Soviet architecture, Kazakh nationalist sentiments and the making of Soviet Kazakhstan, 1925–33: the cases of Kyzylorda and the House of Government of the Kazakh ASSR in Almaty

ABSTRACT

Using the example of the construction of two major architectural projects – the short-lived national capital city of the Kazakh Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (Kazakh ASSR) Kyzylorda and the House of Government of the Kazakh ASSR in Almaty – the article investigates the development of Soviet architecture in Kazakhstan and links it to the political changes of the 1920–30s. It considers how the building process in Kazakhstan changed under the growing influence of the central Soviet authorities and became dependent on Moscow architectural organizations and construction companies. Furthermore, the article demonstrates the attempts to represent the Kazakh national character in traditionalist and Constructivist architecture associated with the nationalist sentiment of the national communists in the Soviet Kazakh government. It argues that the growing influence of the central Soviet authorities on construction in Kazakhstan furthered the adoption of Constructivist architecture as the main style of the new Soviet Kazakhstan.

KEYWORDS:

• Soviet architecture
• Russian avant-garde
• Constructivism
• architecture of Kazakhstan in 1920–30s
• Soviet Kazakhstan
• national communism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The Soviet name of Almaty was Alma-Ata. This article uses the contemporary spelling.

2 Most studies on the topic consider the Soviet architecture of the time from the viewpoint of avant-garde architectural theories, such as the Sovetskaya arkhitektura pervikh let oktyabrya (Soviet Architecture in the First Years of the October Revolution), by Russian art historian Vigdariya Khazanova (Khazanova 1970), and Arkhitektura Sovetskogo Avangarda (Architecture of the Soviet Avant-Garde), by Russian architectural historian Selim O. Khan-Magomedov (Khan-Magomedov 1996, 2001). Both monographs provide a vast knowledge about Soviet architecture of the interwar period, including workshops, organizations, association, theories, new building types, etc., considering them in connection to the ‘utopian’ ideas of the early revolutionaries, but disregarding the dismal reality of the political change of the time. Other monographs that belong to this historiographical canon are: Russian Avant-Garde: Theories of Art, Architecture and the City, by Catherine Cooke (Cooke 1995), and Town and Revolution: Soviet Architecture and City Planning, 1917–1935, by Anatole Kopp (Kopp 1970). Finally, the most recent study on the subject, Soviet Architectural Avant-Gardes: Architecture and Stalin’s Revolution from Above, 1928–1938, by Danilo Udovicki-Selb (Udovicki-Selb 2020), attempts to break the established tradition by considering the interactions between architects and politicians. However, its primary focus is still the history of the Soviet avant-garde.

3 The name Alash comes from the mythical ancestor of all Kazakhs.

4 For more information on the history of the Alash Orda, see Allworth (1989).

5 At one of the later sessions of the Kazakh Sovnarkom, member of the second Special Committee Neindels, who was sent from Moscow to investigate the construction of Kyzylorda, mentioned that the Kazakh government started the construction of the buildings in Kyzylorda without seeking the evaluation of the relevant government organizations (Protokol Zasedaniya, 11 April 1928, Fond R30, Box 1, Folder 823).

6 None of the architectural elements used by L’vov as references could be unquestionably defined as being a traditionally Kazakh. Until the establishment of the Kazakh ASSR, the majority of Kazakhs were nomadic, which problematizes any discussion about Kazakh architecture. For the problem of the definition of a Kazakh national style, see Bissenova (2014, 136–38). It is also important to underline that I touch upon the subject of the development of the national style only briefly, as it is not the aim here to scrutinize what could be considered as traditional or local Kazakh architecture, or whether the attempts of the architects to represent Kazakh national character were genuine. The main objective is to show that these attempts changed due to the growing influence of the central Soviet authorities. Accordingly, I generalize and refer to the development of a Kazakh national style based on regional architectural traditions. For the same reason, I use the terms ‘modernist’ and ‘Constructivist’ interchangeably.

7 The investigation of the first Special Committee under the supervision of Yurtsin (first name unknown) and its results were described at one of the joint sessions of the Kazakh Sovnarkom and the second Special Committee, which took place in April 1928 a few months before the showcase trial of the builders of Kyzylorda. The participants mentioned several times that the second Special Committee arrived at the same conclusion as the first Special Committee, and their main task was to make sure that the instructions given by the former committee would be followed (Protokol Zasedaniya, 11 April 1928, Fond R30, Box 1, Folder 823).

8 See note 7.

9 The design of the House of Soviets in Bryansk was chosen by holding an all-union competition with the help of the Moscow Architectural Society (Kazus 2010). The Government House of Soviets of the Dagestan ASSR in Makhachkala was designed by Moscow architect Ivan Zholtovsky and built by a Moscow-based Russian–German construction company, Rusgerstroj (Pismo ot stroitelnoj komissii k Rusgerstrou, January 1927, Fund R93, Box Op. 3, Folder 11). Finally, the House of Soviets in Elista was designed by Constructivist architect Iliya Golosov and built by the Moscow construction company Tekhbeton (Pismo ot Tekhbetona, 12 February 1930, Fond R112, Box Op. 1, Folder No. 249).