Minsk Old Town, Minsk, Belarus Drawing

I am now pursuing a long-term journey of a flaneur documenting architecture in the former Eastern Bloc – the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe. To date I have visited the following countries: Belarus, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Ukraine. I am seldom interested in the ideology or social concepts that often associates these buildings with a totalitarian regime. Instead, creating a multimedia archive of the buildings, which currently have little or no documentation, are set to be demolished or remain abandoned. As part of my ongoing exploration I often stay with locals in residential areas of cities as a means to understand the communities that surround the architecture and the nature of decay, which was the case in Lithuania, Kaunas in April 2017 where I studied the demolition of the never-completed and abandoned Soviet Respublika hotel. Furthermore, I hope to highlight the importance of protecting structures, such as communal living, recreation, aviation, industrialisation, urban planning and communication. Examples include: Vilnius Palace of Concerts and Sports also known as the Sporto Rūmai, closed in 2004 deemed unsafe.