Compare images of moscow with images of st petersburg
Discussion question. Please choose ONE of the following:
Option 1: “Old” vs. “new” in Russian architecture: Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Please compare images of Moscow (from the films, web sites, class readings) with images of St. Petersburg. Share your thoughts regarding its significance in terms of its historical importance as well as its visual symbolism. For the architectural monuments of St. Petersburg, you should consider the historical function or purpose of the building (or plan) as well as the ways in which the architecture (or city planning) itself is very different from the few earlier Moscovite examples of Russian architecture we have seen or discussed (e.g., St. Basil’s Cathedral and Ivan the Terrible, Kremlin and Ivan the Great etc.).
Option 2: 19th century Russia: to the “East” or to the “West”?
In the 19th century, the question of Russia’s relationship to the West and the problem of Russia’s future path of development becomes one of the “burning questions” that would haunt Russian intellectuals since early 19th century and to this very day. A key element of this question involves Russians’ attitudes towards history relate your responses back to the discussion about “Old” vs. “new”, images or concepts on which we have spent some time in this class. Evaluate, for example, Catherine’s monument to Peter (The Bronze Horseman), the Domostroi, the Old Believer Schism, the reign of Ivan the Terrible, Westernizers vs. Slavophiles, etc.
