Проун на море

Проект предполагается и как памятник, и как самодостаточное общественное место, расположенное на искусственном пляже Обского моря - наиболее эффектном месте для начала трансформации этого научного кластера в настоящую столицу с культурной жизнью и парками развлечений, работающими круглогодично. В экстремальных погодных условиях Западно-Сибирской равнины проект предполагает различные способы функционирования в течение года, работая в программируемом и экологичном режимах. Прототип основан на использовании воды в разных состояниях (вода из моря, снег, лёд, дождь, горячая, холодная, очищенная и т. д.). Предлагается организовать специальные программы и бассейны с подогретой водой, с солёной водой, с очищенной водой, комнаты для переодевания, пирсы, лунки для подлёдной рыбалки, остров-лес, башню для наблюдения за птицами и для панорамного обзора, места для проведения времени на открытом воздухе и для прогулок.

Proun on the sea

Dedicated to El Lissitzky, the project is coinceived as a symbolic object for a city environment. That is to say, it is proposed both a memorial and a self-sufficient social condenser to be positioned on the artificial beach of the Ob Sea. Within a hostile climate and an occupation density near to zero, Novosibirsk (founded 1893), strives to conquer a vast and flat territory. Being the capital of Siberia it was used as strategic device for its conquest both in infrastructural terms as for the propagation of the ideology of the central apparatus.

Academgorodok was founded under these conditions; a secret scientific complex located 20 km away from the city center. Its construction was led by prominent scientist Mikhail Lavrentyev, combining the idea of territorial conquest with the autonomy of scientific thinking from the central authority. The town is located in the center of a large pine forest facing the Ob Sea, an artificial lake created after the installation of a hydroelectric dam. At the edge of it, a beach was created (also artificial), a favorite destination for residents in summer. Altogether, these infrastructures embody the constructive will of the Soviet avant-garde thinking, capable of conquering nature and artificially creating its own environment.

The project is tentatively installed on the Ob Sea Beach, the most effective space to begin the transformation of this scientific cluster into a real metropolis with leisure and amusement spaces that can work throughout the year.

In terms of form the project is based on El Lissitsky’s 1920 PROUN (now at the Indiana University Art Museum). It means to bring it back, three-dimensionally transformed to receive a program that will resolve the controversies and problems associated with the traditional notion of monument, combining symbolic and social functions, getting close to the idea of PROUN as the space mediating between painting and architecture as to the understanding of the project as a social condenser capable of adapting to future social needs.

Given the extreme weather conditions of the West Siberian lowland, the project assumes the possibility of functioning in different ways throughout the year, operating in programmatic and ecological terms over the place throughout its variations. To ensure this we propose a self-sufficient prototype based on the utilization of water in its various states (lake water, snow, ice, rain, hot, cold, recycled water, etc.) as a way to attract new activities and to be able to be replicated elsewhere in the Siberian territory. In fact, the proposed programs and spaces include heated and swimming pools, bitter salt pool with medicinal properties, seawater pool and purified water pool, plus dressing rooms, piers, under ice fishing pot, forest island, bird watching and panoramic tower, outdoor living, and a public promenade.

In order to sustain the program, the object integrates geothermal and biomass technologies, associated with the use of water by heating and depurating it. The integration of these technologies and the selection of aquatic programs responds to climatic and biological conditions, with a predominant winter (five months), dark and cold in which most animals disappear and everything freezes, except for migratory birds and fishes, a short spring without snow but with very little vegetation, a summer of wildlife animals and people active with temperature up to 30 °, and a short and rainy autumn.

This homage to Lissitzky involves the creation of a meaningful and active space for Academgorodok, Novosibirsk and Russia, highlighting the importance of Russian Constructivism as a project for a future yet to come.