MILKA BLIZNAKOV

THE CITY OF THE RUSSIAN FUTURISTS

"We look at their nothingness from the heights of skyscrapers! ..." A Slap in the Face of Public Taste, December, 1912

Futurist architecture and urbanism transcend the confining categories and fixed time periods of their artistic counterparts. Although Futurism was an international phenomenon, only one architect, Antonio Sant' Elia (1888- 1916) aligned himself with the Futurists. Sant' Elia was a latecomer to the movement and the "Manifesto of Futurist Architecture" was the last prin- cipal Futurist manifesto to be published (July, 1914). Hence, Filippo Tom- maso Marinetti (1876-1944), the founder of Italian Futurism, did not have an architect among his followers when he visited Russia at the beginning of 1914 (January 26 to February 15). Thus, Sant' Elia's architectural manifesto was not among those published in Russian translations during 1914 and, in fact, was never translated into Russian. Furthermore, no Russian architect, plan- ner, or urban designer called himself a Futurist, and none joined the Futurist groups such as Hylaea or Centrifuge which, in any case, were founded by po- ets, painters, and composers. The works of the members of these groups, however, their proclamations and theoretical premises, their social and aes- thetic commitments, had a lasting impact on the development of avant- garde architecture and city planning. The aim of this study is to demonstrate that the architects borrowed the legacy of the artists and carried its develop- ment further, well after Futurism in the arts had declined. One may even con- clude that the only logical expansion of Futurism, Suprematism, and Con- structivism is to be found in architecture and urban design. The boundaries between the groups comprising the Russian avant-garde remain imprecise, and all conventional demarcations of artistic fields (poetry, art, sculpture, architecture) tend to disappear as the members of the avant- garde groups engaged in activities bridging accepted categorizations. For ex- ample, David Burliuk, Aleksei Kruchenykh, and Elena Guro, were both ac- complished poets and painters. Mikhail Matiushin composed and painted, and Kazimir Malevich turned from painting to architecture and urban design. In- deed, the strength of the avant-garde was in the group dynamics arising from the professional variety of its members and from the heated dialogue between artistic groups. Although the competition between these groups often com- pelled the members to stress their differences, their lasting contributions were based on common ideals and visions; on shared theoretical premises and ideo- logical commitments. Avant-garde architecture assimilated many ideas first voiced by the Russian Futurists. The necessary, abrupt break with past tradi- tions for a clean new start was as pertinent for architects as it was for Futur- ist poets. While the Futurists threw "Pushkin, Dostoevskii, Tolstoi, and all the others overboard from the Steamship of Modernism,"3 the architects threw overboard all past styles and academic canons. The Futurists' aspiration to an innovative formal language pertinent to a technological society also became the driving force of avant-garde architecture. The Futurists' faith in science and technology, their search for a scientific approach to artistic form and art criticism was continued by the architects. Above all, the Futurists' commit- ment to social change was also shared by avant garde architects. As an urban and cosmopolitan culture, Futurism was the first movement to embrace the city and its buildings. Futurist poets and painters looked to urban architecture not only for inspiration but overtly for extracting prin- ciples and devices applicable to poetry (Velimir Khlebnikov), or art (David Burliuk). In the words of David Burliuk, the Futurists

are praising the culture of the city, the dynamics of the world, the mass movement, the inventions, discoveries, the radio, the cinema, airplanes, automobiles, machines, electricity, express trains-in a word. all the new that contemporary life offers. And we think that you should demand of art a bold reflection of reality. And when we offer you not Raphael, but a dynamic construction of highly colorful lines, shifts, and breaking down of planes. experiments in constructivism. the introduction of new materials into a work, when we put up for show the whole laboratory of our search- ings, you state that the futurist paintings are not very intelligible.... It's time to look ahead from the contemporary perspective and not with external eyes alone, but also with the eyes of intellect, reason, calculation. It's time to see in painting geometry and planes, material and textures. dynamism and construction. It's time to learn to understand how the art of futurism is constructed....22 -

The rational method of constructing Futurist art from the calculated com- binations of planes of contemporary materials and textures is actually a me-

1. D. Burliuk, A. Kruchenykh, V. Maiakovskii, V. Khlebnikov, "Poshchechina ob- shchestvennomu vkusu," in V. Markov, ed., Manifesty i programmy russkikh futuristov (Munich: Fink Verlag, 1967), p. 50. 2. David Burliuk during the Futurist tour of Russia in 1913-14, quoted in Vasilii Ka- menskii, Zhizn' s Maiakovskim (Moscow, 1940), pp. 18-20 and translated in Vahan D. Barooshian, Russian Cubo-Futurism 1910-1930: A Study in Avant-Gardism (The Hague: Mouton, 1974), pp. 71-72.