Victor Melnikov; painter who tried to preserve his father's house (GREAT)
Hyfler/Rosner
Russian painter who spent much of his life battling to
preserve his father's house
Kathleen Murrell
Monday February 13, 2006
The Guardian
The artist Victor Melnikov, who has died aged 91, produced
delicate paintings that capture the muted colours of light
and of figures, but spent much of his life battling to
preserve the heritage of his father, the greatest of the
Soviet avant-garde architects of the 1920s, Konstantin
Melnikov, against the Soviet, and post-Soviet authorities -
and against some members of his own family.
It was in 1969 that I first visited the unique Melnikov
family home in central Moscow, near the Arbat, designed by
Konstantin and met the architect and his son. Konstantin,
his vigorous architecture rejected from the 1930s onwards,
had obtained official permission in 1927 to embark on the
construction of that house.
Designed in the form of two interlocking cylinders one
slightly higher than the other resulting in oddly shaped
rooms, it is a striking and exciting example of the best in
the 1920s avant-garde. Konstantin avoided sharp right angles
as much as possible, preferring round and angled forms.
Victor's mother, however, was fond of net curtains and old
fashioned heavy furniture which, still in situ, look bizarre
in the ultra modern house. There is even an icon corner with
a little curtain drawn over the holy image. The walls are
pierced by hexagonal windows that are placed regularly
throughout the facade and can be hidden or revealed as
desired providing uniform illumination. Above the huge
studio at the front with its floor to ceiling glazing are
the words "Konstantin Melnikov, Arkhitektor".
Caring for the famous house has occupied much of Victor's
time and energy ever since his father died in 1974. He
bombarded the Soviet, and then the Russian authorities, to
have the house properly repaired and taken over by the
government as a museum to his father and repository of his
archive. Before the fall of the Soviet Union, the communist
government remained indifferent, unwilling to praise an
architect publicly denounced, not only in the 1930s but also
by the then Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in the 1960s.
After the Soviet Union was no more, new interests rose to
claim the valuable central Moscow property. First Victor's
sister, Lyudmila, laid claim to it. After many years the
dispute finally came to court and Lyudmila lost her case.
She has since died, but her son took up the cudgel together
with the younger of Victor's daughters, Yelena.
Last year the acrimonious court case was decided in Victor's
favour. Saddest of all, only a few hours after his death his
daughter, Yelena, and her cousin appeared with armed guards
and lawyers intent on taking over the house. Victor's eldest
daughter, Yekaterina, managed to stop the illegal entry but
the case is again to go to court. In Victor's will, the
house is to be given to the Russian state and Yekaterina is
to be the executor. It seems the Shchusev Museum of
Architecture, before his death, had already embarked on the
difficult process of documenting the enormous archive that
is scattered in piles all over the house.
When Victor was born his father was a 25-year-old
architectural student. In 1917, the year of revolution,
Konstantin graduated and received his first commission, the
neo-classical facade of Moscow's first automobile factory,
the AMO, later, the Likhachev works.
Victor recalled as a young boy the thrill of his father
becoming one of the principal architects of the new Soviet
regime. His designs were encouraged in the 1920s when the
members of the Russian avant-garde were briefly free to
indulge their imagination. Konstantin designed and built
five workers' clubs and his universally praised design was
chosen for the Soviet pavilion at the 1925 Paris
International Exposition of Decorative Arts and won the
Grand Prix.
Victor, aged 10, accompanied his parents to Paris. He often
recalled his impressions of France - he enrolled at a school
in Chartres - and of the high esteem in which his parents,
dressed in the latest Parisian fashions, were held there. He
never forgot his French and years later could still write it
fluently.
Victor's career closely mirrored that of his father. He
studied at the Moscow Technical School of Decorative Arts,
and then concentrated on painting at the State Art
Institute, graduating in 1942.
But after the rise of Stalin his father's work was heavily
criticised and after 1937 Konstantin, although he submitted
brilliant designs never received another commission. Victor
suffered in parallel fashion. He was allowed to become a
member of the official Moscow Artists Union, but his
paintings were unacceptable to the authorities and he made a
living by making copies of the work of other Russian
artists.
Meanwhile he refined his early dreamy style of portraying
light with barely a hint of form and colour. Unable to have
his paintings exhibited publicly, in 1971 friends staged his
first solo exhibition privately in a studio. George
Costakis, the great collector of the Russian avant-garde art
who visited the exhibition, wrote: "Melnikov has revealed a
new world. These are not landscapes, they are icons of the
new mysterious religion."
Until recently, when his sight began to fade, Victor
remained in good health. Well into his 80s he would surprise
guests by performing energetic chin-ups on the doorframe of
the Melnikov house when saying goodbye. In 1990, marking the
100th anniversary of Konstantin's birth and of Victor's 75th
birthday, a large exhibition of father and son was held in
the Central House of Artists.
Victor married Irina Georgievna Pavlova, but the marriage
did not last and in the 1970s he moved back into his
parents' home.
Perhaps now the Melnikovs' extraordinary cylindrical house
will be saved for the Russian nation. It would be a suitable
memorial not only for the greatest of the avant-garde
architects of the 1920s, but also for his remarkable son.
Victor's daughters survive him.
· Victor Melnikov, artist born December 28 1914; died
February 5 2006
Hyfler/Rosner
"Hyfler/Rosner" <rel...@rcn.com> wrote in message
news:wpadnX8XQ7mLb3Le...@rcn.net...
> Victor Melnikov
>
> Russian painter who spent much of his life battling to
> preserve his father's house
>
Couldn't find any of Victor's paintings, but here is a
website devoted to the house.
http://agram.saariste.nl/scripts/index.asp?dir=melnikof&pics=me&tekst=K.%A0Melnikov