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Russian architectural designer, Alexandra Mokwinska was one of the first woman modernists in South Australia.
Alexandra Wasiliewna Mokwinska was born on 4 April 1917 in Novi Sanzhary, near Poltava, Ukraine, daughter of Wasili Sudia and Aleksandra Yefimova. Of Russian background, she grew up amid political turmoil and military conflict, in northeastern Ukraine’s fraught transition from Imperial Russian rule to its absorption within the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Graduating in 1939 in Kharkiv with a degree and diploma in architecture (Dunstan 1967, p.38), during the upheaval of the Second World War she fled the conflict in Ukraine but was designated an Ostarbeiter or “Eastern Worker” by the Nazis and was interned in a Polish camp for forced labourers between 1942-45 (Arolsen Archives, 6.3.3.2 / 108091102). Assessed as a ‘Displaced Person’ by the International Refugee Organisation, she and her Polish husband, Zygmunt (b. 20 Dec. 1921, Bydgoszcz, Pl.; d. 15 Sept. 1990, Adelaide) passed through various refugee camps before eventually sailing for Australia, departing Genoa, Italy in 1948 on the third voyage of the IRO-chartered vessel, the S.S. Svalbard, arriving in Sydney on 15 January 1949. They initially lived at Bathurst Migrant Camp and Zygmunt, like many Polish refugees, found work on the Snowy Mountains Hydroelectric Scheme. The Mokwinskis made their way to Adelaide, where they remained for the rest of their lives, naturalising as citizens in 1958 (Zygmunt) and 1961 (Alexandra). It is not clear that Mokwinska ever registered as an architect in South Australia, but she reportedly designed at least twenty projects here (Dallwitz and Marsden, 1986). Alexandra Mokwinska died on 10 October 2002, twelve years after Zygmunt. She was buried in the Russian Orthodox section of Centennial Park Cemetery in Adelaide, survived by her son, Alexander.
EDUCATION
Mokwinska obtained her degree and diploma in architecture, Kharkiv, Ukraine, graduating 1939 (AWW 1967: 38-39).
Due to military conflict in Ukraine in the period immediately preceding and during the Second World War, and again in the 2020s, it has not been possible to confirm the institution at which Mokwinska received her education in architecture; many records are said to have been destroyed (University History Museum, V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, pers. comm.). Two institutions offered architectural education in Kharkiv in this period, the V.N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, and the Kharkiv National University of Civil Engineering and Architecture (University History Museum, V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, pers. comm.).
From 1920-1934, Kharkiv was the capital of Soviet Ukraine, becoming an important scientific, cultural and educational centre (Hewryk 1992, p.325). Ukraine had already absorbed the impact of the State-sanctioned famine, the Holodomor, in 1931-32. From 1936, the Stalinist purges, including summary executions, political imprisonments, and reprisals, would impact the intelligentsia and educational institutions; Ukraine’s higher education institutions were dissolved and reformed to better serve the Communist project (Didenko et al. 2015, p.71; see also, Fitzpatrick 1979). Ukrainian institutions of higher education at this time were of two types: the technicum, a secondary school which trained “narrow specialists”, and the former universities and polytechnics, renamed “institutes”, “which had a broader curriculum and longer course of study than the technicums” (Fitzpatrick 1979, p.45). In referring to Mokwinska’s position as a Russian in Ukraine, and an architectural student within a Russian-based Soviet culture, it is important to note the “intermingling of cultures” and “weak reliance on nationality as a form of self-identification” (Wanner 1998, p.22). This cultural fluidity is said to be particularly common to eastern Ukraine, where migration to and from Russia and intermarriage were commonplace (Wanner 1998, op. cit.).
Kharkiv during this turbulent period was known as “the capital of design” in Ukraine (Akinsha, Denysova and Kashuba-Volvach, 2023). Artistically, the Ukrainian nationalist tradition in modern art and design that briefly flowered under the policy of Ukrainisation and, in architectural terms, resulted in a vernacular form of Art Nouveau, was suppressed and the Soviet reconstruction of Kharkiv began (Smolenska 2022, p.46). In the 1920s and early 30s there had been significant interchange between the Russian and Ukrainian avant-gardes (Akinsha, Denysova and Kashuba-Volvach 2023, p.10). From the mid-late 30s formal experimentation was deprecated, and interest in modernism would not renew until the Khruschev thaw (Oosterhof 2017, p. 103). Contemporary architects and urbanists were necessarily involved in Ukraine’s mass-scale programme of urban and social redesign, however, which has left a contested twentieth-century architectural legacy in present-day Kharkiv (Didenko et al. 2023, p. 69).
WORKS
Mokwinski Residence
The substantial International Style house that Mokwinska designed for her own family in Kensington Park, in Adelaide’s eastern suburbs, was built in 1956 for £3000, with the family doing most of the work (Burnside Heritage Survey: Part 2 ‘A’ Item Documentation 1987, p. 89). It features a flat roof and is a local heritage place in Burnside (Burnside Heritage Survey (S.A.): Part 1 General Report, 1987, p.45). The Mokwinskis spent the rest of their lives here and the house is still owned by the family.
The house sits on a corner block, facing north and east, with two main entrances, with a street one adjacent to the attached carport and driveway. Roughly L-shaped in plan, it is built of hand-cut Mount Gambier limestone, with the corrugated iron roof split into sections set at different, overlapping heights, and a curved corner wall with projecting bay window facing the street. The framing of the windows and external door openings by projecting stone courses is unusual. Original internal fixtures and fittings are not visually documented but are said to have harmonized “with the unusual spaces and curved lines” (BHS 1987, p.89).
In a leafy suburban landscape of mainly traditional detached homes set in cottage gardens, the most distinctive feature is the roof structure. Historians commissioned for the Burnside Heritage Survey reported that council building inspectors “were won over by her enthusiasm, professionalism and collection of pictures of sub-tropical buildings with flat roofs” (BHS 1987, p.45).
Chwalczyk Residence
The house at Eden Hills, is a striking modernist home with International Style elements, designed by Mokwinska and constructed in 1961 for Polish-Ukrainian clients, Alfred Chwalczyk and Nadia Chwalczyk (née Medwiedewa). In addition to cultural background and refugee experiences shared with the Mokwinskis, Zygmunt and Alfred had both worked on Government Hydro-Electric schemes, in Alfred’s case in northern Tasmania (NAA: A11394, MOKWINSKI Z; Suzy Stevens, Hydro Tasmania, pers. comm.). The house was created as part of a new postwar subdivision of colonial survey land in the foothills suburb of Eden Hills, with the first homes being built in 1958 (City of Mitcham, 2008).
The Chwalczyk residence sits on the high side of the street, elevated slightly on a sloping block. The house features an uncommon reverse plan, with split level living / dining, kitchen and guest spaces upstairs, and bedrooms, utilities and home office downstairs. The home features large areas of glazing, capturing impressive 360° views. At the time of construction, the Australian Women’s Weekly feature writer noted that the house could itself be seen for three miles around. The site selected for their home lies on the other side of town from the established Polish migrant community in Adelaide’s northwestern suburbs, centred around Woodville, with its Polish Catholic church, and the then Dom Polski Centre. The site and the unusual architectural design therefore suggests a certain confidence on the part of her clients; a level of aspiration and independence.
Mokwinska’s poetic vision was for a ship-like design, “sailing over the waves” (AWW, p.38). The top floor is larger than the lower, and the sculptural concrete forms beneath the slim-profile balconies are structural and also serve as sides for the carport. These pillars were reported to represent the waves “keeping the ship afloat” (AWW, p.38) The v-shaped pattern formed by the stone and slate under the front balcony was intended to suggest “the reflection of a ship on water” (AWW, p.38).
Cost blowouts led to design changes and prevented the adoption of the curved roof that Mokwinska had originally envisaged (AWW, p.38). A standard, kidney-shaped pool was eventually substituted for the original cone shaped, integrated pool design, while the external terrace was reduced in size. Features built as designed included the rockery and indoor garden, and the use of free angles in plan. The curved wall in the dining room and kitchen enclosing the raised kitchen/dining areas and the suspended staircase, featuring ramin-wood treads on steel-rod hangers, are of particular interest. The house also incorporated practical features, such as the carport and the use of interior paving at the lower ground floor, so pool users could enter the house and reach the bathroom or place towels in the laundry without dripping on the Tasmanian myrtle floor.
Colour is an important expressive element of the interior spaces, and was used by Mokwinska to define and separate activity zones within the semi-open plan, including through contrasting use of warm and cool tones (yellow-golds and blue-greys). Thanks to the colour reproductions in the Weekly, the original scheme could be reinstated in future. A raised dining area to the left of the suspended staircase adjoined the original kitchen entrance. Nadia Chwalczyk created an abstract fabric mural (AWW, p.38), which unfortunately does not survive, although the integrated light fitting that originally illuminated it remains. Mokwinska designed the inset ceiling lights, which fortunately are still in situ, to represent the northern constellations of the Great Bear and Little Bear; a reminder of ‘home’ in Europe for her clients (AWW, p.38).
Overall, the house has been well-maintained, and many original design features remain intact. The main change that has been carried out has been to carve out an opening in the kitchen wall to give coastal views to the occupants and direct access to the open plan area. There have been some cosmetic changes to the original kitchen / dining wallpaper and tiling. The original form is still readable, and the change is reversible.
SIGNIFICANCE OF WORKS
Mokwinska is significant as one of the first women modernist architects, or architectural designers, practising in South Australia. She is the only woman to have a building included on the Australian Institute of Architects (SA Chapter)’s Register of Notable 20th Century Buildings.
However, her female contemporaries at the then RAIA in South Australia, including M. Dawson, Valerie Havyatt, Pauline Hurren, Marjorie Simpson, and Ruth Smith, were all slightly younger than Mokwinska and all had joined the Institute after the end of the Second World War (RAIA Yearbooks, 1945-63). Mokwinska’s professional identity and trajectory is thus significantly different from that of other women practitioners. Her professional experience in South Australia is, in some but not all ways, much more akin to that of other Eastern European émigré architects and design professionals who arrived in this period, including Eric von Schramek, Vaclavas Navakas, and Tadeusz Andrzejaczek. Her work should be interpreted in relation to the Eastern European émigré contribution to South Australian architecture and design in the postwar period.
Mokwinska’s descriptions of the Chwalczyk Residence in the Australian Women’s Weekly might encourage a reading of the house in terms of a personal, and perhaps naïve, expression of the migrant experience. However, its form may also have been influenced by the work of Hans Scharoun, and particularly his design for House Schminke (1932-33). The ‘steamship’ inspiration, reverse plan, diagonal staircase, level changes, the use of colour, and the accommodation of arrival by car (Blundell Jones 1997, pp.73-74; Samuel and Jones 2012, p.109) are all elements in the Chwalczyk Residence that could conceivably be derived from Scharoun. Knowledge of Scharoun’s work would have been disseminated in Ukraine indirectly by Russian and Ukrainian architects continuing to travel to Europe during the 1930s (Zubovich 2016, pp. 105-106) and more directly through those Western practitioners who came East to pursue more radical aims, including Lotte Stam-Beese, who had worked with Scharoun in Berlin prior to her arrival in Kharkiv in 1932 (Oosterhof 2017, pp.98, 101).
In comparison with the work of other contemporary architects, including those building in the Adelaide foothills—many of which evoke a kind of retreat into nature—the overall effects achieved by Mokwinska are sculptural and distinctive. There is scope for more work to be done in order to interpret the ways in which Mokwinska’s design practice reflects and evolves a European and international tradition of formalism inherited from the first generation of modernists.
Citation details
Howell, Catherine, 'Mokwinska, Alexandra Wasiliewna', Architecture Museum, University of South Australia, 2024, Architects of South Australia: [http://www.architectsdatabase.unisa.edu.au/arch_full.asp?Arch_ID=168]
The author would like to thank the following individuals for contributing to this research: Professor Deborah Ascher Barnstone, School of Architecture, Design and Planning, University of Sydney, for drawing attention to the work of Hans Scharoun in connection with Mokwinska; the staff of the University History Museum, V. N. Karazin National University, Kharkiv; Ms Suzy Stevens, Hydro Tasmania; Mr Danyon Michalkowski, SPK Hobart Sub-Branch.
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Architects of South Australia, Copyright 2008, Updated regularly