Architecture · Heritage · People · Pop Culture

Jeremy Irons restored the 15th-century Kilcoe Castle in County Cork

Jeremy Irons lives in a restored 15th-century Irish castle. In 1998 the actor bought the ruined Kilcoe Castle in County Cork; its restoration took six years and about 2 million dollars. Irons's castle was built in 1458, but from 1603 onwards it lay in a state of

Art · Museums · Observations · People

The bronze mask of Igor Shelkovsky, made by the sculptor Boris Orlov, seems to me a direct allusion to the Mycenaean golden mask of Agamemnon

Shelkovsky's mask is on show in the Artists' Village on Maslovka. The mask of Agamemnon is in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens

Oil painting of a red-haired woman in a knitted vest seen from behind, set against a dark background. A museum label hangs beside it on the wall.

NB!

Vasily Chuikov, At the Piano, 1970s: painting on a museum wall

Architecture · Art · Moscow · Museums · Observations

Museum of the Artists' Town on Verkhnyaya Maslovka opens in Moscow

I did not know that Moscow had a little neighbourhood where, from the 1930s onwards, outstanding Soviet artists lived and worked side by side. Igor Grabar, Boris Ioganson, Geliy Korzhev, Vladimir Tatlin, Alexander Tyshler, Semyon Chuikov: the names of these luminaries are familiar to everyone, but one need only imagine

Young woman with long reddish hair, a red hat and an ornate dress holds a sword and the severed head of a bearded man resting on a stone ledge.

NB!

Judith with a sword and the head of Holofernes, Renaissance painting

Art · Mores

Gloves for Those Whose Diamonds Are Itching

Late medieval custom held that rings were not to be worn over gloves; instead, one was advised to wear special perforated gloves, through which the jewellery could be seen. Gloves of just this perforated kind appear, in particular, in the paintings of Lucas Cranach the Elder.

Art · Observations · Society · Reportage · Ethnography

We have already said a great deal about Blazar, but I cannot help returning once more to the design section that so appealed to me, and dwelling on one of its brightest stands: the stand of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, designed by the architect Misha Maslo

We have already said a great deal about Blazar, but I cannot help returning once more to the design section that so appealed to me, and dwelling on one of its brightest stands: the stand of the Nizhny Novgorod Region, designed by the architect Misha Maslov, which the fair named

Aristocracy · Monarchies · Observations · People · Humour

Theory linking Kate Middleton to the Rothschilds through her mother

There is a very amusing theory that Kate Middleton, Princess of Wales, is a Rothschild on her mother's side. Her mother, née Goldsmith, is supposed to have come from the Goldsmith-Rothschild family. The theory is often refuted, but then such a fact would hardly be something to

NB! · Observations · Nature

Poor Capybara

Books · Observations · Mores · People

The pink dress in Marina Tsvetaeva's 1919 poem and her wish to be loved

In 1919 Marina Tsvetaeva wrote the poem "To You, in a Hundred Years", addressed to an admirer from the distant future. Piercing yet lyrical, sad yet spirited. "Friend! Do not seek me! Fashions are other now. Not even the old folk remember me." In this unusual

Books · People

Marina Tsvetaeva’s poem of August 1919 addresses a reader born a hundred years later

To You, in a Hundred Years. To you, who are to be born A century hence, once I have breathed my last, From the very depths, like one condemned to death, I write with my own hand: "Friend! Do not look for me! The fashion is different! Even the

Coming Up · New York · Pop Culture

Reeves to make his Broadway debut in “Waiting for Godot” on 28 September

Keanu Reeves makes his Broadway debut in Waiting for Godot. On 28 September, Jamie Lloyd's production of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot will open at the Hudson Theatre on Broadway. Although Reeves first appeared on the stage as long ago as 1985, playing Mercutio in Romeo

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