Historical Modernism of Yerevan

Four Segments of One Straight Line

Abstract

The article deals with the phenomenon of “historic modernism” inherent in urban development of Yerevan – the capital of the Republic of Armenia. There are “Four Yerevans” described – the main periods of this city’s development: Ancient (Urartian, medieval Armenian, and Ottoman-Persian); Russian imperial; Soviet; and Post-Soviet. The author shows how at each subsequent stage the environmental achievements of the previous period were “canceled” in the frame of the linear modernist paradigm, and a new, more “correct” city was built on these ruins. The emphasis is placed on the exceptions to this rule: vernacular districts created in the “bottom- up” manner by the citizens themselves, the so-called “islands of resistance”. However, the urban community in general remains “undermodernized” and has little effect on the ongoing top-down processes of city formation. Apparently, only the signifi cant changes in the society (development of the actual local self-government; awareness raised on the value of all periods and styles heritage; genesis of a genuine urban culture) will be able to launch the transition to the “Fifth Yerevan”, a contemporary historic city carefully keeping the whole multilayered urban heritage.