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Abstract
The article examines a crucial shift in models of domestication of the Soviet Far North during the Thaw period. The closure of the Gulag system and the social transformations of the 1950s caused changes in the social space of the Soviet North and in the role of expert knowledge in the USSR. By focusing on modernist urban projects for the Soviet Arctic, I analyse how urban specialists during the Thaw attempted to formulate a new conception of the North as a place for ‘ordinary life’ and therefore transform a peripheral region into an ‘average’ Soviet space.
I wish to express my deepest gratitude to Peder Roberts and Julia Lajus for their valuable comments on earlier drafts of this article. This article was written with financial support from the Basic Research Programme at the National Research University Higher School of Economics.
Notes
1 James C. Scott defines the concept of high-modernism as an ideology and practice of rationalisation and standardisation of social and natural worlds by science and technology into a legible and administratively more convenient format, which often led to rough simplifications and damage (Scott Citation1998, pp. 3–4). In the case of the Arctic region, high-modernist intentions of different northern countries in the twentieth century often included radical transformation of the landscape and built environment with modernist architecture. For more about high-modernist projects of different countries in the Arctic, see Sorlin and Norlund (Citation2003), Farish and Lackenbauer (Citation2009) and Hemmersam (Citation2016).
2 ‘V Severnom variante’, Pravda, 8 May 1970; Odnovalov (Citation1961); Semushkin (Citation1965).
3 The interviews were conducted with architects affiliated to the Department of Urban Planning in the Far North at the Leningrad Branch of the Soviet Academy of Construction and Architecture (from 1964 the Leningrad Zonal Scientific Research and Planning Institute (Leningradskii Zonal’nyi Nauchno-Issledovatel'skii Institut Eksperimental’nogo Proektirovakiya—LenZNIIEP)): Urii Dmitrievitch Brusnikin (born 1937), Kuz’ma Afanas’evitch Lytkin (born 1950), Aleksander Gerbertovitch Rappaport (born 1941), Alexander Ivanovitch Shipkov (born 1936), Valentin Gavrilovitch Tankayan (born 1932), and with Valentina Rimskaya-Korsakova (born 1941), a daughter of Tatyana Vladimirovna Rimskaya-Korsakova (1915–2006), who headed the department during the 1960s.
4 See, for instance, discussions about this issue in the letters to the Soviet of Ministers of RSFSR at Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (hereafter GARF), f. 259, op. 42, d. 1226.
5 As in various sources for this article, the terms ‘Arctic’, ‘Far North’ and ‘North’ are used interchangeably to refer to the territory of the first climate zone. In the context of this study, ‘Far North’ is also used as an overall description of the region.
6 Rossiiskii Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Ekonomiki (hereafter RGAE), f. 746, op. 1, d. 135, l. 221.
7 ‘Na severe dal’nem’, Pravda, 11 January 1959.
8 It also could be explained by the fact that many projects for northern industrial towns were created by members of two Leningrad architectural institutes—Lengiprogor and LenGiproarktika.
9 GARF, f. 259, op. 42, d. 2104, l. 50.
10 Tsentralnyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv nauchno-tekhnicheskoi dokumentatsii (Sankt-Peterburg) (hereafter TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg), f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 411, l. 3.
11 ‘Chelovek prikhodit domoi’, Zapolyarnaya Pravda, 12 January 1964, p. 1.
12 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 180, l. 2.
13 For instance, see reports from the observation of several towns in Yakutiya: TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 384.
14 GARF, f. 259, op. 6, d. 7191, l. 2.
15 For instance, see, TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 410.
16 Rossiiskii Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv sotsial’no-politicheskoi istorii (hereafter RGASPI), f. 556, op. 14, d. 58, l. 135.
17 Concerning the danger from snow in northern settlements see, Bruno (Citation2013, pp. 683–709); TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f.17, op. 2–2, d. 479, l. 25.
18 See, Tsentral’nyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv literatury i iskusstv, Sankt-Peterburg (hereafter TsGALI Sankt-Peterburg), f. 347, op. 2, d. 4; Nazarova (Citation2004).
19 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 362.
20 Statements about housing policy as a powerful tool for Soviet officials to control and suppress the population are developed in the works of Meerovich (Citation2008).
21 Already in 1955 the Commission on the Issues of the North (Komissiya po problemam Severa) was established as part of the Soviet Academy of Science, which became the main centre for coordination of the work of different scientific institutions, both in the centre and the periphery, as well as planning institutions and industrial agencies, on elaborating new schemes for the development of the North without using forced labour. Almost simultaneously, in 1958, a Committee on the Acclimatisation and Regional Pathology of the People in the Far North (Komissiya po akklimatizatsii i kraevoi patologii cheloveka na Krainem Severe) was established as a part of the Ministry of Healthcare of RSFSR. For more about new institutions in the Soviet Far North in the 1950s, see Kalemeneva (Citation2018).
22 ‘Obrashchenie Tsentral'nogo Komiteta Kommunisticheskoi partii Sovetskogo Soyuza i Soveta Ministrov SSSR ko vsem komsomol'skim organizatsiyam, k komsomol'tsam i komsomolkam i ko vsei sovetskoi molodezhi’, Pravda, 19 May 1956, p. 1.
23 ‘V Tsentral’nom Komitete VLKSM’, Molodoi Leninets, 23 May 1956, p. 1.
24 ‘Na stroiki Noril'ska—iz Moskvy’, Zapolyarnaya Pravda, 9 July 1956, p. 1.
25 ‘Pis’mo s Severa’, Komsomol'skaya Pravda, 25 December 1956, p. 2.
26 ‘Nasha Arktika’, Izvestiya, 1 June 1958, p. 3.
27 Natsional’nyi arkhiv Respubliki Sakha (hereafter NARS), f. 3051, op. 1, d. 11.
28 RGASPI, f. 556, op. 14, d. 8, l. 25.
29 ‘O razvitii zhilishchnogo stroitel'stva v SSSR’, in Sobranie postanovlenii Pravitel'stva Rossiiskoi Sovetskoi Federatsii Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik (Moscow, Gosyurizdat, 1960, pp. 332–48).
30 ‘Po sledam neopublikovannykh pisem’, Zapolyarnaya Pravda, 9 February 1956.
31 ‘Korotkie signaly’, Zapolyarnaya Pravda, 3 January 1956.
32 NARS, f. 3051, op. 1, d. 11, l. 2.
33 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1, d. 396, l. 2.
34 From 1956 to 1963 the Department for Urban Planning in the North slightly changed its official title several times (such as, Department of the Far North, Department of the Construction in the North and so forth), but its functions, principles of work and members were the same throughout that period. In 1963, when the Soviet Academy of Construction and Architecture was reorganised and divided into several Zonal Scientific Research and Planning Institutes, the Leningrad branch of the Academy became known as LenZNIIEP and the Department of Urban Planning in the Far North became a part of this institution. For ease of reading, throughout the article the department is called the Department for Urban Planning in the North or Lenfilial.
35 Stroitel’nye Normy i Pravila. Chast’ 2. Razdel L. (Moscow, Izdatel'stvo Literatury po Stroitel'stvu, 1964, pp. 3–4).
36 Pravila i Normy Planirovki i Zastroiki Naselennykh Mest Krainego Severa. Proekt. Akademiya Stroitel'stva i Arkhitektury, Leningradskii Filial (Leningrad, 1950).
37 For instance, local architects often asked departmental members for ‘scientific help’ or sent their projects to Lenfilial for consultations and approval. See, for instance, TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1, d. 410, l. 8; RGAE.
38 Interview with Alexander Ivanovich Shipkov, architect, Moscow, 26 April 2014.
39 For instance, see: Otchet po komandirovke v Vorkutu. TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 380.
40 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 2–2, d. 423.
41 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 410.
42 Interview with Alexander Ivanovich Shipkov, architect, Moscow, 26 April 2014.
43 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 2–6, d. 1188, l. 1.
44 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 411, l. 21.
45 For instance, see: XX S”ezd Kommunisticheskoi Partii Sovetskogo Soyuza. 14–25 Fevralya 1956 goda. Stenograficheskii Otchet. Vol. 1. Moscow, Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel'stvo politicheskoi Literatury, 1956, p. 80.
46 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 395, l. 4.
47 TsGALI Sankt-Peterburg, f. 347, op. 2, d. 45, l. 15.
48 The issue of exact authorship of the projects is problematic as many Soviet institutions were based on collective work. At the same time, the shared character of research led to similar basic principles in all of the projects created at the Department for Northern Urban Planning.
49 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 2–4, d. 890.
50 TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17. op. 2–2, d. 467.
51 See, ‘Doklad inzhenera Yastrebova A. na Pyatom Plenume Pravleniya Soyuza sovetskikh arkhitektorov v gorode Stalinske “Osobennosti proektirovaniya zdanii v usloviyakh Krainego Severa”’, in TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 1–1, d. 444, l. 14.
52 See, ‘Iskhodnye polozheniya i rekommendatsii po sostavu zastroiki’, 1963, in TsGANTD Sankt-Peterburg, f. 17, op. 2–2, d. 479.
53 Mirnenskii rabochii, 1 January 1962.
54 ‘Vilui: elektrichestvo na starte’, Izvestiya, 21 August 1967.
55 See for instance, ‘Proektnoe Zadanie: Grahdanskoe stroitel'stvo poselka Aikhal’, in Industial’nyi arkhiv instituta Yakutniproalmaz (gorod Mirnyi, Respublika Sakha), delo 72-AS.
56 RGAE, f. 5. op. 1, d. 6.
57 RGAE, f. 5, op. 1, d. 26.
58 ‘Zapolyarnyi gorod budushchego’, Mirnenskii Rabochii, 8 May 1962.
59 Interview with Alexander Ivanovich Shipkov, architect, Moscow, 26 April 2014; interview with Valentin Gavrilovich Tankayan, architect, St Petersburg, 15 December 2013.
60 Interview with Alexander Gerbertovich Rappaport, architect, Riga, 13 June 2013.
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Notes on contributors
Ekaterina Kalemeneva
Ekaterina Kalemeneva, Department of History, National Research University Higher School of Economics, St Petersburg, Promyshlennaya str. 17, St Petersburg, Russian Federation