hile the Bauhaus remained a small, close-knit school, the staff and students at Vkhutemas were less of one mind. Avant-garde views flourished, especially amongst the school’s architecture faculty, as Ladovsky’s approach won more and more followers, achieving impressive results. Since architects must think spatially, Ladovsky advocated working on three-dimensional objects in actual space, not just on paper, and later rendering the detailed plans on blueprints.

This maquette method encouraged imagination and led to new approaches and the incorporation of unusual materials. This was the year, too, of an incident that threw light on the larger social-political context. During a visit from Lenin visited he inquired, “Perhaps there is even a Futurist among you?” only to be answered unhesitatingly: “Plenty.” Lenin left unhappy, apparently not enthused by the thought of artistic revolution. This was also the year of Wassily Kandinsky’s departure from the Soviet Union (never to return, it turned out). Although Kandinsky never taught at Vkhutemas he became a leading figure in INKhUK (the Institute of Art Culture), which worked closely with Vkhutemas.