"It is impossible to believe, but you cannot exclude"

On the night of Saturday, January 31, in Moscow, the building of the library of the Institute of Scientific Information on Social Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences (INION RAS) on Nakhimovsky Prospekt caught fire. The damage caused to the library funds has yet to be evaluated, but now it is clear - the losses are huge . In the building of the fundamental library, more than 10 million storage units were placed, including one of the largest collections of books in Slavic languages, ancient publications in rare languages, many in a single copy. According to the President of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Vladimir Fortov, who compared the fire in INION with an accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, at least 20% of materials died from fire and water: archival documents (including related to Stalinist repressions), catalogs, rare manuscripts, magazine bearing. Only 7 thousand books managed to digitize.

However, no less significant loss is the destruction of the building itself, built in 1964-1967 according to the project of architects Yakov Belopolsky, Efim Vulykh and Lev Misozhnikov and included by Docomomo Russia in the list of one hundred of the most significant objects of Moscow architecture of the twentieth century . Yakov Belopolsky for a long time managed the 11th workshop of Mosproekt-1, which in 1952-1966 was engaged in the planning and development of the South-Western District of Moscow. The buildings of three scientific institutions-INION, CEMI (Central Economic and Mathematics Institute) and the Central Scientific Medical Library, were a kind of frame of the general plan of this area, each of which is rightfully considered a masterpiece of Soviet modernism, which had an impact on projects of a later time.

The buildings of INION and CEMI were a single work of two parts, and the loss of one of them was a real disaster.

“The library of INION is one of the best buildings built in Moscow in the late 1960s-early 1970s,” says Anna Brronitskaya, historian of architecture. - It was especially important in the composition of the whole area of ​​scientific institutes, which was destroyed by the recent years of the invasion of commercial construction: several years ago, residential skyscrapers that violated historical buildings grew near the Inion. The buildings of INION and Tsemi were a single art work of two parts, and the loss of one of them was a real disaster. ”

The fire almost completely destroyed the roof of the building, the glass facades of the third floor, the internal ceilings, pylons, the pylons, cornice partially collapsed. The corps, blurred along Nakhimovsky Prospekt, according to eyewitnesses, continued to smolder throughout Sunday. The director of INION Yuri Pivovarov is sure that the building is not subject to restoration.

After the first reports of the fire began on the network, versions began to appear on the network, which could cause an emergency. In particular, there were assumptions that the building became a victim of arson in order to get a tidbit of Moscow land for the construction of the next shopping center (however, there was no documentary evidence of this version - as Kommersant reports , they did not receive applications for new construction in the Moscow government). And the deputy of the municipal assembly of the Cheremushka district, Aleksey Gusev, told in his LiveJournal a fantastic story: in December 2013, at a meeting of the Council of district deputies, it was almost decided to build a church and a multi -level parking lot on the site of INION, while the issue of demolishing the library building was officially not discussed anywhere. However, Yuri Pivovarov believes that there was no arson.

“The version of the deliberate arson, on the one hand, looks plausible in the context of those monstrous events that occur in the last two years in Moscow,” says Bronovitskaya. -For some commercial project, this is a completely suitable place-the INION building is located at the intersection of important city highways, near the metro, occupies a large area. They could very well have encroached on him. On the other hand, this is one of the main bookstores of the country, just a guarded, and not an abandoned factory or shed. So it turns out: it is impossible to believe, but it is impossible to exclude. "

So far, the version that the fire could flare up due to a faulty wiring seems to be the most convincing, especially since this has already happened a few years ago. “There have been no overhaul of the building for many years, although cosmetic work has been carried out constantly,” one of the current library employees (who wished to remain unknown) told Colta.ru. - The wiring was in unimportant condition, from time to time small smokes occurred, but the reasons were always and quickly eliminated. Do not forget that during the construction of the building, well -known violations were committed. The mines, which were supposed to ensure the work of air conditioners, were overwhelmed with garbage, so there was nothing to breathe in the room in the summer. It was impossible to cool the air, even when a pool worked that performed the functions of an external air conditioner. The pool itself has been closed for more than fifteen years. The version of arson seems unlikely to me. I know that several years ago certain projects were discussed, which suggested the construction of a shopping center next to Inion, the developers then even promised us to allocate money for repairs, but then all these plans disappeared. It will be possible to return to the version of deliberate arson only if the institute is liquidated. ”

You can restore anything, this is a matter of political will and finance.

The question of the future fate of INION is not only about the scientific community. The day after the fire on the Change.org website , the collection of signatures began under the appeal to Dmitry Medvedev with an appeal to restore the INION building and save the institute and the library in it (later a similar appeal to Putin appeared). Yesterday it became known that the Prime Minister instructed Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich to oversee the restoration of INION. The administration of the institute will be temporarily placed at the Central Economic and Mathematics Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences on the same Nakhimovsky Prospekt. The remaining employees of the institute will work in the premises provided by other scientific institutions: IMEMO, the Institute of Oceanology, the Faculty of Social Sciences of the NRU HSE. The fate of the funds has not yet been decided. Despite the statement of the Ministry of Emergencies that it is impossible to restore the building, the chance to preserve at least the surviving building remains, experts say.

“Restoration technologies have reached a large degree of perfection today, plus all design materials should have been preserved, so you can restore anything, this is a matter of political will and finance,” said Marina Khrustaleva, coordinator of the Archnadzor public movement. - The architectural and social value of this building is so great that it is now even stupid to argue whether to reconstruct it or not. The tragedy that happened is not a reason to put an end to the building, this is a reason to talk more thoughtfully about how to put it in order. ”

Help in the restoration of the INION library, which could take several years, has already been offered by governments and scientific groups from Australia, Ukraine, the USA.