Architecture · Faith · The East · Heritage
On 26 September 1687, during the Venetian siege of the Athenian Acropolis, the Parthenon was blown up, the Turks having made it a powder magazine and a place of refuge. The Parthenon, which had by then served as a mosque for more than two hundred years, was bombarded without mercy:
NB! · Archive · Art
Coming Up · Pop Culture · Saint Petersburg
The Shostakovich Saint Petersburg State Academic Philharmonic celebrates its centenary and, to mark the opening of the new season, which coincides with Dmitri Shostakovich's birthday, will broadcast a grand concert live. The programme includes Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 and Shostakovich's Symphony No. 1.
Cinema · Books · Observations · Society
The National Electronic Library, under the Ministry of Culture, has released an app called “Svet” [“Light”] with free access to thousands of books, films and plays. Since we do, after a fashion, have a copyright law, what has been made openly available is mostly classic works whose terms happen to
NB! · Cinema · Observations · Pop Culture · Humour
London · Observations · Society · People · Humour
I know that many are still mourning the untimely death of the American judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg, but let us not pass by the darlings still among us, such as Baroness Floella Benjamin, who celebrated her 71st birthday in such a dazzling look that, as Andrey Malakhov would say, "
London · People · Humour
A true story that befell Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, hero of the Second World War, in London, when he climbed into a taxi and said to the driver:. - Waterloo, please. - The railway station? - Of course. For the battle, it is a little late now.
Museums · Society · Saint Petersburg
As for the view from the museum community, concessions are laid down in an order of the Russian Ministry of Culture, but there is also a list of concessions that a museum sets for itself, and the Hermitage has evidently availed itself of that right. In most museums, staff from
Moscow · Museums · Observations · Education · Society
Back in my postgraduate days I noted with vexation that the overwhelming majority of Moscow museums did not count a postgraduate card as a student one, and not only denied free entry (although one would think that a history faculty should be able to visit at least the historical museums
Monarchies · Observations · Mores · People
Other sources also report on the Potemkin villages, but the notorious villages of painted plywood did not lead Catherine astray: this was the ordinary practice of adorning a monarch's route, just as was the building of sumptuous wayside pavilions for the Russian empress's halts. To begin
NB! · Observations · Society
Architecture · Moscow · Observations · Heritage · Society · Reportage
In my view, the trouble with events of this kind, where people try to stand up to commercial giants backed by the authorities at every turn, lies not even in the futility of such undertakings in our country, but in the fact that the camp of defenders of the righteous