Coming Up · Moscow

Five actresses of a certain age, with very different professional histories and ranges, from Pippi Longstocking and an elderly sow to Nina Zarechnaya, meet at an audition, not yet knowing what to expect from texts quite unsuited to them, unfamiliar…

Matters take an unexpected turn, and the audition goes nothing like what was expected. The ladies share the details of their artistic fates, speak of what was and what never came to pass, of life, love and dreams. "Casting 81/18" at the Taganka Theatre. A kind, light

NB! · Aristocracy · Archive · London · Monarchies

The Attire of Prince Charles and Princess Anne for the Coronation of Elizabeth II

The East · Art · Monarchies · Ethnography

Kashan Mohtashem carpets, their distinctive features and the end of production

Persian Carpet by Mohtashem of Kashan with a Portrait of Nicholas II. Mohtashem was a celebrated weaver who, in the Iranian city of Kashan in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, produced carpets so skilful and of such high quality that his name became a byword for an entire

Archaeology · Faith · Museums

Drawing on a tablet with Demeter and Persephone sheds light on the Eleusinian Mysteries

Votive clay plaque of the 4th century BC from the Sanctuary of Eleusis, with four holes at the corners for hanging. The image on the plaque lifts a corner of the veil over the riddle of the Eleusinian Mysteries. Demeter sits on a cista, a chest on legs, beside Persephone,

NB! · Museums · Heritage · Society

UNESCO plans to open a virtual museum of stolen artefacts

A hand wearing a pearl bracelet holds an open book on the folds of a turquoise silk dress trimmed with orange roses. Lace and pink bows are visible at the top.

NB!

Painting detail: a hand holding a book on a turquoise silk gown with roses

Art · Books · Science

Paintings of Reading as an Illustration to a Bookmate Article on the Benefits of Fiction

Epochs change, but the wish of artists to capture people's rapture in reading remains unchanged. Paintings of people reading are an excellent illustration to an account of an important article from Bookmate, the book service of Yandex Plus. The neurophysiologist who serves as the article's expert

Books · Moscow · Observations · People

I saw "Living T." at the Theatre of Nations, with Dmitry Lysenkov playing Protasov, more or less

I saw "Living T." at the Theatre of Nations, with Dmitry Lysenkov playing Protasov, more or less. It is ostensibly a staging of Leo Tolstoy's play "The Living Corpse", but the T. is meant to stand for "Living Tolstoy". Accordingly, the protagonist

Monarchies · Society · Paris

The Women's March on Versailles in 1789 over bread shortages and high prices

The Women of Paris Go to Call on the King at Versailles, 5 October 1789. It was the March of the Women on Versailles, or the march of the women for bread, 234 years ago, that became one of the key turning points of the French Revolution. The women of

Art

The Education of Achilles, Bénigne Gagneraux, 1785

The centaur Chiron fed Achilles on the entrails of wild boars, bears and lions

NB! · Moscow · Observations

Moscow: A City of Contrasts

Aristocracy · Archive · Monarchies · Observations

Diana's brother Charles Spencer shares a photograph from the family archive showing Queen Mary of Teck surrounded by the Spencers during her visit to their ancestral seat, Althorp House

Diana's brother Charles Spencer has shared a photograph from the family archive showing Queen Mary of Teck surrounded by the Spencers during her visit to their ancestral seat, Althorp House. The picture shows the grandfather and grandmother of Charles and Diana, their aunt, and their father with a

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