This fascinating book charts the dazzling trajectory of Russian
avant-garde architecture during the brief but intense period of
design and construction that took place from c. 1922 to 1935. Fired
by the radical new language of Constructivist artists, such
architects as Konstantin Melnikov, Moisei Ginzburg, and the Vesnin
brothers produced designs whose innovative style embodied the
energy and optimism of the new Soviet Socialist state. Streamlined,
flat-roofed, and white-walled, their extraordinarily novel
buildings must have seemed like alien forms. Architectural
photographer Richard Pare has spent the last 15 years documenting
the remains and ruins of these structures. Here, his spectacular
photographs are juxtaposed with vintage images, ephemera, and
drawings and paintings by artists such as Malevich, Tatlin, Popova,
and Lissitzky.
