Observations · Pop Culture · Ethnography

Folk motifs, embroidery and kokoshniks in Ulyana's Haute Couture collections

Today the most significant Russian fashion house, Ulyana Sergeenko, celebrates its 12th birthday with the release of its 21st couture collection. I confess my love for Ulyana! No one knows how to present folk elements so artfully that evening gowns look not like historical costumes from a ball of 1903,

Books · Observations

Don Quixote of La Mancha and his epithet the Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance

Gentlemen, tell me: have you ever considered that those decorated in war are far fewer than those who perished? Don Quixote of La Mancha, Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance

NB! · Observations · Humour

Perhaps Odysseus is not the best name for a boat after all?

Perhaps Odysseus is not the best name for a boat after all? At least if you are not setting out on a dreadful wandering that will last twenty years and bring you and your loved ones a sea of suffering

Faith · London · Monarchies · Heritage

Pope Francis gives Charles III splinters of the True Cross for the 6 May coronation

Pope Francis has made the grandest of gifts to the British Crown in honour of the forthcoming coronation of Charles III. Francis I has presented the monarch with two fragments of wood from the True Cross of the Lord. The fragments, or rather tiny splinters, 5 and 10 mm in

Art

“Sleeping Venus” by Giorgione, 1508, and Its Influence on European Painters

The first large-scale depiction of a female nude in Italian painting was the "Sleeping Venus", also known as the Dresden Venus, by the outstanding High Renaissance master Giorgione of Venice, 1508. The "Sleeping Venus" is considered the first painting in which the main subject is

NB! · Art · Cinema · People

Poster for Andrei Konchalovsky's film "Sin", about the life of Michelangelo

Aristocracy · Books · Mores · Humour

Tolstoy Cousins Alexey Konstantinovich and Leo Married Women of the Same Name

Alexei Konstantinovich Tolstoy's wife was called Sofya Andreyevna Tolstaya, just like the wife of Leo Tolstoy. Alexei Konstantinovich and Leo Nikolayevich were second cousins to one another

A marble sculpture of three human heads on a white plinth. On the left, a dark painting in a gilded frame hangs on the gallery wall.

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Anna Golubkina, Prisoners, 1905: marble sculpture on display

Aristocracy · Books · Mores · Society

Pomyalovsky on plebeians and the nobility's view of them in “Meshchanskoye schastye”

What Do the Nobility Think of Commoners Who Have Made Their Way in the World? "These plebeians, who somehow or other force their way up: in all the many I have met, I have found them a remarkably capable and clever lot… Seminarists, petty townsfolk, all this small fry:

Archive · Books · Observations · Humour

Sketch of an animal's head on the draft of the poem “Andrey Chenier” of 1825

How about this self-portrait of Pushkin as a horse? Drawing on the draft of the poem “Andrei Chénier”, 1825

Moscow · Observations · Society

Anatoly Shulyev, 33, appointed chief director of the Vakhtangov Theatre

It has become known that Anatoly Shuliev, a graduate of the Shchukin School, has been appointed chief director of the Vakhtangov Theatre. Why is this news of interest? First, the Vakhtangov is the richest and, to all intents and purposes, the foremost theatre in Russia. Second, for a long time

Painted portrait of a young woman with dark hair and long pale pendants beside her face. Ochre, green and blue brushstrokes; the work hangs in a gilded frame on a dark grey wall.

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