Shchusev Aleksey Viktorovich [26.9(8.10).1873, Kishinev – 24.5.1949, Moscow; buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery], a Russian architect, restorer, researcher, museum figure; an academician of architecture of the Imperial Academy of Arts (1910), a full member of the Academy of Architecture of the USSR (1939), and the USSR Academy of Sciences (1943).
He studied at the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg (IAH; 1891–1897) in the architectural workshop of L. N. Benois; he graduated from IAH with the title of artist-architect and a gold medal with the right to a pension trip abroad. In 1895 and 1897, he was in Central Asia with the expedition of N. I. Veselovsky, visiting Samarkand among other places. He traveled to Austria-Hungary in 1896. As a pensioner of IAH in 1898–1899, he visited Austria-Hungary, Germany, Italy, France (from where he made a trip to Tunisia), Belgium, and England.
While in Paris, he attended the Julian Academy for six months. Since 1901, he served as a freelance architect at the office of the Ober-Procurator of the Holy Synod. Almost all of Shchusev's pre-revolutionary works are associated with temple architecture: the Trinity Cathedral of the Pochaev Lavra, the Spasskaya Church in Natalievka (both now in Ukraine), the Pokrovsky Cathedral of the Marfo-Mariinsky Convent in Moscow (all in 1912), the pilgrimage center of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society in Bari, Italy (1913–1915), the memorial church of Sergius of Radonezh at Kulikovo Field (1913–1917; restored by 1980; now in the Tula region). Having deeply studied a wide range of ancient Russian architectural monuments, he freely combined and skillfully composed volumes, forms, and decorations borrowed from various sources in his works.
As a result, he created emotionally and artistically expressive images in the style of a generalized interpretation of ancient Russian architecture within the aesthetics of Art Nouveau. By the end of the 1900s, he became one of the recognized leaders of the Neo-Russian direction of Art Nouveau. He mainly worked on commissions from church hierarchs and Orthodox societies of Ukrainian dioceses or private individuals associated with Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna and supporting the architect's artistic aspirations. The restoration of the 12th-century Church of St. Basil in Ovruch (completed in 1911; now in Ukraine) brought him fame as a researcher and restorer; the work immediately became a model of scientific monument restoration, and Shchusev was elected as an academician of architecture of the Imperial Academy of Arts (1910).
In the 1910s, the typology of his works expanded: educational institutions, museums, banks, rental houses. The range of borrowing sources also expanded: Baroque, Empire style (Moscow-Kazan Railway stations, 1916), monuments of architecture of Byzantium and the Principality of Moldavia (Holy Trinity Church in Verkhniye Kugureshty, project 1912, construction 1913–1930; now in the Florești district of Moldova). However, in Shchusev's major buildings, he remained within the framework of creative stylization of ancient Russian architecture: for example, the Russian pavilion at the 11th Venice Biennale (1913) and the Kazan railway station in Moscow (1st phase, 1913–1926; 2nd phase completed in 1940) refer to the Naryshkin style. By the end of the 1910s, Shchusev became the foremost architect of the Russian national style, skillfully designing buildings of all types.
Thanks to his continuous and lengthy work on the construction of the Kazan Railway Station, he was able to remain in the architectural profession even after the October Revolution of 1917. Since the construction was under the jurisdiction of the People's Commissariat of Railways, he constantly interacted with the leaders of this institution, including F. E. Dzerzhinsky (who held this position in 1921–1924), who headed the commission in January 1924 to organize the funeral of V. I. Lenin. Hence, Shchusev was invited to design the mausoleum and subsequently continued his work for the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs – the People's Commissariat of State Security – of the Ministry of State Security of the USSR.
After the construction of the wooden (1924) and then the stone, in the Art Deco style (1930) Lenin Mausoleum on Red Square in Moscow, Shchusev's activities gained administrative and urban planning significance.
He headed the architectural workshop of the Moscow Soviet, where the plan "New Moscow" (1918–1925) was created, the Tretyakov Gallery (1926–1928), to which he tactfully added a new wing, echoing the main features of the building according to the project of V. M. Vasnetsov, and the 2nd architectural and design workshop of the Moscow Soviet (1932–1937).
His professional ability to work freely with any stylistic form allowed him to engage in architectural design immediately with the resumption of real construction in the mid-1920s. During the dominance of the avant-garde, Shchusev successfully participated in competitions with a number of constructivist projects: the Central Telegraph Office in Moscow, the House of Industry in Kharkiv (both in 1925), the State Bank in Moscow, the New Matsesta Hotel-Sanatorium in Sochi (1st place) (both in 1927), the Lenin Library in Moscow, and the Columbus Monument Lighthouse in Santo Domingo (both in 1929). In the constructivist spirit, he built the residential building for the artists of the Moscow Art Theater in Bryusov Lane (1928), the buildings of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture (Narkomzem; 1933; now the Ministry of Agriculture of the Russian Federation) and the M. V. Lomonosov Mechanical Institute (1934; now the building houses the Military University named after Prince Alexander Nevsky). Shchusev directly responded to the shift in Soviet architecture from avant-garde to tradition by modifying the project of the Moscow Hotel by L. I. Saveliev and O. A. Stapran: he gave the building's exterior and interiors Art Deco features (1st phase, 1935; 2nd phase, 1937–1938).
Among Shchusev's constructions of the second half of the 1930s to the 1940s are mainly large public and departmental buildings for the Academy of Sciences, as since 1938 he headed Academproekt, the architectural and design workshop of the USSR Academy of Sciences. They are executed in traditional classical forms, but Shchusev's developed plastic thinking invariably introduced volumetric-spatial and formal originality into the designs: the "semicircular" residential building of the Union of Soviet Architects on Rostovskaya Embankment (1936; completed in the 1960s), the residential building for the artists of the State Academic Bolshoi Theater in Bryusov Lane (1934–1936), the Moskva River Bridge (1938), the institutes of the USSR Academy of Sciences on modern Leninsky Prospekt – genetics (1938–1939; now houses the Scientific Research Institute for Fertilizers and Insectofungicides named after Ya. V. Samoilov), organic chemistry, and metallurgy (both completed in 1951; all in Moscow), the main building of the Academy of Sciences of the Kazakh SSR in Alma-Ata (presidium; completed in 1954). More concise in this series are the residential building of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1939; now Leninsky Prospekt, 13) and the main building of the Ministry of State Security of the USSR on Lubyanka Square (1947; both in Moscow).
During and after the Great Patriotic War, Shchusev was extensively involved in the restoration and rebuilding of cities. He executed projects for the restoration and redevelopment of Istra (1942–1943), Novgorod (now Veliky Novgorod; 1943–1945), Stalingrad (now Volgograd; 1943–1944), Tuapse (1945), and the restoration of the Pulkovo Observatory near Leningrad (now St. Petersburg; 1944).
To preserve, study, and restore the monuments of national architecture damaged during the war, Shchusev's efforts led to the creation of the Museum of Russian Architecture in Moscow (1945; now the A.V. Shchusev Architecture Museum), and he became its first director.
The broad return to tradition in the 1940s allowed Shchusev to return to what he had excelled at – creating works of modern, in this case Soviet, architecture using national forms. All three of his major constructions in this spirit were awarded Stalin Prizes: the branch of the Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute in Tbilisi (1936–1937; 1st degree, 1941 for 1938), the State Academic Opera and Ballet Theater named after Alisher Navoi in Tashkent (1940–1947; 1st degree, 1948 for 1947), the Komsomolskaya metro station on the Circle Line in Moscow (opened in 1952; 2nd degree, 1952 for 1951, posthumously). Shchusev is the only architect to have been a four-time laureate of the Stalin Prize (also for the reconstruction of the sarcophagus of V.I. Lenin in the mausoleum on Red Square, 1946; 2nd degree, 1946 for 1943–1945).
In the forms of Russian architecture, Shchusev designed the main building of the USSR Academy of Sciences (variants, 1935–1949) and the Borodino Hotel (1947; both projects were not implemented). The high-rise tiered compositions inspired by Russian church architecture, which were developed by Shchusev, were incorporated into the concept of constructing the so-called Stalinist skyscrapers by his disciple, the chief architect of Moscow (1945–1949), D. N. Chechulin.
Pragmatic, goal-oriented, and ambitious, Shchusev energetically took on not only purely architectural but also organizational work, in which he could demonstrate himself. For instance, he replaced F. O. Shekhtel as the chairman of the Moscow Architectural Society (1922–1930) and remained in that position until the dissolution of the association. From 1932 to 1937, he was a member of the board of the Union of Soviet Architects.
He taught extensively: at the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts (1908–1911), the Stroganov School (1913–1918), the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture (1914–1917), the Moscow Institute of Civil Engineers (1921–1924), Vkhutemas (1924–1930; workshop leader), the Moscow Architectural Institute (1948–1949). However, his main disciples emerged from Shchusev's architectural workshop, forming a galaxy of prominent Soviet architects of the 1930s–1960s: D. N. Chechulin, A. V. Vlasov, M. V. Posokhin, and others.
He was awarded the Order of St. Anne, 2nd degree (1910), and the Order of Lenin (1947).
Keypen-Vardits Diana Valerievna
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