Moskonstruct

Moskonstruct is an exhibition of site-specific artworks with a series of symposia and debates.  The exhibition and accompanying events explore the current discussions to preserve the heritage of avant-garde architecture in Moscow.  The artworks have been created by a team of contemporary European and Russian artists, they draw inspiration from and interpret the work of the avant-garde and offer a unique chance for Moscow to explore its important architectural heritage.

Artists and Architects include:

Gino:knauss (Italy); Adam Page and Eva Hertzsch (Germany/UK); Mikhail Nemtsov (Russia); Iced Archiects (Russia/Ukraine)

Ogino:knauss
Ogino:knauss was founded as a “mutant cinema laboratory” in 1985, its work over the years is a constant drift through audio-visual languages and practices of communication.  Based in Berlin since 2008, the group’s production includes short films, documentaries, installations, live media and vj sets, audio works, graphic design, as well as curatorial activities and media activism. In recent projects, supported by the formation as architects of some of its members, the group’s attention has been focusing on the globalizing urban landscape, applying image production techniques in an attempt to develop innovative practices for listening to and describing cultural urban processes.  Their most recent project, Re:centering Periphery, is a broad investigation of modernist ideology, the production of the periphery and the daily practices transforming the urban environment. Moskonstruct represents an opportunity to develop a new phase in this research, tackling the seminal contribution made by Constructivism to the development of Modern architecture.  www.oginoknauss.org

Adam Page / Eva Hertzsch
In the mid-1990s Adam Page and Eva Hertzsch opened in an abandoned store the project Zwischenstation Dresden, a space for discursive action on the politics of urban space in Dresden. In 1997 an invitation to participate in Documenta X, Kassel, followed with Adam Pages’ work Executive Box. In 2000 they developed the Kiosk Info Offspring, which they used for projects in various public spaces in Dresden. A helium balloon in the form of an over-sized handy-cam called Event Manager© E-M 981, floating above an abandoned space in Leipzig’s city in 2000 and above the Kokerei Hansa in Dortmund, 2002, addresses the schizophrenia of the today’s event driven society. In the frame of their residency at Villa Massimo, Rome, they developed the mobile betting office Lotto aL38 which through manipulated bets turned into a fundraising action for the deprived tower blocks in Rome-Laurentino. 
Their projects reflect the strategies and hierarchies that define urban space. They investigate issues like city as prey, the development of public space from a common property towards a product, the depreciation of the social in favour of the economic and the festivalization of the city.  www.infooffspring.de

Iced Archiects
Iced Architects was founded in Moscow in 1993 by Ilya Bilashenko, Mikhail Leikin, and Ilya Voznesensky. At present, the group's members include Igor Bury, Alexei Kononenko, Ilya Voznesensky, and Vera Samorodova, all graduates of the Moscow Architectural Institute. Iced Architects had a prominent profile this year as the traditionally close ties between Russia's conceptual art and architecture resurfaced. The collective approaches real problems like overpopulation and homelessness with intelligence and humor, adding a rare display of social conscience to the Moscow art scene without being preachy or pedantic. Their May show "Living Conditions," about housing the billions of resurrected workers that 19th-century eccentric Nikolai Fyodorov hoped would inhabit a future Communist utopia, was a stand-out in the exhibition program of the Contemporary City foundation. "Bum Hotel," a scaffolding cradle trimmed with all the comforts of home, was the most memorable piece at "Modus R," an exhibition of contemporary Russian art in Miami timed to coincide with Art Basel Miami Beach, the largest art fair in the United States.  Their work has been shown at the Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, Moscow Museum of Contemporary Art.  www.icedarchitects.ru

Mikhail Nemtsov
Mikhail Nemtsov was trained as a stage designer under the guidance of the legendary Valery Levental. After a short stint in the theatre, he moved to easel painting, gaining recognition at numerous exhibitions in Moscow and occasionally abroad – in England, Poland, and Italy. He also worked as a book illustrator and taught painting in the Institute of Technology. In 1997, he formed a tandem with Julia Pokhaletskaya, specializing in wall painting. Together, they transform domestic and public interiors into the theatre of human life. Architecture in its relation with the people who inhabit it is a recurrent theme of his work.

Moskonstruct is sponsored by the European Commission and coordinated by the Dipartimento Interateneo Pianificazione Territoriale e Urbanistica, at the “Sapienza” University of Rome and the MARKHI - Moscow Architectural Institute.

 www.moskonstruct.org