Theories of Architecture Lecture-8- Architecture in the beginnings of 20th century 1915- 1930

CONSTRUCTIVISM

Prepared by Tara Azad Rauof

This lecture Context:

 The Origin  Characteristics of Constructivism  A revolution in architecture  Famous Constructivism Pioneers

Constructivism [The Origin]:

Constructivist architecture emerged from the wider constructivist art movement, which grew out of Russian Futurism in the Soviet Union in the 1920s and early 1930s.

After the Russian Revolution of 1917 it turned its attentions to the new social demands and industrial tasks required of the new regime. Two distinguished approach emerged, the first was encapsulated in Antoine Pevsner's and Naum Gabo's Realist manifesto which was concerned with space and rhythm, the second represented those who argued for pure art and the Productivists, a more socially-oriented group who wanted this art to be absorbed in industrial production such as Vladimir Tatlin.

A central aim of the Constructivists was instilling the avant-garde in everyday life. From 1927 they worked on projects for Workers' Clubs, communal leisure facilities usually built in factory districts. Among the most famous of these are the Kauchuk, Svoboda and Rusakov clubs.

Characteristics of Constructivism:

* Combined engineering and technology with political ideology.

* Constructivist art had attempted to apply a three-dimensional cubist vision to wholly abstract non-objective 'constructions' with a characterized by movement element.

* Technological details such as signs, and projection screens

* Abstract geometric shapes.

* Glass and steel

* The term Constructivism has frequently been used since the 1920s, in a looser fashion, to evoke a continuing tradition of geometric abstract art constructed from autonomous visual elements such as lines and planes.

* Also characterized by such qualities as precision, impersonality, a clear formal order, simplicity and economy of organization.

* The use of contemporary materials such as plastic and metal.

* Most famous work of constructivist architecture was never actually built.

A revolution in architecture:

* The first and most famous Constructivist architectural project was the 1919 proposal for the headquarters of the Comintern in St Petersburg by the Futurist Vladimir Tatlin, often called Tatlin's Tower. Though it remained unbuilt, the materials glass and steel and its futuristic spirit of a culture and political subjective influence (the movements of its internal volumes were meant to symbolise revolution and the dialectic) set the tone for the projects of the 1920s.

* Another famous early Constructivist project was the Lenin Tribune by El Lissitzky (1920), a moving speaker's podium. During the Russian Civil War the UNOVIS group centered on Kasimir Malevich and Lissitzky designed various projects that forced together the 'non-objective' abstraction of Suprematism with more utilitarian aims, creating ideal Constructivist cities.

Famous Constructivist Pioneers: 1- Vladimir Tatlin 2- Naum Gabo 3- El Lissitzky 4- Vladimir Shukhov

Vladimir Tatlin Vladimir Yevgraphovich Tatlin (1885-1953) was a Soviet painter and architect described as a "laboratory Constructivist”. With Kazimir Malevich he was one of the two most important figures in the Soviet avant-garde art movement of the 1920s, and he later became an important artist in the Constructivist movement.

Projects:

* Tatlin's Tower , 1919

Tatlin’s Tower was to be built from industrial materials: iron, glass and steel. In materials, shape and function, it was envisaged as a towering symbol of modernity. It would have dwarfed the Eiffel Tower in Paris. The tower's main form was a twin helix which spiralled up to 400 m in height, around which visitors would be transported with the aid of various mechanical devices. The main framework would contain four large suspended geometric structures. These structures would rotate at different rates. At the base of the structure was a cube which was designed as a venue for lectures, conferences and legislative meetings, and this would complete a rotation in the span of one year. Above the cube would be a smaller pyramid housing executive activities and completing a rotation once a month. Further up would be a cylinder, which was to house an information centre, issuing news bulletins and manifestos via telegraph, radio and loudspeaker, and would complete a rotation once a day. At the top, there would be a hemisphere for radio equipment. There were also plans to install a gigantic open-air screen on the cylinder, and a further projector which would be able to cast messages across the clouds on any overcast day.

Naum Gabo

Naum Gabo [1890-1977] was an influential sculptor, theorist, and key figure in Russia's post-Revolution avant-garde and the subsequent development of twentieth-century sculpture. His work combined geometric abstraction with a dynamic organization of form in small reliefs and constructions, monumental public sculpture and pioneering kinetic works that assimilated new materials such as nylon, wire, lucite and semi-transparent materials, glass and metal. Responding to the scientific and political revolutions of his age

Projects:

* Head no 2, 1916:

In 1915-20 Gabo used planes to construct heads and figures that demonstrated the application of this method to traditional subjects. 'Head No.2' is a later enlargement of the most dramatic of these models.

* Revolving Torsion kinetic sculpture, Thomas's Hospital, London, U.K:

The sculpture is the culmination [The act] of an idea that Gabo developed from the mid-1920s, to implement the ideas published in his 1920 Realistic Manifesto.

* Metal sculpture, in Rotterdam, Netherlands:

A three-dimensional construction that has flanked De Bijenkorf department store since 1957 was an ‘ideological contribution to Constructivism’. This is related to the level of integration between the sculpture and the architecture, the transparency of the space defined by the sculpture and the impression of weightlessness in a sculpture of this format and weight (approximately 40,000 kilos).

Vladimir Shukhov

Vladimir Shukhov [1853-1939] was a Russian engineer-polymath, scientist and architect renowned for his pioneering works on new methods of analysis for structural engineering that led to breakthroughs in industrial design of the world's first hyperboloid structures, diagrid shell structures, tensile structures, gridshell structures. He is also the inventor of the first cracking method.

Projects:

* Shukhov Tower in Moscow, 1920–1922

The 160-metre-high free-standing steel diagrid structure was built in the period 1920–1922, during the Russian Civil War. The Tower It is currently under threat of demolition, and there is an international campaign to save it.