City of Mosaics
In 1966, Tashkent was struck by a 5.2 magnitude earthquake, followed by powerful aftershocks of 8-9 magnitude. Many buildings crumbled, leaving over 300,000 people homeless. Builders, architects, and artists from various Soviet republics flocked to Tashkent to aid in the reconstruction. This marked the beginning of Tashkent’s mosaic legacy. The Zharsky brothers — Peter, Nikolai, and Alexander — are among the most renowned mosaic artists. They created about 240 mosaics in Tashkent, mostly on residential buildings. Their materials included ceramics, smalt, concrete, metal, and even semi-precious stones. The Zharskys mainly used ceramic tiles, experimenting with texture and volume. By varying the thickness and shape of the pieces, they created dynamic, relief panels that seemed to come alive. Their mosaics featured Orientalist patterns, designs mimicking Uzbek fabrics, artistic abstractions, scenes from everyday life, and themes of space exploration and the friendship of nations. These mosaics brought color to the otherwise uniform gray panel buildings. Sometimes, entire compositions on a single theme spanned multiple buildings in new neighborhoods. Mosaics adorned not only the sides of buildings but also the spaces between windows, blank walls, and entrances to stairwells.
For the Soviet authorities, mosaics were a propaganda tool, but for the artists, they were a chance to create something intresting within strict constraints. The Zharsky brothers drew inspiration from traditional plant (islami) and geometric (girekh) patterns, occasionally incorporating images of birds and animals.
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