MOSCOW’S MONUMENTS UNDER THREAT

Moscow’s monuments under threat

The destruction of the Russian city’s architectural heritage has contributed to recent anti-government protests

By Sophia Kishkovsky. Web only

Published online: 25 June 2012

Preservationists are voicing growing concerns about Moscow’s architectural heritage and the state’s role in ensuring it survives. The controversial destruction of monuments has contributed to recent anti-government protests in Russia, even though a number of preservationists believe that Moscow’s authorities are doing a better job of saving landmark buildings under Sergei Sobyanin, who was elected as the city’s mayor in 2010, than under his predecessor Yuri Luzhkov, who was notorious for allowing historical architecture to be demolished.

The disputed sites include two that are now controlled by the state-owned VTB Bank: Dinamo Stadium, which is being redeveloped as a potential venue for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in a project worth at least Rb20bn ($635m), and Detsky Mir, a children’s store in Lubyanka Square, next door to the former headquarters of the KGB.

According to Natalia Samover, a co-ordinator of the Moscow-based Archnadzor movement, which monitors threats to architectural heritage and organises protests and lawsuits in its fight to save endangered buildings and monuments, officials ignored the fact that Dinamo Stadium was listed as a monument. The stadium, built in 1928 by the architects Arkady Langman and Lazar Cherikover as a homage to athleticism in the Stalin era, was “the last major sports facility in the constructivist style that was still preserved in Russia,” she says.

“Sobyanin’s new government has made numerous politically correct statements about the importance of cultural heritage,” Samover says. “In those places where the city makes decisions, there is progress. Where vandalism is to the advantage of a powerful state bank, they meekly obey everything they are told to do,” she says.

The new stadium, provisionally called the VTB Arena, will have a capacity of up to 45,000 people. The plans include an arena that can hold 15,000 people and a large area devoted to retail outlets, while a neighbouring park is earmarked for property development. The Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat was originally commissioned to create a design that would preserve part of the stadium’s original walls, but Samover laments the loss of these walls in the final project. It is being carried out by the American architect David Manica, who has worked on major arena projects in China.

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