’d like to approach have leaded me towards the concept of diversity (and to the seminar section of the same name). A diverse nature of the case chosen (Icheri Sheher and the city of Baku are somewhere between Europe and Asia, Muslim and liberal worlds, tribalism, socialism and capitalism, richness and poverty, etc.), diversity of lives and deaths bonded in old urban milieu, diversity of images superimposed on the local substance, diversity of tools failed or succeeded to save the heritage – this is a mental environment of my article. Consequently I base my reasoning on the assumptions that not sole but diverse answers are relevant to tackle an issue of the soul of place and that this urban soul is diverse due to its multi-subjective nature. 1 The ancient core of Baku – Icheri Sheher (Walled City) of 21,5 ha was included in the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2000: “Walled City of Baku with the Shirvanshah's Palace and Maiden Tower. Built on a site that has been inhabited since the Palaeolithic, the Walled City of Baku reveals evidence of Zoroastrian, Sassanian, Arabic, Persian, Shirvani, Ottoman, and Russian presence in cultural continuity. The Inner City (Icheri Sheher) has preserved much of its 12th-century defensive walls. The 12th-century Maiden Tower (Giz Galasy) is built over earlier structures dating from the 7th to 6th centuries BC, and the 15th-century Shirvanshahs' Palace is one of the pearls of Azerbaijan architecture” (WHC Nomination Documentation). The site was transferred to the “black” list of the World heritage in danger due to the vigorous redevelopment in 2003. 2 One more important preposition is that a large collection of famous philosophical and theoretical works devoted to the issues of genius loci and the spirit or the soul of place2 is deliberately passed over in this article. It concentrates on the relationship between methodological approaches and real conservational processes but theory. The article consists of three sections. The first section contains an observation of spiritual values’ reflection in the set of conservation charters and other official papers devoted to urban heritage. The second section discusses some examples of actual conservation practice indifferent to the soul of place question and some attempts made by the author to raise the interest to this issue. The main, third section tells the story of the Icheri Sheher’s IAMAP and examines the mental possibility of elaboration of “another project” there more targeted to the genius loci’s understanding and preservation. 1. Conservation charter s’ analysis from the soul (spirit) of place point of view The principal conservation charters – the Venice and the Washington Charters – are both targeted mainly towards the material part of the heritage; there is nothing distinctive said about the spirit or sense of monument or place there. “A message from the past” transmitted to us by the historic monuments is mentioned in the very first paragraph of the Venice Charter; we can guess on some immaterial values important for this process, but it is not developed hereinafter3. In the Washington Charter adopted a quarter of a century later a “spiritual component” was named once, but it hasn’t been developed in any way either: “Qualities to be preserved include the historic character of the town or urban area and all those material and spiritual elements that express this character, especially: a) Urban patterns as defined by lots and streets; b) Relationships between buildings and green and open spaces; c) The formal appearance, interior and exterior, of buildings <…>; d) The relationship between the town or urban area and its surrounding setting <…>; and e) The various functions that the town or urban area has acquired over time” (Washington Charter, 1987, Article 2; here and future italic selection made by the author – A.I.). The Nara Document on Authenticity, 1994, is dealing with a “spirit” precisely in the same way: “Depending on the nature of the cultural heritage, its cultural context, and its evolution through time, authenticity judgements may be linked to the worth of a great variety of sources of information. Aspects of the sources may include form and design, materials and substance, use and function, traditions and techniques, location and setting, and spirit and feeling, and other internal and external factors”. The “spirit” considered here as one of numerous “factors” of a monument and knowledge of it joins in understanding of authenticity of a monument by means of data from those or other sources. The same standing mentions are founded in more special papers on a heritage, e.g. in the Belgrade Declaration, 20044: “We condemn ethnic violence, which caused loss of 2 Bachelard, G., The Poetics of Space; Greenberg, M., The Poetics of Cities: Designing Neighborhoods That Work; Lefebvre, H., The Production of Space; Norberg-Schulz, Ch., Genius Loci: Towards a Phenomenology of Architecture; and many others. 3 “Imbued with a message from the past, the historic monuments of generations of people remain to the present day as living witnesses of their age-old traditions. People are becoming more and more conscious of the unity of human values and regard ancient monuments as a common heritage. The common responsibility to safeguard them for future generations is recognized. It is our duty to hand them on in the full richness of their authenticity” (The Venice Charter, 1964). 3 lives and devastation of precious tangible, intangible and moral values belonging to all communities in the area”. Nevertheless in the subsequent text the authors never return to those “moral values”. In many documents the spiritual component of a heritage is not mentioned at all; in others it is mentioned but has not become the institutional conservation’s parameter5. One of the documents closest to our discourse is the Charter on the Built Vernacular Heritage. The spirit is not particularly mentioned in it, but some important concepts related to spiritual aspects appear: “The conservation of the built vernacular heritage must be carried out by multidisciplinary expertise while recognising the inevitability of change and development, and the need to respect the community's established cultural identity”; “Contemporary work on vernacular buildings, groups and settlements should respect their cultural values and their traditional character”; “The vernacular embraces not only the physical form and fabric of buildings, structures and spaces, but the ways in which they are used and understood, and the traditions and the intangible associations which attach to them”.

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