172 pp. volume on spatial composition in architecture, illustrated throughout with numerous black-and-white drawings and photographs. Quarto (11 1/2 x 8 1/4 inches). Original publisher's cloth with red-stamped lettering to front cover. Light staining to spine, toning and minor spotting to title page, overall very good. Moscow/Leningrad: Gos. Nauchno-Tekhnicheskoe izd-vo Stroitel'noi Industrii i Sudostroeniia Gosstroizdat NKTP SSSR, 1934.

Vladimir Fyodorovich Krinsky/Krinskii (1890-1971) was a Russian artist and architect active with the avant-garde ASNOVA (Association of New Architects) architectural association in the Soviet Union who studied at the Imperial Academy of Arts, worked for the Moscow City Duma and Narkompros, and went on to teach at Vkhutemas. He was also one of the heads of the United Workshop ('Obmas') with Ladovsky and Dokuchaev, and a prominent member of the architectural rationalism movement.

This rare textbook-type volume comprises a study of composition, proportion, and space in historical architecture and its application to concerns and issues in modern Soviet designs. Krinskii based the material on his own experiences of teaching university students the basics of architectural composition. Krinskii wrote that "you can't design and build only based on studies of spatial composition (it becomes formalism), but you can't manage without it." The book is dedicated to what resources and tools the architect can use and how to best operate them. It also includes tasks for students and examples of their solutions. This work does not renounce constructivism but does speak against formalism.

The book is illustrated throughout, with interesting combinations of old and new architecture placed side by side - for example, a frieze from the Parthenon alongside the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station, or the Palazzo Valmarana in Vicenza placed alongside a design by Le Corbusier.

Scarce; as of December 2025, OCLC locates only three holdings of this work in the United States.

Book ID: 53603

Price: $1,950.00