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[ARCHITECTURAL AVANT-GARDE] MAO: Konkursy 1923-1926 [i.e. Moscow Architectural Society: Competitions of 1923-1926]

Moscow: Izd. Moskovskogo Arkhitekturnogo obshchestva, 1927. Item #1385

147 pp.: ill. + 2 pp. of publisher’s ads. 32,5x25 cm. In original wrappers with letterpress design. Restored, otherwise mint. Pages 89- 104 inserted upside down.

First and only edition. One of 3,000 copies. Rare.
Signed by the Soviet Jewish artist and architect Iakov (Iankel Meer) Raikh (1883-1957) on the title page (1927). For this edition, he produced a letterpress cover design in Constructivist style. Raikh graduated from the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture in 1915. During the Civil War, he was a member of the Zhivskulptarh, a commission of pictorial, sculptural, and architectural synthesis under the Department of Fine Arts of the People’s Commissariat of Education of the RSFSR in 1919-1920.
MAO: Konkursy 1923-1926 is a review of the winning designs submitted to competitions sponsored by the Moscow Architecture Society (MAO). The society was founded in 1867 and was the first Russian professional union of architects and constructing engineers. MAO studied architecture and organized numerous exhibitions and competitions. The society held the first open architecture design competition in 1868. By the 1920s, these competitions became instrumental in creating a favourable atmosphere for the development of the avant-garde movement and architectural design. Interestingly, although the number of architects during the formative years of MAO (the 1920s) was extremely small, still they didn’t have an opportunity to deal with real projects (construction was rare during the Civil War and for some time afterward). Thus, the 1920s became an era of architectural design and pre-projecting. As a result, a small group of architects formed a creative reserve, an unrealized legacy that harbored great shaping potential. In the late 1920s, the state construction began to realize some of these projects, but many of them were considered too avant-garde.
In the period from 1923 to 1926, MAO held sixteen competitions for the construction of different buildings in Moscow, provincial cities of the RSFSR, Belarus, and Uzbekistan. The first competition presented in the edition, the People’s House named after Lenin, was intended to be built in Ivanovo-Voznesensk. This section includes designs by Vesniny brothers, I. Golosov, P. Golosov with M. Parusnikov, S. Chernyshev, Ia. Raikh with D. Fridman, etc.
The edition showcased a notable project of the Palace of Labor in Rostov-on-Don by architects I. Golosov and B. Ulinich. Another design for the same competition was created by A. Grinberg together with the student Alexander Vlasov. In the 1930s and the 1940s, Vlasov became the chief architect of Kyiv and in 1950 headed the Department for Architecture of the Moscow City Executive Committee. Vlasov was responsible for the design of all buildings and structures in the Soviet capital in the early 1950s. The next section, dedicated to the competition for the Palace of Labor in Ekaterinoslav, contains an interesting project by Ia. Raikh with D. Kogan and D. Fridman. It attracts special attention by its semi-circle central part with protruding fragments that entirely look like a gear.
The edition also documents an urban plan of a workers’ town for “Grozneft.” This oil processing enterprise was founded in Grozny in the pre-revolutionary period, then it was nationalized and reconstructed. The outstanding architects Kolli, Chernyshev, Vesniny brothers, and Golosovy brothers participated in this competition.
The most curious section is devoted to the building of the Central Telegraph, Radio Station, and International Telephone Station in Moscow. Eight projects created for this competition captivate with their forms and solutions for the upper part (towers and antennas) and passages. An extended program for the Republican Hospital in Samarkand is followed by eight projects, including those created by P. Golosov, D. Fridman, and V. Fidman.
In all, a valuable source of information about early Soviet architectural thought.

Worldcat shows copies located in Princeton, Columbia, Arizona Universities, and MoMA.

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