Exhibition of Achievements of the National Economy (VDNKh) – Moscow

Posted on 27/06/2024 by Michael

VDNKh – 10

Exhibition of Achievements of the National Economy (VDNKh)

Exhibition of Achievements of the National Economy (VDNKh) is located in Ostankinsky District of Moscow, less than a kilometer from Ostankino Tower. It is served by VDNKh subway station, as well as by Moscow Monorail. Cosmonauts Alley and the Worker and Kolkhoz Woman statue are situated just outside the main entrance to VDNKh. It also borders Moscow Botanical Garden and a smaller Ostankino Park, and in recent years the three parks served as a united park complex.

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The exhibition was established February 17, 1935 as the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition (VSKhV) (Russian: Всесоюзная сельско-хозяйственная выставка; Vsesoyuznaya selsko-khozyaystvennaya vystavka). An existing site (then known as Ostankino Park, a country territory recently incorporated into the city limits), was approved in August 1935. The master plan by Vyacheslav Oltarzhevsky was approved in April 1936, and the first show season was announced to begin in July 1937 and was designed as a ‘City of Exhibitions’ with streets and public spaces, which was very common in the 1930s. However, plans did not materialise and three weeks before the deadline Joseph Stalin personally postponed the exhibition by one year (to August 1938). It seemed that this time everything would be ready on time, but again the builders failed to complete their work, and regional authorities failed to select and deliver proper exhibits. Some pavilions and the 1937 entrance gates by Oltarzhevsky were torn down to be replaced with more appropriate structures (most pavilions were criticised for having no windows). According to Oltarzhevsky’s original plan, all of the pavilions were to be constructed from wood. In 1938, a government commission examined the construction and decided that it did not suit the ideological direction of the moment. The exhibition was considered too modest and too temporary. Oltarzhevsky was arrested, together with the Commissar for Agriculture and his staff, and eventually released in 1943. Later, he worked on the 1947-1953 Moscow skyscraper project [The ‘Seven Sisters’ on the USSR page.].

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As a result, in August 1938 Nikita Khrushchev, addressing the assembled Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, declared that the site was not ready, and the opening was postponed until August 1939. It finally opened on 1 August 1939, and was open to the public until 25 October. The 1940 and 1941 seasons followed but following German invasion in 1941 the exhibition was closed until the end of World War II.

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In October 1948 the State ordered the renewal of the Exhibition, starting with the 1950 season. Again, the opening was postponed more than once; the first post-war season opened in 1954 (still as Agricultural exhibition). In the 1956 season the planners set aside an Industrial area within the main territory; more restructuring and rebuilding followed. In 1959 the park was renamed Exhibition of Achievements of the National Economy (Russian: Выставка достижений народного хозяйства, Vystavka dostizheniy narodnovo khozyaystva) or ВДНХ/VDNKh.

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By 1989 the exhibition had 82 pavilions with an exhibition area of 700,000 square metres. Each pavilion (including the 1939 regions) had been dedicated to a particular industry or field: the Engineering Pavilion (1954), the Space Pavilion (1966), the Central Industrial Zones Pavilion (1955), the Atomic Energy Pavilion (1954), the People’s Education Pavilion (1954), the Radio-electronics Pavilion (1958), the Soviet Culture Pavilion (1964).

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During Soviet times, each year VDNKh hosted more than 300 national and international exhibitions and many conferences, seminars and meetings of scientists and industry professionals. The most memorable feature of the exhibition site was the Worker and Kolkhoz Woman (Rabochiy i kolkhoznitsa) statue, featuring the gigantic figures of a man and woman holding together the ‘hammer and sickle’. The sculpture, which reaches 25 meters toward the sky, was designed by Vera Mukhina and originally crowned the 35-meter-tall Soviet pavilion at the Paris Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne (1937).

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In 1992, VDNKh was renamed, receiving the new acronym VVC, which remained in use until 2014. It occupies 2,375,000 square metres of which 266,000 square metres are used for indoor exhibits. The territory of VDNKh is greater than that of the Principality of Monaco and has approximately 400 buildings.

On 14 May 2014 the previous name VDNKh was restored, following an interactive poll. In addition, the mayor of Moscow announced that the Russian space shuttle, the structural test article – TVA, which was an attraction and restaurant at Gorky Park in Moscow was to be moved to the VNDKh, to be displayed near the Vostok rocket in front of the Cosmos hall. It was moved 5–6 July 2014 and re-assembled by 21 July.

The above text from Wikipedia.

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This park is vast and it’s impossible to see all there is on a single visit – even a handful of visits would probably mean missing out on something. There’s so much to take in that it exhausts you with information, image, and impression overload.

The slide show below, which I have to admit is huge (perhaps too big?) can only give an impression of what exists in the park – and I didn’t have time to enter any of the pavilions, just satisfying myself with taking in the architecture from the outside.

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For anyone interested in Soviet era architecture it allows you to see, and appreciate, the marriage between Socialist Realism and the cultural influences of the various Republics of the Soviet Union.

Originally the various pavilions would have contained exhibitions related to the Republic under whose name it was built but more recently many of the pavilions have been taken over by commercial companies to promote themselves and their own capitalist values.

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This commercial ‘development’ has also meant the construction of more contemporary buildings and/or temporary modifications of existing buildings. This has drastically changed the environment of the park, more specifically that part of the park closest to the entrance. Commercial companies know that if they built their edifices down by the Cosmos Pavilion and the Transport Museum no one would see them let alone enter.

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There’s a fine statue of VI Lenin just in front of the Russian Republic pavilion.

The Worker and Kolkhoz Woman is outside the main park space, to the right as you look at the main site entrance arch, about 10 minutes away. That has been the subject of a separate post so images of that magnificent sculpture, truly accepted to be an iconic representation of the Soviet Union, can be seen by following the link above. It’s very much worth a short diversion to appreciate the sheer scale and beauty of the, now, renovated and restored masterpiece.

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As (in June 2024) the conflict in the Ukraine is still ongoing it might be worthwhile to make a reference to the pavilion that was dedicated to the Republic of Ukraine. Although many of the pavilions are impressive that of the Ukraine is even more so.

The Ukrainian Republic pavilion is probably bigger, more ornate, more complex in its imagery, having had more attention paid to it, having had more money given to it and stands out amongst many impressive buildings. And this is the case with many other references to the Ukraine in Moscow. Both the two stations on the metro system (Line 3 and Line 5) are amongst the most ornate amongst a collection of very ornate structures. As is the internal decoration of the Kievskaya mainline railway station.

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It seems that if you pay attention to your ‘favourite child’ it will still turn against you because you haven’t given it enough.

Location;

VDNKh is located in Ostankinsky District of Moscow and is served by VDNKh subway station, north east of the city centre, on Line 6, the brown line.

GPS;

55°49′47″N

37°37′56″E

Opening times;

‘VDNKh is open around the clock’.

Entrance;

Free to the complex but you might have to pay to enter some of the pavilions.

Website;

VDNKh (in English)

Mies van der Rohe Pavilion, Barcelona

Posted on 28/04/2014 by Michael

Mies van der Rohe Pavilion

Mies van der Rohe Pavilion, Barcelona

If, after a few days in Barcelona, you’re suffering from a surfeit of Modernism (too much Gaudi or Domenech i Montener) then you could do much worse than visit the Mies van der Rohe Pavilion in the exhibition and conference area, between the Plaça de Espanya and the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya.

Many, many thousands of people walk close-by but the overwhelming majority of them – unless they are specifically looking for it – won’t even know of the existence of this building or know of its importance in the development of 20th century architecture.

The German Pavilion and the International Exhibition of 1929

The present building is on the same spot as the original (designed as the German Pavilion for the 1929 Barcelona International Exhibition) but for more than 50 years nothing was there, just an empty space, an even more extreme example of minimalism.

Although it appears to be a house there’s no accommodation, kitchen or bathroom. I don’t understand why, it just wasn’t part of the requirements of the commission. I would have thought that creating a realistic living environment would have been more useful in promoting the Minimalist argument but Mies didn’t think so and just created ‘a space’ through which the people visiting the pavilion couldn’t just use it as a shortcut to the Pobla Espanyol, they had to see all of it.

The structure followed those tenets of Minimalism established a few years earlier: angular in appearance (no ‘softening’ of the structure which was taken for granted by the Modernists); a flat roof supported by simple iron columns; large, plate-glass windows – virtually forming the exterior walls; and limited, and purely functional furnishings.

When the exhibition finished attempts were made to find a buyer for the structure, and there was even a proposal to establish a restaurant in the location, but that all fell through and the German government decided to sell the iron for scrap and sent the travertine, marble, onyx (the types of stone used in the original) and the sculpture of a female nude (Der Morgen, ‘Morning’), by George Kolbe, back to Germany.

‘Less is more’ – the Mies van der Rohe motto

The Minimalists arose as a reaction to the over decoration that had been a dominant force in European architecture and was heavily influenced by traditional Japanese design. The Minimalists sought to reduce buildings (as well as objects and art) to their necessary elements, eschewing decoration that was over and above what was used, in a practical manner, to achieve the desired result. In the Mies Pavilion this is shown by the use of colourful and imaginatively pieced together slabs of marble and onyx for the walls or the travertine used on the floor.

Entrance – Mies van der Rohe Pavilion

The Bauhaus – the inspiration for Mies

Mies van der Rohe was one of the triumvirate of Minimalist architects which were to have a considerable impact upon the architecture of the 20th century, although this is not always that obvious. The other two were the Swiss Charles-Édouard Jeanneret-Gris, but always known as Le Corbusier, and a fellow German,Walter Gropius.

It was Gropius who had designed the Bauhaus in Dessau, in the Weimar region of Germany, which was completed in 1926. This established some of the ‘ground rules’ for Minimalist architecture with its angularity, use of iron columns, concrete and a lot of glass, as well as dividing the building up (it originally functioned as an art and design college, together with accommodation for students and staff) so that the design reflected the use of each section.

However, the Bauhaus complex exposed problems (I’m not going as far as to say failings) of the Minimalist approach, something which the Pavilion in Barcelona never would as it was never ‘used’ in a real life context, only ever being an exhibition space, a concrete realisation of the ‘idea’.

To some extent these problems arose due to the use of glass and the openness that this implied. In the Bauhaus, aligned as it was to make maximum use of natural light, the students would be cooked as the sun shone through the windows in the summer – if the Bauhaus had been constructed in Britain this would not have been a problem. In order to survive the ‘solution’ was to put up curtains, a total anathema to Minimalist thinking. In the winter the problem was the reverse. Any heat created inside the buildings just dissipated through the not very insulation efficient windows with their iron framework.

Privacy perhaps wasn’t a major issue for the classrooms but it was for the teachers in their homes, situated a short distance from the college building – or at least for one of them, the Russian born painter, Wassily Kandinsky.

It seems he didn’t like living in a ‘goldfish bowel’ and painted over the glass windows to his house. He also didn’t like the minimalist decoration of the house where the walls were painted in plain colours to reflect the function of that particular space. He was reputed to have used a palate of hundreds of colours in counteracting the original, simple selection.

This situation, didn’t, couldn’t and will never arise from the Mies Pavilion as it has no real function, perhaps yet another ultra-minimalist statement.

The Pavelló Mies

After the death of the Fascist Franco the Barcelona Municipality decided to attempt a reconstruction and as all the plans, together with photographs of the original, were to hand the project was completed and the ‘new’ building opened on 2nd June 1986.

The statue of Morning, by Kolbe, had found a permanent home in a public square in the Schöneberg district of Berlin so a copy was made and that now stands where its original had in 1929, on a plinth in the small pool.

‘Der Morgen’ – Morning – George Kolbe

The Barcelona Chair

Minimalists tried, when at all possible, to not only design the building but all the interior fittings within the structure. At the Bauhaus, for example, Gropius designed the light fittings, power sockets, door and cupboard handles to mention just a few. In this way they were very similar to the Modernists the result of which can be seen in the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, at the top of the steps above the fountain a few minutes walk from the Pavilion.

For Mies this resulted in the design of what is still known as the ‘Barcelona Chair’, a simple padded chair for one person based upon a tubular steel structure. This is still made and bought in their thousands today and is one indication of the longevity and reach of Minimalist ideas which might not be recognised by those who sit in those chairs – which are said to be quite comfortable. Don’t try that at the Pavilion or you’ll be thrown out on your ear.

‘Barcelona’ Chair – Mies van der Rohe Pavilion

Just as an aside, another well-known everyday design from that period of the 1920s is the anglepoise lamp.

A breath of fresh air?

Although in no way as extensive as the Modernist buildings in other parts of Barcelona and Catalonia the Mies Pavilion is still worth a visit but it might be worthwhile doing a little bit of research before a visit so you know what you are looking at and the intentions of the architect. At the same time only a real aficionado of Minimalism would be there for more than a half an hour – if that.

Location and contact details:

Pavelló Mies van der Rohe

Aviguda Francesc i Guàrdia 7

Parc de Montjuic

08038 Barcelona

Tel: +34 93 4234016

Internet: The Mies van der Rohe Foundation

How to get there:

The nearest Metro station is at Plaça de Espanya – this is also a major bus intersection. From there take the exit directing you to the Palau de Congressos and the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya. Walk along the right hand side of the avenue, go up the first set of escalators and then turn right alongside the sandy park space. The building is just in front of you but remember it’s minimalist so you have to look hard.

Opening times:

Everyday between 10.00 – 20.00

Entrance: €5

(At 10.00 on a Saturday a free guided tour in English is advertised. You still have to pay the entrance but there was no information of having to book in advance.)