Mikhail Aleksandrovich Okhitovich () (1896–1937) was a Soviet sociologist, town planner and Constructivist architectural theorist, most famous for his 'Disurbanist' proposals of 1929–30. Okhitovich, born in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

, joined the

Bolshevik Party The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),. Abbreviated in Russian as КПСС, ''KPSS''. at some points known as the Russian Communist Party (RCP), All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet ...

in 1917 and served in the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

from then until 1925. He became a supporter of the

Left Opposition The Left Opposition () was a faction within the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) from 1923 to 1927 headed '' de facto'' by Leon Trotsky. It was formed by Trotsky to mount a struggle against the perceived bureaucratic degeneration within th ...

Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky,; ; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky'' was a Russian revolutionary, Soviet politician, and political theorist. He was a key figure ...

, leading to his expulsion in 1928. He was readmitted to the Party in 1930, at which time his theories were garnering a great deal of attention. Disurbanism, which he propounded mainly via the

OSA Group The OSA Group (Organization of Contemporary Architects) was an architectural association in the Soviet Union, which was active from 1925 to 1930 and considered the first group of Constructivist architecture, constructivist architects. It published ...

's journal SA, is a theory resembling

Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright Sr. (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed List of Frank Lloyd Wright works, more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key ...

Broadacre City Broadacre City was an urban or suburban development concept proposed by Frank Lloyd Wright throughout most of his lifetime. He presented the idea in his book ''The Disappearing City'' in 1932. A few years later he unveiled a very detailed twelve ...

: an abandonment of the metropolis in favour of a diffuse, partly agricultural but technologically advanced network. His proposals were, along with other OSA members, the basis of the rejected

Magnitogorsk Magnitogorsk ( rus, Магнитого́рск, p=məɡnʲɪtɐˈɡorsk, ) is an industrial city in Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, on the eastern side of the extreme southern extent of the Ural Mountains by the Ural River. Its population is curre ...

plan of 1930 and a 'Green City' competition of the same year.

Le Corbusier Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , ; ), was a Swiss-French architectural designer, painter, urban planner and writer, who was one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture ...

's riposte to Okhitovich's proposals would become the ''

Ville Radieuse Ville radieuse (; ) was an unrealised urban design project designed by the French-Swiss architect Le Corbusier in 1930. It constitutes one of the most influential and controversial urban design doctrines of European modernism. Although Le Corbus ...

''. In 1933 Okhitovich was reprimanded by the Communist Party and in 1935, a speech of his in which he defended Constructivism and attacked the Stalinist 'cult of hierarchy' and nationalism caused consternation. A campaign led by

Karo Alabyan Karo Semyonovich Halabyan (; ; 26 July 1897 – 5 January 1959) was a Soviet Union, Soviet Armenians, Armenian architect. He earned the title of emeritus art worker of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, Armenian SSR (1940). Biography Halab ...

and

Arkady Mordvinov Arkady Grigoryevich Mordvinov (; born Mordvishev (), January 27, 1896 – July 23, 1964) was a Soviet architect and construction manager, notable for Stalinist architecture of Tverskaya Street, Leninsky Avenue, Hotel Ukraina skyscraper ...

led to his arrest the same year. He was sent to the

Gulag The Gulag was a system of Labor camp, forced labor camps in the Soviet Union. The word ''Gulag'' originally referred only to the division of the Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies, Soviet secret police that was in charge of runnin ...

, where he died 1937.

References

* Hugh D. Hudson Jr
Terror in Soviet Architecture: The Murder of Mikhail Okhitovich
''

Slavic Review The ''Slavic Review'' is a major peer-reviewed academic journal publishing scholarly studies, book and film reviews, and review essays in all disciplines concerned with "Eastern Europe, Russia, the Caucasus, and Central Asia, past and present". ...

'' Vol. 51, No. 3 (Autumn, 1992), pp. 448–467 {{DEFAULTSORT:Okhitovich 1896 births 1937 deaths Constructivist architects Soviet architects Urban theorists Russian Trotskyists Great Purge victims from Russia Soviet Trotskyists