News and views of (other) Russia(n)(s)
After the rain. Kronverksky Prospect, Petrograd Side, Petersburg, 16 September 2017
My favorite song when I was a little kid was Johnny Nash’s “I Can See Clearly Now.” It came into my head when I took this picture in my favorite place on earth three years ago today. || TRR
At night, the young women in Petersburg often sit in the windows, gaze at the street, and smoke. On a white night, they are visible from the ground even if the light in their flats has been turned off. I have several similar shots. All of them were takenfrom a distance, with a hidden camera, you might say. I don’t see it as unethical, because I’m not peering into windows and trying to see what’s inside. It is the young women who are showing themselves to the city. Moreover, this particular girl (I took the picture on June 17, 2017, on the Petrograd Side) has become an image, a symbol, which, in fact, makes the shot quite good.
—Vadim F. Lurie, July 2, 2017
My thanks to Mr. Lurie for his kind permission to reproduce his photograph here and his agreeing to respond to my questions about it in writing. TRR
Leningrad Then
Even with the Soviet visual propaganda, the city remained spacious and limpid. But the current [powers that be] have killed everything, although they did restore the gates of the Winter Palace.
—Comment on Facebook
Leningrad 1974. Footage courtesy of Footageforpro.com
Leningrad (Alexei Uchitel, dir., 1978)
Petersburg Now
What follows is a annotated, partial pictorial record of a long walk I took recently in the northern parts of inner Petersburg with a group of local psychogeographers and historical preservationists. The immediate impulse for our walk was the news developers had begun constructing a block of flats cheek by jowl with the renowned power station for the Red Banner Textile Factory, designed by the Jewish German architect Erich Mendelsohn. Worse, it transpired that the developers had the moxie to dub their little contribution to catastrophic urban redevelopment the Mendelsohn Housing Complex, as if they had received the great architect’s blessing for their vandalism from beyond the grave. Continue reading “Leningrad Then, Petersburg Now”