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Vasilii Ivanovich Bazhenov, 1737-1799, is
sentimentally considered a great Russian architect, particularly by Soviet art
students, partly because his early life was very promising and partly because
of the high reputation he acquired abroad, and partly because of his grandiose
plans, many of which, however, never materialized. His father, a priest wanted
him to study for the priesthood and Bazhenov was sent to the
Slavonic-Greek-Latin Academy in Moscow. After a short stay there his talent for
designing was discovered and he was sent to the Imperial Academy of Art in
Saint Petersburg to study architecture. He graduated with honors, received a
scholarship and went to Paris to complete his education. From Paris he went to
Italy, where he studied at the academies in Rome, Florence and Bologna.
Ambitious and full of new ideas, some of them influenced by the works of great
contemporary French architects, which Bazhenov had seen and studied, he began
his rapid climb to fame. First he became a member of the Academies of fine arts
in Florence and Bologna, and some Soviet Scholars say that he was even offered
a professorship at the Rome academy. He returned to Saint Petersburg in 1765,
and his first work was the plan for the Arsenal, which later housed the county
court. This square, three-story building, which does not exist any longer, was
built in the late baroque style, with a magnificent facade decorated with
allegorical figures and models of war trophies. In Moscow he completed the new
palace for Catherine II to replace the Annenhov wooden summer palace that
Empress Ann erected for her, on land that formerly belonged to counts Golovin.
Catherine gave her name to the new palace. When Paul I became emperor, he
ordered this huge stone palace that could easily accommodate two regiments
turned into a military barracks and named after his mother!
The building housed Napoleon's regiment in 1812, and was severely damaged
during the retreat and the fire that followed it.
It was at this time that Bazhenov was appointed architect of the Kremlin,
sharing in Moscow the fate of Count Grigorii Orlov, Catherine's former lover
who had been removed from Saint Petersburg. In the absence of an urgent project
in Moscow, Bazhenov spent a few years drawing-up plans for a grandiose and vast
palace, over 4,000 feet long, which he hoped Catherine would erect in the
Kremlin. A range of ionic columns around the entire palace decorated the two
upper floors, and softened its classical appearance. He wanted to dedicate this
"Hymn to the column" to the "Glory of the Russian Empire."
At first Catherine liked the grandiose project of rebuilding the entire
Kremlin, and the cleaning work was begun. Several old palaces belonging to
princes and boyars were removed, including a church, two towers and part of the
Kremlin wall. And then Catherine realized that the entire project would cost a
great deal of money and serve very little purpose since no Russian monarch
planned to return the capital to Moscow. The construction never went beyond the
blueprint stage, and only a few young architects profited from the work. Among
them was Kazakov, another distinguished Russian architect. A model of the
palace was made and had been preserved. Russians proudly talk about it whenever
Bazhenov's name is mentioned.
In 1774 Catherine purchased from Kantemir, Prince of Moldavia, the village of
Chernaya Griaz (black mud) and renamed it Tsaritsino (the village of the
Tsarina). Again encouraged by Bazhenov she decided to erect there a huge palace
in a mixed neo-Gothic and Moorish style, (bricks richly decorated with white
stone) surrounded by an enormous English park with lakes, isles, bridges,
grottos, pavilions, a separate theater etc. To supervise the work, which lasted
almost ten years, Bazhenov moved to the village. Finally in 1785 the Empress
came to see the almost finished palace, and legend says that she suddenly
became frightened because the edifice looked to her like an enormous coffin,
with the palace towers standing over it like gigantic candelabra. She hurriedly
left the village and ordered the destruction of the palace. Bazhenov was
retired, and Kazakov commissioned to build a new palace on the same spot.
Kazakov chose the same style, and the two-storied palace was already roofed in
1796 when Catherine died. The work stopped, and the palace and all other
buildings around it have since been abandoned. Time and neglect have turned
them into ruins. Curiously enough, Catherine's superstition contaminated not
only her royal descendants but the Bolshevik leaders too. Nobody has since
touched the palace in the village of the Tsarina, not even its separate theater
building, which could have easily been restored and used for many purposes.
With all their housing shortages, Soviet authorities never thought to finish
the buildings or use its millions of bricks and stones for construction
elsewhere. Only recently did they have the idea that something should be done
with this entire complex, located close to Moscow and in a very beautiful area.
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