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[A SOVIET PRAISE TO WESTERN ARCHITECTURE] Arkhitektura sovremennogo zapada [i.e. Architecture of the Modern West]

Arkin, D.

Item #2007

Moscow: Izogiz, 1932. 185, [2] pp.: ill. 26.9x19.5 cm. In original publisher’s cloth binding with silver lettering on the front cover and illustrated dust-wrapper in Constructivist style. Neat restoration of a tear on the dust-wrapper, otherwise near fine condition.

Scarce with dust-wrapper. First edition. 1 of 7,000 copies. Edited by V. Kemenov. Dust-wrapper, title-page, and layout by one of the most prominent Soviet avant-garde artists El Lissitzky (1890-1941).
This important book on the constructivist architecture was written by the noted Soviet art critic and historian of architecture David Arkin (1899-1957) in 1932. The publication came out just a few months before the advent of “Stalinist architecture,” when the author had to completely abandon his modernist perspectives and principles. In December 1947, David Arkin, the secretary of the Union of Soviet Architects, faced accusations of anti-Soviet propaganda for his monograph Arkhitektura sovremennogo zapada [i.e., Architecture of the Modern West], criticized for allegedly promoting “cosmopolitanism” and “Americanism” in Soviet architecture.
This “troubled” edition offers a tribute to Western architecture, providing in-depth examinations of leading modernist designers and architects of the time, including Le Corbusier, Bruno Taut, J.J.P. Oud, Ludwig Karl Hilberseimer, Richard Neutra, Ernst May, Erich Mendelsohn, Moholy-Nagy, and Frank Lloyd Wright, etc. Profusely illustrated with black-and-white photographic reproductions of designs and built structures, the book delves into 20th-century modernist trends. It includes analyses of constructivism, functionalism, and “new architecture,” while highlighting various achievements in foreign construction. The edition also comprises selected excerpts from the treatises of these architects, featuring articles like Le Corbusier’s “A New Era in Architecture,” “Reorganization of Cities,” “Modern City for 3 Million Inhabitants,” “Aesthetics of a New City,” “Plan for the Restructuring of Paris”; Bruno Taut’s “What is New Architecture,” “Problems of Housing Architecture”; Oud’s “The Future of Architecture and its Possibilities”; Frank Lloyd Wright’s “The Third Dimension,” etc. The photographs of the showcased constructions provide a captivating glimpse into the state of Western architecture in the 1930s.

Status: On Hold