The role of an architect in creating the city landscape

Excerpts from a discussion between architects Anton Gorlenko, Kirill Asse and Yury Grigoryan

Этот текст опубликован также на русском языке: «Роль архитектора в формировании городского пейзажа»

The discussion between architects Kirill Asse and Anton Gorlenko on the role of an architect in creating the city landscape took place on February 9, 2019 as part of a public programme of The New Landscape exhibition at The Ekaterina Cultural Foundation in Moscow. The conversation was moderated by an architect Yury Grigoryan.

As an introduction to the discussion, Anton Gorlenko and Kirill Asse made short presentations. We published the outlines of the presentations separately: “The architecture, the landscape, an individual and the city”, “The individual in the city as a social animal”.

What is “a city” for an architect?

Anton Gorlenko: The concept of a city as a totalitarian space, as a space of single power, and the concept of a city as a space where an architect just does his job, are definitely not in the same category.

Pier Vittorio Aureli, an Italian architect and theorist, writes in his book “The Possibility of an Absolute Architecture”:

“Architecture has to address the city even if the city doesn’t have any challenges for the architecture”.

Pier Vittorio Aureli. The Possibility of an Absolute Architecture. Moscow, 2014, p. 75

Aureli generally follows the paradigm where the city is something “above the authority”. He carries on the tradition of his fellow countrymen colleagues of the 1960s, who claimed that the city was a set of settled historical patterns. In this way, an architect has to refer to to some kind of a personality which reflects the city as a whole. […]

The curse of a modern architect is considering the city to be something contemporary to him, an “existing” environment. Everything we can see on the photographs here [at The New Landscape exhibition — ed. note], was at a certain moment an intervention in the existing (actually, everything created during past five or ten thousand years is an intervention). Paradoxically we speak of the old architecture as of something that existed before us, but it probably will also survive us.

Palimpsests project, Max Sher, 2010–2017

Kirill Asse: We can discuss the urban space as a space of power as long as we like to, but the truth is that almost every city is a product of at least ten, or maybe even hundreds, of different “poleis”, which overlay one another as a palimpsest, resulting in a very contradictory environment and making [architects] tack. That’s when it becomes apparent that the architect can tell himself what he “can” or “cannot” do. Because he needs to feel like a part of the process. […]

Urban population, as we know, has exceeded the rural on the global scale in spite of the cities still being horrible. They continue to grow because the people think they [the cities — ed.note] are still better. Ironically, the clear message we get is that the cities aren’t as bad as they seem to be.

By the way, this exhibition also says something about it. It turns out that the audience can suddenly discover some charm in this kind of hell, in the horror of some figurative Kapotnya [“Kapotnya” is a residential district situated near a huge oil refinery in the outskirts of Moscow and famous for the worst ecology in the city], they can discover the “Arcadia” [“Arcadia” is a project by Anastasia Tsayder, part of the exhibition — ed.note.], where the life is blooming, and which can only be ruined by our “living streets”.

That is the objective and the role of an architect — to understand that the mess of the environment can be repulsive, but this mess is a part of the permanent mess and fun, where all the natural and living things exist and which makes the country lifestyle attractive to us.

Architects have to stop calling the person who will live in the building they design “a user”.

What do the people and the authorities have to do with it?

A.G.: In the XX century, or maybe even beginning from the XIX century, they begin to apply the term “user” to architecture. It shows that in an architectural deal there are three (active or passive) parts: the architect, the contractor and some third part — the user, which the authorities have in mind when they order to build something, but who doesn’t equally take part in the discussion of the project. Naturally, the exclusion of the user from the decision-making process is conducted under the slogan which claims it’s for his [the user’s] own sake.

It seems to me that it’s very important for an architect to reflect on these relationships, to identify the challenges and find out their own role in these relationships. Architects have to stop calling the person who will live in the building they design “a user”.

Trees, cars, figures of people, assorted barriers, Petr Antonov, 2010–2013

A.G.: I don’t think that what we see here [at The New Landscape exhibition — ed. note] is a totally chaotic, natural, unruly process. If we suggest that our laws and authorities affect how all more or less significant buildings look, I think that the approach to architecture of the authorities as an influence agent has shifted towards pluralism.

In mass residential projects you can see a clear trend to aim at the “welfare state”, where every “user” should be happy. The looks and the poetics aren’t as important as using nice materials and making people feel comfortable. It’s quite a consistent position.

K.A.: That’s not the official who makes the design, that’s the architects. Even if he will have to make 20 drafts, they will be his own 20 drafts. And finally one of them will be built. Or the project won’t be executed at all, then he’d made what he could.

An architect is the one who designs, who delineates, who conceptualizes all the impulses which come from the government contracts and manifest themselves in form of the mass housing development. This is a form of public commission. The role of the architect is just to conceptualize what is happening, it’s limited by a lot of factors which lay outside the powers of authority.

The lack of a solid architectural direction, its determination by the segments of the market, is an evidence that the authorities don’t have any clear political project, but they only have the economical one.

A.G.: I suddenly realized that the lack of a solid architectural direction, its determination by the segments of the market, can be the evidence that the authorities don’t have any clear political project, but they only have the economical one.

When the authorities have a political project, they are ready for some non-economical expenses, they are ready to debate and even to be placed in an awkward situation of being criticized for its totalitarianism and the style which expresses it. But today the authorities try, on the contrary, to resolve all the possible political contradictions. Nobody tries to convince those who want to buy cheap flats in the mass housing, that neoclassicism, for instance, is a good style, as it used to be in Stalinesque architecture.

Who is “an architect”?

K.A.: On the one hand, an architect is an organizing source and thus a political figure, that’s his role cannot be endlessly significant. As soon as it becomes endlessly significant and he begins to apply his idea, his thought to the huge territory of the city, the architect himself one of those people on top of the hierarchical chain who destroy everything. We [the architects] have to equivocate between our own understanding of what is needed to be done and the understanding of what is ethically acceptable.

The role which Le Corbusier took on by designing “The Radiant City” is quite tempting. We can see its realisation in the Arcadia project.

A.G.: And it came out great.

К.А.: It came out what it needed to be, what it meant to be: a forest where there are some towers. And suddenly it happens that nobody likes it! How come, it’s not neat, all those plants should be “quiet, gentle and sweet”.

Arcadia, Anastasia Tsaider, 2016

A.G.: I don’t know whether it’s good or bad, but I think that the role of an architect nowadays is to do what we are doing here — talking and reflecting on the subject.

On the one hand, the architect pictures himself as somebody actively involved in the economy, with all the rights and duties of this involvement. On the other hand, the architect still feels generically connected to artistic disciplines, to the fine arts. He is often satisfied with those two ideas which provide a convenient self-justification for not being an intellectual. I do not mean education, erudition and knowledge of the history of architecture, but the ability to articulate complex concepts in a disciplined manner, building on observations of the real life situations.

Architects think they can just draw or build something anytime they want. They don’t have the right to do it, they actually matter little or nothing as builders. The only thing that can make architecture valuable as a discipline — is the creation of intellectual constructs. But the architects have an excuse not to do it. […]

Architects often think that their job is too complex. I claim it to be even more complex.

Architects often think that their job is too complex. I claim it to be even more complex. I mean, in addition to what they already do, they have to begin to apply the level of mental effort which brings them out of the comfort zone.

Again, the function of an architect is to carefully, attentively define what is his own role model with regard to the other parties of the architectural “deal”. Firstly, what are the authorities? What are their interests, what is their role model? Do they want to be the kind of authorities which commission pro-European trendy architecture or the cost-effective one? Do those who are going to live in those buildings have their own ideas or motivation?

It seems to me that it’s very important to carefully define one’s position. And that’s what we often need.

Documents of nature, Valeri Nistratov, 2008–2011

K.A.: I have an inner feeling that we are waiting for an architect to come, who is some sort of an arbitrator, who knows how the things should be done and without whom nothing can be done at all. He will step in and save everybody. We are taught to think like this, we’ve learnt it at our mother’s knee. It’s interesting how in current times, when they at least rhetorically proclaim that any kind of hierarchy should be destroyed, we turn out to be in a situation where we are trying to redefine an hierarchy, in which we [the architects] are somewhere on the top of it.

Must the architect influence anything?

A.G.: I’m strongly against posing the question “must we”.

There is naive idealism in this formulation of “must we” or “must we demolish everything”. We inherited this idealism from the XVIII-century architects. It was the same in the early XX century. We are still a community which tries to decide whether “we have to do this or that” or “we should do like this”, or “should we change these things”? Personally, I can’t answer any of these questions, just because, as an architect, I see my relationship to the society in a different way.

The questions concerning how we can influence or change the world — they are very important, but they are optional and lay outside the master plan.

My position is quite practical. As an architect, one has an opportunity to execute 1, 5, 10, 25, 150 or 500 projects during your professional career. How can one do it in the best possible way and, in every single case, how can one influence the context, which scale depends on the project itself and the level of the architect’s ambition, to the best advantage? Poetry can’t save the humanity but it can help an individual. My concept of architecture is the same.

I can’t see anything negative about all these photos here [at the New Landscape exhibition — ed. note]. I’d feel great in any of those places, I’d just sit down and enjoy looking at them, because I was raised in a certain visual culture.

The main function of art is to teach somebody how to look at something in a different way. Composer John Cage used to recall the moment when he first saw Robert Rauschenberg’s paintings, he learned to see art in spatter on the pavement, and now it has become common knowledge.

It’s an interesting question — how can an architect teach somebody a new perception of the space, forms, materials and function? The other questions concerning the whole situation and how we can influence it, or can we change the world — they are very important, but they are optional and lay outside the master plan, the situative master plan, I’d say.

Less Than One, Alexander Gronsky, 2006–2008

Architects should also try to compare his professional activity within the context to the relationships between people, — which architects often forget to do. Well, when we enter a certain space or a room where people are having a conversation, we don’t just say — I’m sorry if this metaphor is rude, — “OK, that’s enough, get out of here now”. Or “that’s it, thank you, and now, everybody, listen to us!’’ No, we also need to sit there for some time, listen, pity an offended person, maybe get a rude one kicked out, and if it is possible to say something, too.

I think that an architectural design project should be based upon the common principles of decent behaviour and attention, both sensual and intellectual.

February 9 2019

The event was organized by the Yardstreet [Dvorulitsa] project and the Meganom architectural practice as part of public workshop schedule of the New Landscape exhibition in the Ekaterina Cultural Foundation, Moscow.

Translated from Russian by Daria Ermoshina