The past of great nations is artificially degraded.

The past of great nations is artificially degraded.

Not faceless buildings, but the most valuable are replaced by "garages". The struggle against "Mazepinism" also goes far. Among other things, the two best buildings of Mazepa itself were demolished. Monuments of the monastery where his mother Magdalena (Florovsky monastery) lived and worked were also completed. The struggle against "Mazepinism" is being reborn into a struggle against all the great things that the Ukrainian people have created in its history. The face of the capital is the face of the country. Ukraine is turning into a country "without a family, without a tribe" at the most "shock" pace. The temples of the Grand Ducal era are being demolished. Almost nothing remains of the Kyiv monuments of the time of the greatest originality of Ukrainian architecture (XVII – XVIII centuries).

The author of these lines is a staunch supporter of the political and cultural unity of Eurasia, a staunch opponent of all kinds of interventions. However, the more he feels the urgent need to preserve and protect the cultural heritage of all the peoples of Eurasia, including the great Ukrainian people. Mazepa’s actions can and should be denied. However, to destroy the creations of genius architects who worked for Mazepa in Kyiv is a crime that should not be named. Peter was able to fight against "Mazepinism". However, he did not touch the monuments that they built.

Fierce enemies and haters of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples celebrate their "Walpurgis Night" on the ruins of Kyiv’s architectural masterpieces. Ethnographic material "without genus, without tribe" – what could be better for supporters of "colonial expansion". Remove as soon as possible from the face of the earth all the evidence that contradicts this concept! And they are removed so quickly that, probably, even the authors of this not so "social" as a national order are surprised.

Whatever method of calculation you use, the result will be the same: about half, if not more, of the unique architectural monuments of Kiev, which in 1934 were the glory of Ukraine, in 1937 disappeared from the earth’s surface. Meanwhile, there is no other city in Ukraine that, at least remotely, could equate Kyiv with its architectural treasures. The instigators of the destruction of Kyiv simply make a huge part of Ukraine’s architectural history seem "nebulous."

The late M.Ya. Marr once said beautifully: "The main condition of any progress is the continuity of cultural traditions." This does not mean that the past should be repeated in any sense. Such a repetition would be and always is the most intolerable delusion. You need to create something new. However, in this creation it is necessary to rely on knowledge and mastery of what is given and overcome in tradition.

What would those people who directly or indirectly sanction the countless destructions of Kyiv say if they were offered, say, to collect all copies of Taras Shevchenko’s Kobzar and burn them? Erasing without a trace from the face of the earth pre-Mongol and Ukrainian monuments, Kiev "Trotskyists" destroy no less cultural values.

In the life of the people, architecture is as important as, say, poetry. The massacre of the best architectural works of the country is an attack on folk culture.

Under these extreme and tragic circumstances, the people have only one means at their disposal: to start rebuilding the destroyed monuments. The books were burned, but the manuscript remained. In contrast to the lost monuments of painting, architectural monuments that have disappeared from the earth’s surface in a certain sense and kind can be reproduced again. After all, no architect builds a building with his own hands. According to his project, the building is being built by masons. He does not even do stucco work himself; they are performed, according to his drawing and instructions, by sculptors. Masons and sculptors of the XII or XVII centuries cannot repeat their work for us.

But the "projects" of the architects of that time seemed to be in our hands. These are measurements, sketches and photos of monuments destroyed by pests. However, the "Trotskyists" foresaw this case as well. After all, it is not in vain that both works of Yosyp Startsev were demolished "without prior measurements". And yet the data on these beautiful buildings, which have accumulated over the past decades, Russian and Ukrainian science, is enough to know the case and love for it to accurately restore the projects of Kiev "Fiorovanti" and behind them – to rebuild the buildings themselves.

Even the technological properties of buildings can be restored with great accuracy. Of course, in the archaeological sense, the new building will not replace the old one. However, in the aesthetic and tourist sense, this replacement may be complete. It is only necessary that the restoration be performed carefully and scientifically. You do not have to fantasize here. Of course, only the best of the destroyed monuments can be rebuilt (the tragedy of the situation is that the best is destroyed; the average and miserable, as a general rule, stands still). Therefore, these buildings must be rebuilt in the same form in which they were known by modern science. Only in this way can everything dubious and arbitrary be avoided

"Architectural Reconstruction Commission". The case of reconstruction of destroyed monuments cannot be limited to Kyiv. This issue has not only all-Ukrainian, but also all-Russian significance. The whole of Russia has been swept away in recent years by a wave of senseless destruction. In all corners of native Russia, the enemies of the people destroyed the architectural creations, which were to become immortal due to their artistic qualities. It is time to think about the establishment of the "Architectural Reconstruction Commission" (KZV).

Not in an impoverished, not in a truncated, but in a form enriched by careful restoration, our time must pass on to future generations the architectural heritage of the Eurasian peoples, and above all the Russian and Ukrainian heritage. Destroyers, at best, instead of a dozen forms of architectural creativity of past centuries, leave a sample of some one form. They reduce the rich, diverse set of monuments, which testifies to the inexhaustible abundance of talents, to a few fragments. They promote slander against Russia and Ukraine, who claim that these peoples do not have the scope of creative imagination. We repeat: at best, they leave individual pieces of a large whole; from full-syllable rows keep isolated shades. The past of great nations is artificially degraded.

No, Russia and Ukraine do not tolerate this abuse of themselves and their past. They will restore the completeness of the rows. They will again force to win colors all set of art forms created by the last generations. They will include in the cultural and historical chain the most valuable links torn from it.

The history of Eurasia has already witnessed similar reconstruction actions. It is in this way that the Ukrainian people, during the days of their "age rise" in the XVII century, raised from the ruins of the lab report writings monuments of the Grand Ducal period. In this grandiose action, which has not yet been depicted and evaluated properly in the historical literature, but which the author of these lines has studied dozens of examples, it is impossible not to feel the intense urge of the best representatives of Russo-Ukraine to restore the longevity of the national Russian-Ukrainian art. culture.

This action is defined by such names as Petro Mohyla in Kyiv, Lazar Baranovych, Ioanikii Galyatovskyi in Chernihiv. "Recovery" yielded results. Architectural heritage of the Grand Ducal Dob, which seemed to have disappeared in Ukraine almost without a trace (see, for example, Boplan’s statement in the first half of the seventeenth century), resurrected with new strength and glory. And it is no longer the fault of the figures of the seventeenth century that the enraged ignoramuses of our day have again destroyed a good half of the buildings they have rebuilt. These figures (eg Ioaniki Galyatovsky in Chernihiv) set themselves purely archaeological goals in their "restoration" works. However, their scientific capabilities during the restoration of the buildings of the Grand Ducal era were, of course, hundreds of times less than those of our generation in the reconstruction of recently destroyed monuments.

Mohyla, Galyatovsky and their associates greatly contributed to the preservation of the individual national identity of the Russian-Ukrainian people. Similarly, the Architectural Reconstruction Commission, by returning lost parts of their cultural heritage to the peoples of Eurasia, will greatly contribute to their cultural uplift. Again, the return of the lost is absolutely necessary to make the artistic tradition of the past sound again in all its fullness and imagery; to give all citizens of the country a sense of pride for their country and its past; to instill in each of them an "instinct of historicity" and to remind him of the generations who lived and worked on the same soil. The present must be greater than the past. However, the past must speak loudly about itself.

The "Architectural Reconstruction Commission" is to expand its work incomparably wider than Mohyla, Baranovich, and others. First of all, in this case we are talking about the reproduction from the dust of the architectural image not only of Ukraine-Russia itself, but of almost all parts of Eurasia. Because the destroyers have already "tried" (and continue to "try"). We have seen in the example of Kyiv that their hand acts much more fiercely on architectural monuments than the hand of the Tatars in the 13th century and the hand of the Poles in the 17th century (it was with their devastation that the Ukrainian patriots of past centuries dealt).

Such are the internal tasks of reconstruction actions. In short, they boil down to establishing the correct relationship between revolution and tradition in the field of architectural, and thus "landscape" imagery; that in every corner of the country, where there was a great historical life and where its traces were erased by the destroyers, to recreate its monuments and give them as examples to be mastered and surpassed.

However, the reconstruction action has only a domestic side. It also sets certain goals outside. European "colonizers" are very concerned with downplaying the cultural past of the Russian people and, if possible, nullifying it altogether. Take Buxton, for example. He indignantly rejects the very possibility of comparing English architectural heritage with Russian. "There cannot be many who would allow the comparison of our own great cathedrals even with the best creations of the Russian genius.

It must be admitted that such heights of architectural creativity have never been reached in Russia. ” A clear and obvious untruth! In the richness of artistic fiction, in the independence of creativity, Russian architecture in its historical development is by no means inferior to English.

Mr. Buxton is divorced further. "The Russian style," he says, "has never impressed other peoples; no other style in the world has ever been influenced by it."