Affinity
Art, Fun, & Nonsense.
I do not remember why I drew this, but based on the paper on which it is drawn I did it at home and at my computer desk.
©Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.
From Giliell, click for full size!
© Giliell, all rights reserved.
Gate Church of the Transfiguration, Novodevichy Nunnery
Novodevichy, corner turret
Our tour of the Novodevichy Nunnery was like stepping into a fairy tale from long ago. The complex is beautifully built with white stone set against pink and red brick in what later came to be came known as the Moscow Baroque style. Its four corners are marked by richly decorated round turrets that tower above you. The convent has also been kept intact and unchanged since the 17th century. In 2004 Novodevichy became a Unesco world heritage site.
Main gate, Novodevichy Nunnery
Novodevichy was founded in 1524 by Grand Prince Vasily III, son of Ivan the Great. It was built to commemorate the victory of Russia over Polish and Lithuanian forces in 1514 for the town of Smolensk. The oldest building in the convent complex is the Smolensky Cathedral built in 1524 – 1525, and later renovated by Prince Vasily’s son Ivan the Terrible in the 1550’s. Smolensky cathedral was modeled after The Assumption Cathedral located at the Kremlin and because of this its architecture is different from that of any other building in the complex. Unfortunately, while we were there the building was undergoing restoration and was blanketed by scaffolding. Built at the same time as the cathedral is Prokhorov’s Chapel, which still receives prayers today.
Prokhorov’s Chapel, front view
Prokhorov’s Chapel, trim detail
Prokhorov’s Chapel, ceiling detail
Prokhorov’s Chapel, rear view
The remainder of the convent complex was built around the cathedral and was designed to also fully function as a military fort. The entire complex is surrounded by towering walls, in places up to 11 meters high and 3 meters thick, and it has a total of 12 watch towers surrounding the perimeter. The convent was strategically placed along the banks of the Moscow River and on the only southern access road into Moscow. Part of its mandate at the outset was to serve as a first defense post protecting Moscow, but because of its well situated location it also became a convenient military barracks and outpost. The nunnery has also seen battle. During Napoleon’s Russian campaign, French forces attempted to blow up the convent, but quick thinking nuns extinguished the fuses as soon as the soldiers left.
Novodevichy’s Protection of the Holy Virgin Temple
Church of the Dormition of the Mother of God and refectory, Novodevichy Nunnery
Chapel, Novodevichy Nunnery
Over the course of its history the convent had close ties to the Kremlin and was well favoured by the elites of Russia. Many of the nuns came from high ranking families, including the royals. This was often not the choice of the women themselves. In historic Russia, as with many other parts of the world, if a woman became troublesome it was often her fate to be sent to a nunnery. Looking around the complex I had occasional feelings that the walls were meant as much to keep some people in as they were to keep invaders out.
Residence, Novodevichy Nunnery
It has been suggested that Prince Vasily actually founded the convent in part as a way to exile his ex-wife Solomonia because she did not bear him an heir. Perhaps the most famous of Novodevichy’s unwilling residents is the half sister of Peter the Great, the Regent Sophia, who ruled Russia from 1682 – 1689. When Peter turned 17 he seized power and Sophia was arrested and forced into the nunnery. It is the Regent Sophia who ordered the construction of many of the buildings in the complex including the Church of the Transfiguration and the famous bell tower.
Novodevichy Bell Tower, undergoing restoration
Administration building, Novodevichy Nunnery
Novodevichy is still an operating convent, but the order is now small. The church maintains the convent mostly out of desire to preserve the site and the large number of important religious relics and icons which are housed here.
Present day nuns at Novodevichy
©voyager, all rights reserved
Link to previous post – Russia – The Kremlin
Daniel Pešta, “Scream III” (2015-2016), acrylic on canvas, (all images courtesy of DOX Centre for Contemporary Art, Prague).
Daniel Pešta is an artist with a lot to say, and he’s well worth getting acquainted with, to say the least. His work is deeply expressive, profound, and stirring. Many times it’s frightening, because people can be quite frightening, and Daniel Pešta has a good deal of insight when it comes to human nature.
Daniel Pešta’s largest exhibition to date, drawn from his high-flying decade starting in 2007 , which has included three Venice appearances and Second Prize in Painting at 2017’s London Art Biennale, dominates Prague’s DOX Centre for Contemporary Art. Pešta’s work is timely, disturbing and profound. His extraordinary artistic range encompasses photography, video, assemblage, installation, sculpture, drawing and painting; his materials include wax, leather, resin, textiles, paper, plaster, wood, acrylic, latex, gum, paint, neon lighting, and stone. Two generative objects pull this exhibition together. One is red string, signifying blood, genetic coding, fatalism, or humanity’s endlessness, variously. The other is the mask. A central motif in Pešta’s practice, it is meant to evoke disguise, dissemblance, and anonymity.
Born in 1959, Pešta lived according to the larger Czech struggle for self-determination. He was painting as the Czechs stumbled out of the darkness of Communist rule in 1989. In the mid-1980s he entered into the underground music scene, anticipating what has been dubbed the “Velvet Revolution” — the demise of what former Czech President Vaclav Havel had called “post-totalitarianism” (in his 1978 samizdat essay “The Power of the Powerless”). After a trip to New York, in 1998, Pešta saw the possibilities of multimedia art.
You can read and see more at Hyperallergic.
It’s winter around here again, complete with snow and ice. The temperature is well below zero and there is a bitter northeast wind. It’s so cold that I wore my long johns and two pairs of socks on our walk today and was still half-frozen by the time we got home. This photo is at one of Jack’s favorite stops. I call the tree Zelda the Messenger because this is where all the dogs in the neighbourhood choose to leave their pee-mail.
Zelda the Messenger
©voyager, all rights reserved
I have to pass on the Iron Curtain series this weekend, because my mind and my hands are now fully occupied by work that won’t wait – repotting my trees. I only have this weekend for the deciduous trees and next weekend for the conifers, because after that the trees would be too grown and I would not be able to touch them without risking they die as a result. Which I do not want.
Currently my trees are more about quantity than about quality, because creating high quality bonsai takes time and I am only doing it for twenty five years. The plan is to build up stock now and refine it when I retire. Growing bonsai trees is not something for the impatient. But I have some medium to good quality ones already and I will share pictures. (I also have trouble getting my hands on quality bonsai pots, because they are not sold anywhere near and I am reluctant to buy them over the internet).
Here is a glimpse into the work that I am currently doing:
It starts with buying a load of coarse sand and spreading it out to dry in the sun. That does not need to be done, strictly speaking, but I find it easier to work with dry substrate so I try to dry it as much as possible. Another ingredience to the sand is high-quality soil or compost, sieved through a 5 mm mesh and also dried if possible. And last ingredience is peat or some suitable substitute, like shredded old leaves and moss and twigs, or maybe even saw dust. The organic material is there mostly to hold moisture and stop the substrate from clumping.
Next step is mixing up the substrate. Because I have a lot of trees and other potted plants, this used to be the most time consuming and tiring part, taking up hours of hard work. Nowadays I am doing it in a concrete mixer. A great saving of time and strength, I do not understand how I could manage without it. I was younger, healthier and I had less money but more time on my hands, so there’s that.
Whilst I am mixing suitable ammount of substrate, lets say 100 liters or so for starters, I also have to scrub and disinfect all the pots and bowls that are currently not in use. That is, I take them out, rinse them with boiling water and let them dry in the sun. That seems enough, I never had problem with fungal infections or rotting roots. I do not have enough pots to replant all trees at once, so I have to repeat this process multiple times as pots are emptied.
When the pots are ready and the substrate mixed, it is time to take out my most important tool case. Have fun trying to spot all the tools that are in it. All are used for tree care. And just in case someone can decipher the writing on that lid in top left corner – that is not actual mustard, just the cup in which once was mustard. Now it is full of charcoal to treat big cuts on roots.
Tiili.
Tiili is Finnish for brick. I found this piece of red brick near Ursininkallio in Eiranranta, Helsinki, in November 2017. Waves and ice had worn it down to a shape similar to a pebble or a small, a bit flat potato. I put it back there after having taken the photos, because I felt that I shouldn’t take it. It wasn’t the only one there, but there weren’t that many of them either.
It’s possible that the brick comes from the sea bathing facilities that were at Ursininkallio (Ursin’s rock) until 1934. Nils Abraham af Ursin (1785 – 1851), after whom the rock and the bathing facility were named, was a Finnish physician, Professor of anatomy and physiology and the Rector of University of Helsinki (at the time the Imperial Alexander University in Finland).
Click for full size!
© Ice Swimmer, all rights reserved.
From Kestrel: We are discing a field preparatory to planting it (even though it does not look like a promising year for rain) and one of the horses, Tito, decided to “help”. You can see he’s not scared of tractors, but it’s still fun to run in the field anyway. At least until it’s time to go back to sleep.
Tito’s a beauty, click for full size!
© Kestrel, all rights reserved.
A Buzzard (Buteo buteo) from Charly, click for full size!
© Charly, all rights reserved.
For a rare change, today Jack and I have not gone for a walk. The weather has been awful. All morning we had high winds and rain which then turned to freezing rain and now the temperature has dropped to minus 2 c and it’s snowing. It’s also still really windy, making it feel like minus 9 c. Poor Jack had to brave the weather to use the yard, but I haven’t left the house all day. I have a few health problems that are affected by weather and on a day like this the old body starts to feel like an old body. So today instead of our daily photo I’ll give you a classic shot. This is Jack at 3 months old.
Jack as a puppy
©voyager, all rights reserved
Donald Trump and Wayne Allen Root (YouTube/screen grab).
Wayne Allen Root, in his latest attempt to defend the endless and mind numbing corruption on the part of the Tiny Tyrant, unleashed an incredibly immature rant against Robert Mueller. The arrested development seen in so many conservatives is rather fascinating, and the older they become, the more they regress. I can’t imagine such a rant having the slightest effect on me, being 60 years old, it’s barely worth an eye roll. I expect if Mr. Mueller was aware of it, the reaction would be the same. Someone should perhaps inform Mr. Root that such rants tend to reveal a great deal more about the ranter than anyone else.
“Robert Mueller has probably never had sex in his life,” Root said. “I know he has never had sex with a beautiful woman. Did you ever see the angry look on Robert Mueller’s face? Robert Mueller needs sex badly and he is so jealous that Donald Trump was a billionaire playboy and obviously had sex with the most beautiful women in the world.”
Hmm. Mr. Mueller is married with two children. As for the Tiny Tyrant, well, a long history of sexual assault, and a descriptor of average from a porn star. Not exactly bragging material.
“Robert Mueller has penis envy,” he continued. “This is so obvious. This was high school, guys. In high school, there were handsome guys, and then there were handsome guys who were jocks, and then there were handsome guys who were jocks and had rich fathers. And that is Donald Trump. And then all the little nerds like Robert Mueller, who had never had sex in their whole lives, they hated the jocks, they hated the handsome guys, and they really hated the jocks who were handsome guys who were rich. This guy, Muller, has never had sex with a beautiful woman, so he hates Trump with a passion.”
I’ve noticed that Mr. Root often talks about high school. About time you got the fuck over it, no? Mr. Mueller has a job to do, and I don’t recall him expressing personal feelings about people at all. That would be called professionalism.
“The greatest president in modern history, a man is trying to take him down who is a pervert,” Root added. “Robert Mueller is a pervert. He probably sits home and watches porn. He has probably never had a girl in his whole life, a beautiful woman, so he sits and watches images and then he realizes there is someone like Donald Trump who is living every man’s fantasy … [Mueller] doesn’t even know what sex feels like. Robert Mueller is an ugly lawyer, he’s got nothing going for him.”
Jesus Christ, most 5 year olds are more mature than you are, Mr. Root. The greatest president? Hahahahaha, no. The greatest crook, perhaps.
“Mueller is a little pervert,” Root continued to rant. “Mueller is vicious, Mueller is disgusting, Mueller is a pervert. Can you imagine what he does at home at night? Who knows what he does, watching his computer images of Donald Trump and beautiful women. I can just guess what Mueller is doing in the dark, with the light of the screen glaring on him inside is office at 12 midnight. Quote me, Robert Mueller: You’re a pervert, you’re a loser, you’re ugly, you have never had a beautiful women in your life and you’re jealous of Donald Trump. It is all so clear now.”
I can pretty much guarantee you that whatever Mr. Mueller does in the evenings, it has nothing to do with watching the Tiny Tyrant and women. You, on the other hand, Mr. Root, that I can envision.
“It’s penis envy,” Root declared triumphantly. “Mueller’s is smaller than Trump’s.”
Who is the official penis inspector, and when is the report coming out?
RWW has the story, such as it is.