Name
3rd Exemplary Workers' Polyclinic
Years of construction
1925-1927
Architect
Address
197, Moskovs'kij Avenue
In search of the Palace for the masses
3rd Exemplary Workers' Polyclinic on Moscow Avenue After the October Revolution of 1917, when the Winter Palace of Russian Emperors was re-established as a seat of the working class, the architects were given a new political task - to create a modern Palace for the proletariat. In the early 1920s, many projects were created. These projects, which have never been implemented, are still part of the architectural heritage. What did these projects have in common? Those were designed to place a significant number of people and were seen as social institutions for the proletariat. The Palaces for the Proletariat were designed, using a wide range of architectural solutions - from avant-garde to clear historical analogies. These borrowings also had an ideological meaning - the architects were borrowing from the epochs of foreign revolutions. The list of those revolutions was long - from the uprising of Spartacus in ancient Rome to the French bourgeois revolution. It also worked another way out - any public space could be easily transformed into a Palace. A striking example of such a Palace was the 3rd workers' policlinic on Moscow Avenue. This building was even officially named "Palace of Sanosvity" (Palace of Sanitary Education). The name was symbolic: until 1917, only wealthy people could afford permanent medical care. Factory workers went to see a doctor only because of serious illness, but never for a preventive examination. Not surprisingly, the Ukrainian Soviet government of the 1920s invested a lot in the education and development of public health organizations, - to demonstrate the achievements of Soviet politics. Therefore, one of the first large medical institutions had to be an example of good architecture. The polyclinic was designed in 1925 by Viktor Estrovych and Oleksandr Lynetsky. In publications, each of them is often referred to as the only architect of this building, possibly because they solved different issues. Starting with this project, Estrovych designed several medical institutions in 1925-1939. Almost all medical institutions in the Kharkiv and Donetsk regions were built by his projects. In the 1930s, he even created an album of typical medical institutions that became a model for new medical institutions of Soviet Ukraine till World War II. From the early 1920s to the mid-1930s, Lynetsky was a chief architect of Kharkiv. It was quite hard work. He shaped the face of the city, and constantly was resolving disputes between supporters of classical and avant-garde architecture. But in 1924 - 1925 he demonstrated the relevance of classical architecture, by means of which he designed the Palace of VUTSVK and the 3rd exemplary workers' polyclinic. And if the VUTSVK building demonstrated to the whole world that Kharkiv is the capital of a new state, the workers' polyclinic is an allegory of a country palace, accessible and ready to serve all citizens of the new Ukraine. Olga Shvydenko
3rd Exemplary Workers' Polyclinic / Medical Institution / City Clinical Hospital № 2
Estrovich V., Linetsky O. / 1925-1927 / 197, Moskovs'kij Avenue
Medical facilities / Influence of classical art
Monuments of architecture / Preserved
Romanticism of Industrial Revolution
Influence of classical art
Constructivism
Art Deco
Influence of Ukrainian folk architecture
Influence of European Modern architecture
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3. Лейбфрейд А.Ю. Архитекторы-евреи в Харькове:очерк. – Х.: Karavella, 2002.
4. Естрович Віктор Абрамович // Вікіпедія. – Режим доступу: https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/Естрович_Віктор_Абрамович
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