Yakov Chernikhov, visionary architect

It could be a design made by the futuristic architect Antonio Sant'Elia at the beginning of the Century XX but it isn't. Besides the similarities, the designs of the Italian glorify the new materials and technologies, like concrete, glass and iron, whereas the architecture represented here denotes gothically marked traces. We're talking about one of the many romantic visions produced by the Russian architect Yakov Chernikhov during the 40's decade, in the plenary of the Stalinist Regime...

Curiously Chernikhov manifested in his first years of activity a very different incline, with the clear influence of the Russian vanguards. His visions of the time were then more abstract and could easily be identified with Constructivism or Suprematism of Tatlin and Malevich. Therefore, shorter after, his visionary architecture inflects and earns monumental and delirious outlines.

Was the artistic evolution of the artist pure strategy or survival? The megalomaniac tastes of Stanlin are known and don't scare, that's why, Chernikhov was headed for a more "official" aesthetic line... Anyway, we can't stop thinking what could have happened of the Stalinist regime would have lasted a few more years without the imposed constraints of World War Two. Would we have seen a gothic Soviet Union?

The drawings remain, magnificent...