Fyodor Osipovich Shekhtel (1859-1921) is undoubtedly one of the most notable Russian architects at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The first master of Art Nouveau, most of whose creations are in Moscow, where the architect spent most of his life. He built mansions, country houses, theaters, train stations, banks, hotels, printing houses, monuments, churches, chapels and even baths, created unique interiors, and each of his projects revealed new facets of his talent. In his work, Shekhtel used different styles and easily moved from one to another, as required by the changing fashion of those times.
The future architect was born on July 26 (August 7) in the family of a process engineer, a descendant of German settlers. His great-grandfather came from Bavaria to Russia during the reign of Catherine II. The family lived in St. Petersburg, where Osip (Joseph) Osipovich, the father of the family, graduated from the St. Petersburg Institute of Technology. At birth, the son was given the name Franz Albert, as many men in the Shekhtel family were called, which he later, having converted to Orthodoxy, changed to the name Fedor (as we will call him later in the text to avoid confusion).
In 1864, the family moved to Saratov, where the family business of Osip Shekhtel’s brothers was located. The family's well-being was ensured by factories, a starch factory and a local theater, a fire in which may have subsequently become the cause of the early death of Osip Osipovich.
In Saratov, Fyodor was surrounded by a lush atmosphere of holidays and a lively, diverse world of theater. The fame of the family, the entertainment events organized in Saratov in those years, all this could not but affect the character of the future architect, a bright and cheerful person. A rare undertaking was accomplished without the participation of the “well-known” Franz Schechtel (uncle of the future architect), and his pleasure garden “Schechtel”, in which, in addition to entertainment events and fireworks, theatrical performances were also held, was a favorite vacation spot for large sections of the city’s population.
In 1867, a series of tragic events occur in the life of the family. Fyodor's father dies of a cold contracted in a fire in the theater and developed into acute pneumonia. Soon Uncle Franz also dies. The family's financial situation is deteriorating greatly. The difficulties were so significant that Osip Shekhtel’s widow, Doroteya Karlovna, was forced to give up her two youngest children for adoption, and she herself moved to Moscow, where, under the patronage of her relative Timofey Efimovich Zhegin, a member of the Saratov City Duma and a good friend of Pavel Tretyakov, the founder of the famous gallery, got a job as a housekeeper in his house.
In the summer of 1875, Zhegina's widow and Shekhtel's cousin Ekaterina Frantsevna moved to Moscow. Around the same time, Fedor himself moved to Moscow. As he later recalled, he left Saratov “at the age of sixteen.” By that time, he had completed the full 4th grade course of science at the preparatory school at the Saratov Catholic Seminary. Fyodor also settled in Tretyakov’s house, where he then met the family’s brother-in-law A. Kaminsky, a leading Moscow architect, with whom Shekhtel later worked together.
Shekhtel wrote: “I didn’t choose a profession - it was decided a long time ago: of course, the architectural department of the school of painting, sculpture and architecture. However, he worked: he is not a bird of God - he needs to feed. I regret: I was expelled for poor attendance. But he worked for Kaminsky, Chichagov, Tersky. From the age of 24 on my own.” Shekhtel is left without a diploma, which does not allow him to independently implement his architectural projects, and he is interested in the work of an artist, makes illustrations, designs books and magazines, draws theater posters, covers for sheet music, and vignettes. Based on his sketches, Chekhov’s collection “Motley Stories” and the cover of Turgenev’s “Notes of a Hunter” were designed. At first, Shekhtel signed his works with the pseudonyms “F. Sh." or "Fine-Champagne".
In 1882, Fyodor Osipovich entered the service of theater director and entrepreneur Mikhail Valentinovich Lentovsky. And even this work, as a theater artist, was closely intertwined with architecture. He participated and was the executor of Lentovsky’s director’s ideas. The most notable work was the open-air theater "Antey", built according to Shekhtel's design in the "Pompeian" style in Moscow (1883-1886). Also, according to Shekhtel’s designs, galleries and theaters in parks, open stages, and pavilions were built for Lentovsky. In St. Petersburg, Shekhtel built for him the Livadia theater and the Kin-Sadness restaurant in the “Chinese” style.
In August 1883, the magazine "Oskolki" published a review of the album "Spring-Red", dedicated to the grandiose solemn procession of the same name, organized by Lentovsky on Khodynskoye Field on the occasion of the coronation of Alexander III. “The album is Russian on all sides, but it must be assumed that the matter could not have happened without the intervention of the Western powers,” wrote journalist Ruver, “The magnificent vignette and the same drawings are signed by a certain F. Shekhtel. Who is this? I know all the Moscow artists, good and bad, but I have never heard of F. Shekhtel. I bet 5 rubles (in credit notes) that he is a foreigner.”
Under the pseudonym Ruver was 23-year-old journalist Anton Chekhov, and the phrase about “foreigner” was used to refute the habit of journalists to write well about friends. Shekhtel had known Chekhov for seven years. They were brought together by the writer's brother Nikolai, a classmate of the architect, and they had enough reasons to become friends.
Around the same years, Fyodor Osipovich worked as an assistant to the decorator of the Bolshoi Theater K.F. Waltz - an unsurpassed master of fabulous transformations and metamorphoses, “a magician and a wizard,” as he was called, who became famous for his productions that presented colorful, amazing spectacles. Shekhtel created costumes and sets commissioned by Waltz. However, he did not really value these works of his, according to the recollections of the theater figure and director, Shekhtel’s nephew N.A. Popov: “he treated his theatrical works very lightly, did not value his sketches in any way and distributed them to workshops, did not care about their preservation. And most of them disappeared without a trace...”
Shekhtel still did not have a diploma, therefore, there were no major projects. Shekhtel's first independent work - the house of the manufacturer Shchapov, which was built in 1878 (according to other sources in 1884), on the corner of Nemetskaya (Baumanskaya) and Denisovsky Lane, was officially attributed to Kaminsky, under whose supervision Fyodor Osipovich worked.
In 1893, fate smiled on Shekhtel. One of the most influential Russian industrialists, Savva Morozov, invited the architect to build a house. The entrepreneur, who received a higher education at the University of Cambridge (UK), chose a project designed in the English Gothic style, providing the architect with unlimited financial opportunities for interior design. Fyodor Osipovich had the rare luck of maximum self-realization, which he was able to use to the fullest. To work on the design of this house, the architect invited the then little-known M. Vrubel, who decorated the house with sculptures and stained glass windows on the theme of the Western Middle Ages, and one of the living rooms with three panels.
After completing work on S. Morozov’s house, Shekhtel passed the exams to become a construction technician and received a diploma giving him the right to carry out construction work.
In the house that Shekhtel built for another Morozov, Ivan Vikulovich, in Podsosensky Lane, the author created a Gothic cabinet of Faust, also decorated with Vrublev panels and sculptures of chimeras. On the stairs to the library sat a wooden dwarf with an open book in which was written in Latin “Life is short, art is eternal,” which became the motto of Shekhtel’s architecture.
With money from the project for Savva Morozov, Shekhtel was able to build his own house in Ermolaevsky Lane. The architect built the house in the Romanesque style in the manner of a medieval castle with round and faceted towers. Above the entrance were laid out in golden mosaic the date of construction “96”, the initials of the wife “S N” and an image of irises.
Work on the mansion of Savva Morozov made Shekhtel popular, one of the most sought-after architects. Others followed Morozov.
Stepan Pavvich Ryabushinsky, an entrepreneur and philanthropist, and one of the brothers of the founders of Russia's first automobile plant AMO (now ZIL) in 1900 acquired a plot of land on Malaya Nikitskaya, not far from the mansion of Savva Morozov. The owner wanted the house not to be adjacent to the street, and then Shekhtel moved the front porch to the red line, and moved the mansion itself deeper into the house and laid out a small garden. In this project, the architect completely abandoned historical motifs and created a building similar to the natural world.
An abundance of contrasts and opposites, huge windows on the second floor, frames made to resemble flowers and trees and porch arches similar to snail horns, floral motifs and waves - a symbol of perpetual motion in the parquet design of the hall and dining room - this project has become one of the symbols of Moscow Art Nouveau and the calling card of Shekhtel himself. He revealed Shekhtel the thinker as an architectural and philosophical definition of modernity.
At the International Exhibition in Glasgow in 1901, Shekhtel was commissioned to design Russian pavilions, in which the heritage of ancient Russian architecture was creatively reworked. In four pavilions, the architect transformed the forms of wooden churches and residential buildings typical of the Russian north into a grotesque popular print town, more reminiscent of theatrical scenery for Russian folk tales. This impression was made by the buildings, which, for all their solidity and structural strength, seemed like cardboard houses, among which some exciting action was about to begin. The work has become a vivid example of the neo-Russian movement in Art Nouveau. For this project, Shekhtel was awarded the honorary title of Academician of Architecture in 1902.
The architect continued to develop the style and grotesque forms of the pavilions in Glasgow in the building of the Yaroslavl station, which was rebuilt in 1902-1904. The theme of the Russian North, its nature and architecture was also embodied here, since the Yaroslavl railway connected Moscow with the northern provinces and the White Sea. Everything in this building seemed designed to remind the viewer of the untouched riches of the subsoil and the beauty of nature, of the historical past. The volumetric composition, the complex silhouette of the building, decorated with ceramic panels made in the Abramtsevo workshop, decorative stucco molding - all this was the stylistic embodiment of the architect’s genius. Yaroslavl journalists wrote about the renovated station: “Something of its own, worth showing to foreigners.”
Having been a theater fan since childhood, Shekhtel in 1902, postponing all orders, rebuilt the old building of the Moscow Art Theater free of charge and carried out interior decoration. The auditorium, which combines in its design a contrasting dark bottom and a light top, ceiling painting in silver-lilac tones, pale pink lanterns on the walls and a chandelier of the same lanterns on the ceiling, a stage, lighting system and theater furniture made of dark oak - all this was designed by Shekhtel. It was also his idea that a white seagull hovering above the waves, a reminder of the Moscow Art Theater production of Chekhov’s play, with whom the architect had long been friends.
In 1907-1909, Shekhtel worked on the project of P.P.’s printing house. Ryabushinsky’s “Morning of Russia”, in which he combined the techniques of modernism with the ideas of rationalism. The house of the Moscow Merchant Society and the bank of the Partnership of Manufactories by P.M. were built in the same style. Ryabushinsky on Birzhevaya Square.
The building of the publishing house "Morning of Russia"
Shekhtel moves from convention to “truth of construction”, but he remains faithful to the historical beginning of architecture, as in the times of late modernity. The neoclassical direction of Art Nouveau will be embodied by Shekhtel in his third and last house on Bolshaya Sadovaya, built in 1910. The project is a symbolic statement of the origins of architecture and historical foundations.
And it seemed that everything had already been passed, everything had been created, but the spiritual peak of Shekhtel’s work was ahead. He also built temples. In 1896, before the coronation of Nicholas II, he decorated the Tverskaya Zastava square in neo-Russian style and a few years later erected the St. Nicholas Chapel at the Church of St. Basil of Caesarea in memory of the marriage of Nicholas II to Alexandra Feodorovna.
In 1915, born Franz Albert Shekhtel converted to Orthodoxy under the name Fedor and the next year created, as he himself believed, his best creation - the wooden church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in the “Straw Gatehouse” in Petrovsko-Razumovsky. His longtime friend, Colonel of the Tula Foot Squad Alexey Mozalevsky, asked to build a parish church for his subordinates. The structure was made according to one of Shekhtel’s favorite motifs - ancient Russian Vologda architecture. Masterfully fulfilling the historical principle, Shekhtel almost literally reproduced the forms and principles of wooden architecture of the past. However, the construction technology was significantly different from the traditional one: the temple was built using a frame system, that is, not from log crowns, but with a common plank on both sides of the beams.
The revolution marked the decline of Shekhtel as an architect. In Soviet Russia, modernity, as a manifestation of the bourgeoisie, was not in demand. The mansions built by him were nationalized, transferred to the ownership of various departments, and the master himself, although he composed new projects, remained out of work. According to his design, only the Turkestan pavilion was erected at the predecessor of VDNKh, the 1923 All-Russian Agricultural Exhibition in Neskuchny Garden.
That period.
Franz-Albert Shekhtel (real name of the architect) was born in St. Petersburg on July 26, 1859 in the family of the Russified Bavarian industrial engineer Osip Osipovich Shekhtel. His childhood and youth were spent in Saratov.
In 1875, Shekhtel moved to Moscow, and the architect’s entire subsequent life, studies and work were connected with Moscow. In 1875-1878, Fyodor Shekhtel studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. His mother worked as a housekeeper in the house of Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov, the future creator of the famous art gallery, so Fyodor had the opportunity to gain practical skills in the workshop of Alexander Stepanovich Kaminsky, a famous architect of the second half of the 19th century, who was a relative of Pavel and Sergei Tretyakov. Perhaps thanks to Kaminsky, Shekhtel began to receive his first orders.
Since 1882-83. the architect begins to conduct an independent practice. In the period until 1893, he created large industrial and estate complexes, collaborated with theaters, designing performances, worked in magazines, and book covers were printed based on Shekhtel’s drawings. Since 1894, Fyodor Osipovich has given preference exclusively to architecture. Despite the fact that most of his creations are located in Moscow, he designs a lot outside of it.
In 1915, Shekhtel converted from Catholicism to Orthodoxy and adopted a new name - Fedor, under which he entered the history of architecture.
After the revolution, Shekhtel tried to cooperate with the new government, but construction practically stopped. In 1918, the mansion on Bolshaya Sadovaya was nationalized, Fyodor Osipovich Shekhtel and his family changed three communal apartments, and the architect died in 1926. One of his suicide letters has survived, in which Shekhtel describes the difficulties of the last days of his life:
“From October to the present, I have not left my bed (more than 6 months) - I have a terrible disease, atony of the intestines and in general of the entire internal entrails, in French it means relaxation, atrophy): neither the stomach nor the intestines work without mechanical influence - I I pray to God to put an end to this hard labor, but for some reason the doctors are trying to prolong this torment. I can’t eat anything, I’m so weak that I can’t sit - lying down is even worse, all I have left are bones and bedsores, obviously I must die of starvation... You don’t recognize me, it seems to me that I have one on my face just the nose...
You know how much I love to work, but I can’t get one anywhere, and no one buys anything...
I built for all the Morozovs, Ryabushinskys, von Dervizs and remained a beggar. It's stupid, but I'm clean."
The man who left a rich architectural heritage died in poverty and need.
Fyodor Osipovich Shekhtel was buried at the Vagankovskoye cemetery, in a family crypt designed by him.
Fyodor Shekhtel's Moscow has a unique charm and harmony of lines. Let's look at the creations that decorated our city.
Smirnov's mansion stretches along Tverskoy Boulevard. The light green building attracts attention with its smooth lines and long facade. This is the estate of Pyotr Petrovich Smirnov, director and eldest son of the founder of the trading house “P. A. Smirnov in Moscow.” The same Pyotr Arsenievich Smirnov, the “vodka king” of Russia.The main house with outbuildings was built in 1834, and in 1901 the estate was rebuilt, changing the facade according to the design of Fyodor Osipovich Shekhtel, with the participation of A.A. Galetsky. The work lasted 5 years. The architect did not destroy the previous layout, but tried to preserve and rethink it. The long facade united all the buildings and wings of the building. The mansion housed 8 reception halls, which were distinguished by luxury and wealth, a winter garden with rare plants was laid out, and a menagerie was equipped. Shekhtel used the latest technical innovations. The house had radiators installed, water heating, its own boiler room and forced ventilation.
At that time, Tverskoy was the only boulevard in Moscow, and people came here to the promenade. The mansion attracted attention with its elongated stained glass windows, remote bay windows and a lace wrought-iron balcony that “floated” above the street. The house seems to have 2 floors, but in fact there are 4.
Smirnov's mansion is considered one of Shekhtel's best works made in the Art Nouveau style.
After the death of Pyotr Smirnov in 1910, the estate was sold. Before the revolution, it housed the Moscow Judicial Administration; in 1922, the Revolutionary Military Tribunal moved here, then the capital's prosecutor's office. In 1990, part of the mansion was given to the Pension Fund. Restoration work took place in 2006.
In 2009, a restaurant opened in the house, as a result of which part of the historical interiors of the outstanding architect was lost. Currently, various celebrations and business events are held here.
Address: Tverskoy Boulevard, 18, building 1
Stepan Pavlovich Ryabushinsky came from a famous dynasty of industrialists and bankers. In 1900, he entrusted the construction to Shekhtel, knowing the wild imagination and creative approach to the work of the architect.
The architecture contains elements of Gothic and Moorish style. The facades of the building are faced with light brick; on top they are entwined with elements of a mosaic frieze depicting irises. The windows are located at different levels and create a bizarre effect of a multi-story building, although in fact there are only 2 floors.
Forged grilles create intricate, wavy patterns. The spiral curl is a favorite Art Nouveau motif, symbolizing the idea of life in the form of perpetual movement and development.
M.A. participated in the interior design. Vrubel. Shekhtel wanted to create the illusion of an underwater world; the main staircase made of white marble, made in the shape of a wave, has been preserved. The chandelier resembles a jellyfish, the walls of the building are painted green, and the door handles are cast in the shape of seahorses.
After 1917, Ryabushinsky had to emigrate; the State Publishing House was located in the mansion, from 1925 to 1931. - All-Union Society for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries.
From 1931 to 1936, Maxim Gorky lived in the mansion at the invitation of the Soviet government, and in 1965 a museum dedicated to the writer was opened, which can be visited.
Address: st. Malaya Nikitskaya, 6
Shekhtel's innovation lay in the organization of space: all rooms are located around the main staircase, which is the main core of the composition.
According to the architect’s plan, each angle corresponds to an ideal composition, so the beauty of the building is better perceived in dynamics. Aspiring artist M.A. took part in the interior design. Vrubel.
Savva Timofeevich Morozov was a rich merchant and major philanthropist. In 1893, he acquired an old estate with a dilapidated house, which was demolished, and in its place grew the “Moscow miracle,” as Shekhtel’s creation was dubbed. According to the legal norms in force at that time, the house officially belonged to his wife Zinaida Grigorievna.
Currently, there is a reception house for the Russian Foreign Ministry here.
Address: st. Spiridonovka, 17
Now the residence of the Ambassador of Uruguay is located here.
Address: Ermolaevsky lane, 28
Address: st. Bolshaya Sadovaya, 4
The talented architect Shekhtel was invited to work on the project. The building of the A.A. Quick Printing Association Levenson" is made in the Gothic style, but a new direction is already felt. The printing house existed until 1917.
Address: Trekhprudny lane, 9
To be continued...
Franz Albert (Fedor) Shekhtel was born on August 7, 1859 in St. Petersburg. His father was a process engineer, and his mother Daria Karlovna was a merchant from a family of Saratov merchants, the Zhegins. Later she worked as a housekeeper for Tretyakov. Shekhtel also had two more brothers and three sisters.
He spent his childhood in Saratov. His father died early and the family's situation was almost dire. Shekhtel graduated from the Tiraspol Catholic Gymnasium, studied at the Stroganov School, but did not graduate from it, and was expelled for poor attendance. After that, he worked as an architectural assistant for the famous Moscow architects of the late 19th century A. Kaminsky and K. Tersky. He participated in the design of the Paradise Theater on Bolshaya Nikitskaya, drafting the facade of this building. Under the influence of Kaminsky, an expert in Russian and Western medieval styles, Shekhtel developed an interest in medieval architecture, which was soon reflected in his works. Not without the influence of Kaminsky, the coloristic gift of Shekhtel, one of the most remarkable masters of color in architecture, also developed.
Since the late 1870s, Shekhtel began to work independently. Architecture was abandoned for a while - he illustrated and designed books, magazines, drew vignettes, addresses, theater posters, covers for sheet music, menus for gala dinners, and collaborated with the satirical magazines Alarm Clock and Cricket. Together with his friend from school N. Chekhov (brother of Anton Pavlovich), Shekhtel painted icons and created sketches of monumental paintings. It was Shekhtel who designed Chekhov’s first collection “Motley Stories” with vignettes.
The work of a theater artist occupies a special place in the work of the young Shekhtel. He created costumes and scenery sketches, helped the famous decorator of the Bolshoi Theater K. Waltz, a great lover of colorful spectacles. At the same time, he also worked in the folk theater "Skomorokh" and designed folk festivals. It’s funny that the entrepreneur of “Skomorokh” Lentovsky began his career in the summer theater of the city “Shekhtel Garden” in Saratov, which belonged to Fyodor Osipovich’s uncle and father.
Shekhtel married his cousin Natalya Timofeevna, whose father, the merchant T. Zhegin, was a famous philanthropist and friend of Tretyakov.
Gradually Shekhtel returned to architecture. Already in the mid-1880s, according to his project, the estates of Kiritsy and Starozhilovo were being built in the Ryazan province, country houses were being built in the Moscow and Yaroslavl provinces, and the interiors of Moscow mansions were being decorated.
Real success came to him after he built several dachas and mansions for the famous Morozov family (in particular, the mansion of Z. Morozova on Spiridonovka, in the design of which Shekhtel was helped by the then little-known M. Vrubel and the “Gothic castle” of I. Morozov in Petrovsky Park). The Morozovs did not skimp on funds and provided the artist with almost complete creative freedom.
In 1893, Shekhtel received a diploma in construction engineering and finally decided to devote himself to architecture. It is curious that Fedor worked in two different styles - “Russian” and “Gothic”. But Shekhtel’s main principle is that a building should not be boring and cannot be viewed from one point; it should change as you walk through it. Contemporaries called him a real "singer of beauty." He filled his buildings with interesting details and knew how to create a feeling of harmony, calm and comfort. After all, the house, according to Shekhtel, was created primarily not to make an impression, but for life. It is characteristic that he treats his own house in Ermolaevsky Lane just as carefully as he does the construction of the most important orders. An expressive mosaic was placed above its entrance, as a symbol of the coming artistic changes. She metaphorically depicted the inexorable dynamics of life - birth, blossoming and death - in the form of a bud, blossoming and withered iris flowers on a golden background.
In the spring of 1900, Shekhtel prepared a design for the building of A. Levenson’s printing house in Trekhprudny Lane, designed in the forms of his favorite Gothic style, but at the end of the year, when the construction of this building was completed, he created the internal staircase in a completely different manner. There was a sharp turn in the artist’s work towards modernism. Perhaps this was influenced by the Paris World Exhibition, which gave creative impetus to many artists and at which Shekhtel was awarded a silver medal. In any case, it is believed that Shekhtel’s works are classics of Moscow Art Nouveau. And the most famous building of Fyodor Osipovich, made in this style, is the Ryabushinsky mansion.
It was built on the principle of a spiral and combined the achievements of Art Nouveau with the Russian architectural tradition.
In 1901, Fyodor Osipovich was awarded the title of academician of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts.
One of the most famous buildings built by Shekhtel during this period in his favorite “pseudo-Russian” style is the Yaroslavl Station. It creatively rethinks the architecture of the Russian North, generously using ceramics and stucco.
At the same time, the architect rebuilt the building of the Art Theater, and it was thanks to Shekhtel (who developed Klimt’s ornamental achievements here) that the Moscow Art Theater acquired its signature design.
Before the revolution, Shekhtel created a number of significant buildings, including those in the style of “rational modernism” - with strict and sparse, but expressive decor. The Khudozhestvenny cinema on Arbat Square is an excellent example of this style.
However, he worked not only in Moscow; a library and museum of the writer built according to Shekhtel’s design in the city of Taganrog became a tribute to the memory of Chekhov. His “spiritual” works are also interesting, for example, the Old Believer Belokrinitskaya Trinity Church with a gatehouse in Balakovo, Samara province, built by order of the merchants the Maltsev brothers and made in the same “pseudo-Russian” (or neo-Russian) style, or a completely different one - in the Byzantine style - Spasskaya Church in Ivanovo-Voznesensk.
In 1914, after the outbreak of World War I, Shekhtel converted to Orthodoxy and took the name Fedor. Shekhtel was far from politics, and after the revolution he continued his creative activity. But he did not create any more significant works; most of his plans turned out to be unrealized.
In 1918, Shekhtel’s mansion was nationalized, and the architect and his family were evicted. He wandered around different apartments until he found refuge with his daughter, Vera Fedorovna Shekhtel (Tonkova).
In total, Shekhtel had two daughters and two sons. Shekhtel's grandson is pop artist Vadim Tonkov, better known as Veronika Mavrikievna.
In 2009, a documentary film “The Genius of Russian Modernism” was shot about Fyodor Shekhtel.
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Russian architect, painter, graphic artist, set designer; one of the most prominent representatives of the Art Nouveau style in Russian and European architecture; Knight of the Orders of St. Anne and St. Stanislaus.
Born in St. Petersburg on July 26 (August 7), 1859 in the family of a Russified German industrial engineer, his brother Osip (1858) and sisters Alexandra (1860), Yulia (1862) and Maria (1863) were born here. Father Osip Osipovich (1822-1867) in 1855 married Daria Karlovna (Rosalia Dorothea) Getlich, who came from a merchant family, the future mother of Fyodor Osipovich. Mother came from a family of Saratov merchants, the Zhegins, and later served as a housekeeper in the Tretyakov family. Fyodor Osipovich was married to his cousin, Natalya Timofeevna Zhegina, whose father T. E. Zhegin was a famous person and was friends with P. M. Tretyakov.
In Saratov, the architect's uncle, the merchant of the 1st guild Franz Osipovich Shekhtel, was considered a notable personality, who acted as one of the founders of the city's first literary and musical circle of enlightened merchants - the German Dance Club. In May-June 1859, F. O. Shekhtel built a wooden summer theater with a stalls and boxes in his country garden. Subsequently, the theater burned down and was rebuilt more than once, and the appearance of the pleasure garden created by Shekhtel also changed. Currently, on the site of the garden there is a square in which there is a modern building of the Saratov Academic Drama Theater, which originates from the small Shekhtel Theater.
The move of Osip Osipovich Shekhtel and his family to permanent residence in Saratov apparently happened during 1865, when the future architect was six years old. Perhaps his older brother insisted on Osip’s move. He himself became seriously ill, and his other brothers - Anton, Ivan and Alois Shekhtel - were no longer alive. Probably, the brothers' farm required constant attention, and process engineer Osip Shekhtel could properly manage the weaving factory and theater that belonged to the brothers.
In the fall of 1865, the City Duma transferred the enterprise for a period of five years to the St. Petersburg merchant and process engineer Osip Osipovich Shekhtel. However, Shekhtel’s abilities as an entrepreneur were not destined to fully develop: he died of pneumonia at the end of February 1867. Osip Osipovich Shekhtel survived his brother by only two months, leaving behind a “legacy” of complicated trade affairs and huge debts. His wife, through a proxy - T. E. Zhegina - sold the country garden with the theater to the French citizen Adelaide Servier. Since the brothers were “in undivided capital,” it turned out that due to the huge debts of F. O. Shekhtel, the family of his younger brother found themselves without any means of subsistence. The situation was so difficult that in 1868 Daria Karlovna gave her youngest son, Victor-Ioann, to the family of State Councilor K.F. Deitch, who lived in the capital, whose surname he later adopted. The eldest son Osip was assigned to the Mariinsky Agricultural School in the Nikolaevsky town (now the Oktyabrsky town of the Tatishchevsky district of the Saratov region), and the younger children, including Fedor, continued to study at home.
Years of study
After passing the entrance exam in the fall of 1871, Fyodor Shekhtel was enrolled in the second grade of the first men's gymnasium - the only educational institution that provided secondary education. Fyodor Osipovich studied mediocrely, actually having decent scores in penmanship, and even in drawing and sketching. Shekhtel studied these subjects from the “dearest, kindest old man” Andrei Sergeevich Godin, the same one from whom, five years earlier, the son of the commander of the Saratov provincial battalion, Misha Vrubel, learned the “technique of drawing from life.”
On August 26, 1873, Fyodor Shekhtel became one of 43 “state-owned” students of the local Tiraspol Roman Catholic Seminary (the Catholic seminary was opened in Saratov on February 11, 1856 and was intended to train the children of colonists as clergy) and graduated in 1875. Certificate No. 168 Shekhtel was given a certificate of completion of the full course of a four-year preparatory school at the Tiraspol Roman Catholic Seminary very late, when he was already in his 22nd year. Life itself made me care about obtaining a certificate. In the fall of 1880, “Saratov tradesman F. O. Shekhtel” was summoned from Moscow to the Saratov city conscription office for drawing lots. Persons who graduated from the school had certain benefits during military service. Shekhtel received a certificate of completion of the preparatory school on October 31, 1880. Two weeks later, on November 14, in the Presence he received a document according to which he was “recognized as completely incapable of military service and was forever released from service.”
In 1875, Shekhtel came to Moscow and entered the architectural department of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture on the course of D. N. Chichagov, which he left in 1878 without completing the course (based on the report of inspector K. A. Trutovsky “for bad attendance"). In the 1880s, he worked as an assistant to the architects A. S. Kaminsky (son-in-law of P. M. Tretyakov) and K. V. Tersky, having experienced a great influence of their romantic historicism. He was engaged in book and magazine graphics, the design of theater posters, ceremonial addresses and menus, collaborated in the humorous magazines “Cricket” and “Alarm Clock” (under the pseudonym Fin-Champagne), together with his friend N. P. Chekhov (brother of A. P. Chekhov ) wrote icons and sketches of church paintings, participated in the design of coronation celebrations in 1883 and 1896. Anton Pavlovich introduced Shekhtel to aspiring authors as an excellent draftsman and vignetteist, especially after Fyodor Osipovich designed his first collection “Motley Stories” with vignettes in 1886. Until the early 1890s, he also worked in the theater, designing performances under the direction of artist K. F. Waltz (Bolshoi Theater) and entrepreneur, also a native of Saratov, Mikhail Valentinovich Lentovsky (folk theater “Skomorokh”). Lentovsky began his career in the summer theater of the city “Shekhtel Garden” in Saratov, which belonged to the uncle and father of Fyodor Osipovich. Built according to Shekhtel’s design in the “Pompeian” style, the open theater “Antey” is perhaps his largest work of those years. Complex mechanical filling the stage was specially designed for staging all kinds of “miracles, flights, transformations", and here the most dizzying extravaganzas and operettas of Lentovsky were seen. In St. Petersburg, for Lentovsky, Shekhtel built the Livadia Theater and a restaurant in the "Chinese" style "Kin-Sadness", and in Moscow there are many temporary structures. N. A. Popov - a wonderful Russian theater figure, director, enthusiast and director of folk theaters, writer and critic - recalls Shekhtel this way: F. O. Shekhtel treated his theatrical works very lightly, neither from any side he did not value his sketches and, distributing them to workshops, did not care about their preservation. And most of them disappeared without a trace. He himself kept only two albums - “Beast People” and another album with sketches of costumes. The rest of the surviving part of his works is in the hands of a few private individuals and in the State Theater Museum named after A. A. Bakhrushin. At one time, Lentovsky’s archive came to Bakhrushin, and among the heap of Bakhrushin’s papers it was possible to identify a significant collection of Shekhtel’s works, which consisted of posters, drawings, and programs. His experience as a graphic artist and set designer helped him develop the idea of architecture as an eccentrically picturesque spectacle.
Independent creativity
In 1894, having passed the exam for the right to carry out construction work, he began to work independently. Apparently, Shekhtel’s very first building can be called a residential building on the corner of Nemetskaya (now Baumanskaya), 58 and Denisovsky Lane. As a student of Kamensky, to whom the authorship is sometimes attributed, Shekhtel in 1878 (1884?) fulfilled the order of the textile manufacturer Shchapov for this construction. Shekhtel built his first personal house at 20 Petersburg Highway, listed as a merchant.
By the end of the 19th century, many buildings, mainly dachas and mansions, had already been built according to his designs. The leitmotif of Shekhtel's figurative concepts was most often medieval architecture, Romanesque-Gothic or Old Russian. The Western Middle Ages with a touch of romantic fantasy dominates Shekhtel's first major independent work - the mansion of Z. G. Morozova on Spiridonovka (1893), where S. T. Morozov gave the architect almost unlimited financial resources. Shekhtel involved the then little-known M.A. Vrubel to work on the design of this building. Among the architect’s buildings of the 1890s, one should also mention the “Gothic” dacha of I. V. Morozov (1895) in Petrovsky Park (in the complex there is an estate, a stable, a fence), the mansion of M. S. Kuznetsov, built in the same style, on Myasnitskaya Street, 6, a house of Gothic forms at 43 Mira Avenue and his own house in Ermolaevsky Lane (1896).
The architect’s works of the late 1890s show a masterful command of the “Gothic” style, but the architect again turns to the “Russian” style several times and makes classical interpretations. The features of a fundamentally new direction, later called “modern”, first appeared in the trading house of V.V. Arshinov on Bolshaya Ordynka, 32 (1899).
The turning point from Gothic to Art Nouveau occurred in 1900. In the spring, Shekhtel completed a design for the building of the printing house of A. A. Levenson in Trekhprudny Lane, designed in the forms of his favorite Gothic style, but at the end of the year, when the construction of this building was completed, he created the internal staircase in a completely different manner. What happened in the master’s creative biography during the process of rebuilding this structure?
On April 14, 1900, the World Exhibition opened in Paris, which excited the artistic environment throughout Europe for almost a whole year. Shekhtel was awarded a silver medal for his participation in it.
After the construction of Morozova’s mansion, Shekhtel became a popular and sought-after architect and built a lot. A number of other buildings - such as the pavilions of the Russian department at the International Exhibition in Glasgow (1901) and the compositionally and stylistically varying Moscow Yaroslavl Station (1902) - were designed in a “neo-Russian” spirit. In any case, Shekhtel interprets ancient prototypes very freely, stylizing them taking into account modern functions. Often the appearance of a building is built - as in its most famous building - the mansion of S.P. Ryabushinsky on Malaya Nikitskaya (1900) - on a bizarre contrast of geometric tectonics and restless decor, as if living its own unreal life.
In 1901, Fyodor Osipovich was awarded the title of academician of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts.
He is a participant in the exhibition “Architecture and Art Industry of the New Style” in Moscow (1902-1903).
Among his other significant works are the mansion of A. I. Derozhinskaya in Kropotkinsky Lane (1901), the house of the Moscow Fire Insurance Society and the Boyarsky Dvor Hotel on Staraya Square (1901), the reconstruction of the Art Theater (1902); (in fact, it was thanks to Shekhtel that he acquired his “signature” design), the bank of the Partnership of Manufactories of P. M. Ryabushinsky on Birzhevaya Square (1903-1904), the Apartment House of the Stroganov School of Art and Industry (1904-1906), the printing house P. P. Ryabushinsky “Morning of Russia” in Bolshoy Putinkovsky Lane (1907-1909), the trading house of the Merchant Society in M. Cherkassky Lane (1909), the “Khudozhestvenny” cinema on Arbat Square (1912). In the last three cases, artistic sophistication gave way to the so-called “rational modernism” - with more sparse decor and strict plasticity of the walls. A library and museum of the writer built according to Shekhtel's design in the city of Taganrog (1914) became a tribute to the memory of A.P. Chekhov.
Among the architect’s non-capital projects, one can note the Old Believer Belokrinitsky Trinity Church with a gatehouse in Balakovo, Samara province, built by order of the merchants the Maltsev brothers. This church is an excellent example of the national-romantic version of Art Nouveau - neo-Russian style. Shekhtel received the right to build this church by winning the competition of the Moscow Architectural Society in 1909, in which, by the way, future leaders of Soviet architecture, students of the Institute of Civil Engineers Viktor and Alexander Vesnin (they received the third prize for their project) also participated. The architect proposed to Anisim Maltsev a design for a temple for 1,200 worshipers with a malt pan and a fence. The idea was approved, and just two years later, a fantastic structure made of concrete and stone rose on the high bank of the Balakovka River at the end of Granary Square. The magazine “Zodchiy” for 1911 published a note about the construction of the Shekhtel Church in the village of Balakovo.
The magnificent Spasskaya Church in the Byzantine style, erected in Ivanovo-Voznesensk, was built at the expense of the manufacturer A.I. Garelin, the construction was supervised by the architect P.G. Begen. The temple was founded in 1900, and the building was consecrated on October 30, 1903. In the design of the facades of the church, F. O. Shekhtel used Byzantine triple arched windows separated by semi-columns. The temple ended with five helmet-shaped domes on faceted drums. The walls were decorated with mosaic ornaments.
After the October Revolution of 1917, the architect was chairman of the Architectural and Technical Council of the Main Committee of State Constructions, member and chairman of a number of competition juries. He continued to work as a teacher (from 1896 he taught composition at the Stroganov School of Art and Industry).
Shekhtel was one of the founders of the Moscow Literary and Artistic Circle (1899); from 1901 member, and from 1906 to 1922. was the permanent chairman of the Moscow Architectural Society (MAS), a participant in all events held in Russia from 1892 to 1912. architectural congresses. Since 1908, he was a member of the committee for organizing international congresses of architects. Honorary member of the Society of British Architects, architectural societies of Rome, Vienna, Glasgow, Munich, Berlin, Paris. From 1921 to 1923 headed the architectural and technical council of the Committee for the Construction of State Structures, was the chairman of the artistic and technical commission at the Scientific and Technical Organization of the Supreme Council of National Economy, and taught at VKHUTEMAS. In 1923, he took part in the first All-Russian Agricultural and Handicraft Exhibition in Moscow, designing the Turkestan Pavilion.
In 1914, after the outbreak of World War I, he was baptized into Orthodoxy and took the name Fedor.
In 1918, the mansion at Bolshaya Sadovaya, no. 4, built by Shekhtel for himself, was nationalized, and the architect and his family were evicted. I wandered around different apartments until I found refuge on the street. M. Dmitrovka, 25, with his daughter, Vera Fedorovna Shekhtel (Tonkova).
He had children - Lev Fedorovich Zhegin (1892-1969), Boris, daughter Ekaterina.
Art critic E.I. Kirichenko noted: “Shekhtel was among the direct creators of a new language of architecture, a new system. His work is one of the peaks of the first stage of modern architecture, known in Russia as “modern.”
Family
Son F.O. Shekhtel, Lev Fedorovich (1892-1969), who bore the surname “Zhegin”, became a painter and art theorist. He was also engaged in the study of the formal and compositional foundations of ancient Russian art (the book “The Language of Painting,” 1970). Son Ivan died tragically. Shekhtel's daughter, Ekaterina (Kitty) Fedorovna Shekhtel, devoted herself to raising her nephews and great-nieces. Shekhtel's daughter, Vera Fedorovna Shekhtel (Tonkova) is a graphic designer, a participant in the Futurist movement in her early youth, V. Mayakovsky's lover. She married an employee of her father’s workshop, an architect of Polish origin, Heinrich Hirschenberg. In 1919, daughter Marina was born (later theater artist Lazareva-Stanishcheva Marina Sergeevna). Second marriage with Sergei Vasilyevich Tonkov. In 1932, a son, Vadim, was born (later Honored Artist of Russia Vadim Sergeevich Tonkov, known in the image of the extravagant old lady Veronica Mavrikievna Mezozoic).
Architect Fyodor Osipovich Shekhtel was born on August 7, 1859 in the city of St. Petersburg in the family of industrial engineer Osip Shekhtel. At birth the child was named Franz Albert. In addition to Fedor, there were three more girls and two boys in the family.
Shekhtel spent his childhood in Saratov. His mother, Daria Karlovna, belonged to the Saratov merchant family of the Zhegins.
Fyodor Osipovich's father passed away early. After this, the family was literally in poverty.
In 1871, Franz Albert, who had previously received home education, was admitted to the Saratov boys' gymnasium in the second grade. The future architect studied very mediocrely. He only had decent grades in drawing and drafting, as well as penmanship. It is worth noting that these subjects were read to high school students by A.S. Godin, whose student a little earlier than Shekhtel was the son of a military man, Mikhail Vrubel.
For obvious poor performance in some subjects, the young man was retained for the second year, and already in the new academic period he showed very good results, after which he was transferred to the next gymnasium class.
In 1875 (not known for certain) Fyodor Shekhtel went to Moscow. He began to live with his mother in the house of Pavel Tretyakov, who, knowing the Saratov Zhegin family, took upon himself patronage over the life of the young man.
It was during those years that Shekhtel met a relative of the Tretyakovs. The architect, well-known by that time, took him into his studio and facilitated his admission to the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in the architectural department.
Unfortunately, in September 1878, the young man was expelled from the educational institution with the wording “for failure to attend classes.” The absences from classes were explained by the fact that by that time his mother had become seriously ill and he was forced to help her, especially since Daria Karlovna had by that time left her job in the Tretyakov family.
Next, Shekhtel goes to work at the Lentovsky Theater as an artist. They accept him, as they say today, by acquaintance. The fact is that in his youth Lentovsky lived in the city of Saratov and worked in a theater that belonged to Franz Osipovich Shekhtel, Fedor’s uncle.
The responsibilities of the future architect included the design of numerous posters, the design of music covers, and the construction of various temporary structures.
The theatrical sketches of the architect Shekhtel of that time have practically not survived - he simply did not appreciate them.
It is worth noting that Fyodor Osipovich never received a full architectural education. He acquired all his skills by working with the architect Kaminsky, and later with another architect, Konstantin Tersky.
In 1894, Shekhtel received the right to carry out various construction works and began independent creativity. By the end of the century, he enjoyed high prestige and built mainly for noble and wealthy families, among whom were the Ferreins, Kuznetsovs, Morozovs and Ryabushinskys.
At the beginning of his architectural career, Fyodor Osipovich Shekhtel worked in the Gothic style, but after the World Exhibition held in 1900 in Paris, where the architect received a silver medal, the choice was made in favor of Art Nouveau.
In 1902, Fyodor Osipovich received the title of “Academician of Architecture”. Then he became the permanent chairman of the Moscow Architectural Society, as well as an honorary member of similar societies in Berlin, Paris, London and Rome.
In 1914, Shekhtel converted to Orthodoxy. It was then that he received the name Fyodor Osipovich instead of Franz Albert.
After the revolution of 1917, the architect tried to find himself under the new government, but, unfortunately, he was no longer in demand.
