Moscow has opened its new philharmonic concert hall on the grounds of the new Zaryadye Park. The venue is the fourth major concert hall in the Russian capital (after the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall, the House of Music, and Philharmonia-2, to say nothing of the Great Hall at the Moscow Conservatory), and its performers will be competing with a raft of fine classical musicians.
The building is actually concealed under a hill inside the park and resembles a glass mushroom. Its two halls have a combined seating capacity of 2,000. The larger hall has seats wrapping around the stage (tickets are less expensive for seats facing the musicians’ backs, but the sound quality is reportedly the best in Moscow for all in attendance). The smaller hall will also host lectures about music.
zaryadyehall.com
In other classical music news, Yekaterinburg, the capital of the Ural Federal District, has hired the architectural firm of Zaha Hadid to build a new cutting-edge concert hall.
The London-based firm’s shiny, spaceship-like design won out against dozens of other contestants. The project is set to take five years and cost over R300 million. Currently, the city’s orchestra (which still uses the city’s Soviet-era name, the Sverdlovsk Philharmonic Orchestra) is housed in a small building. The new building will be located in the same spot, though the grandiose design will require a nearby residential building to be demolished and the use of part of a city park.
Richter, a new creative space that contains a small hotel and restaurant, has opened in Moscow. Located in the capital’s central Zamoskvorechye neighborhood, Richter inhabits a historic, three-story mansion that includes a bar, gallery, shop, library, recording studio, and even something called a “vermoutherie.” The boutique five-star hotel, which has just eight rooms, is set to open later this year, but the other facilities, including the restaurant, are open during Richter’s various events. Those have ranged from an immersive play by Moscow’s leading young director, Maxim Didenko, to an exhibit of portraits.
Richter.moscow
The Azimut hotel chain has launched two new hotels along Russia’s Golden Ring. One large property has opened near Pereslavl, an ancient town on the shore of Lake Pleshcheyevo. It boasts over 300 rooms and 30 cottages, as well as a large sports grounds that includes a clay tennis court. The property is actually more of a resort, since it is about 10 kilometers from central Pereslavl. Prices start at R2,200.
Azimut also took over an existing hotel in Suzdal, a popular tourist destination. The newly-managed property has over 80 rooms and services include a real Russian banya experience. Suzdal, a compact town with beautiful churches and surprisingly good restaurants, had 1.7 million visitors in 2017.
Offering a bit of holiday sparkle, the Kremlin museums are hosting a major exhibit of some of their most exquisite jewelry pieces. Titled “Tribute to Femininity,” the exhibit is a retrospective of jewelry designed by Bulgari and contains some 500 pieces, including famous jewels worn by movie stars, such as Elizabeth Taylor.
Bulgari curator Lucia Boscaini says it is the largest exhibit the Italian design studio has ever assembled. The show runs through January 13.
bulgari.kreml.ru
A completely different kind of exhibit can be seen in the New Tretyakov Gallery, which hosts the first major retrospective (in Russia, that is) of Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, running through January 13.
Called “Not Everyone Will be Taken into the Future,” the show coincides with Ilya Kabakov’s 85th birthday. The artist, who emigrated from the Soviet Union when he was 55, did not attend, staying home on Long Island. His wife Emilia came to Moscow for the opening. The show had previously been shown at London’s Tate Modern and St. Petersburg’s Hermitage Museum.
“Ilya Kabakov is the greatest living Russian artist,” said Zelfira Tregulova, the Tretyakov Gallery director who has overseen a number of enormous retrospectives, to this point mainly focusing on classic painters like Konstantin Korovin and Ivan Ayvazovsky.
The Kabakovs’ work explores the experience of living in the Soviet Union, constructing scenes and rooms using mundane artefacts, like frying pans. They have also donated their old Moscow studio on Sretensky Boulevard to the Tretyakov Gallery, which plans to create a museum of conceptualism there.
tretyakovgallery.ru
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