Evolution of Composition of the Gostilitsy Palace and Park Ensemble

Abstract

The Gostilitsy Palace and Park Ensemble is in the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage list. Now in 2021 the palace-park complex is ruined and may be included in List of World Heritage Sites in Danger. This paper built on earlier analyses and presented new research results. Historiographical data about transfer the estate from Razumovsky brothers to other owners Potemkin and also fact of ownership of the estate by merchant Akimov in 1875 were rediscovered. For the first time graphic data is published — piece of the park layout near Lower Pond. Iconographic data are also published, it is watercolor depicting an open wooden gallery, which made it possible a number of findings about the planning structure the estate holding period of the Kirill Razumovsky, and two watercolors with views of the park. The resulting data and using the cartographic method there has been four development periods and Basic Plans were made. Elizabethan Baroque, Classicism and Romantic Gothic — style of the ensemble changed with the building of each new palace. During the ownership of the Gostilitsy by the Siemens family in the late 19th — early 20th centuries, the park was in its prime. Locations of viewpoints in today’s park were identified using watercolors of the 1850s by the artist Vasily Sadovnikov and photographs of the beginning of the 20th century, and the park pictures were recreated using 3D model. Graphic reconstruction of the park mid-19th — early 20th centuries is product of the work. The graphic reconstruction was analyzed in the context of the theory of A. T. Bolotov, and compared with the Palace and Park Ensemble of Bogoroditsk. As a result of art analysis, similar principles of space organization of both parks were noted, and a compositional structure was revealed, which was a landscape network of scenes and transit spaces.