Faith · Art · Observations · Rome

Sculpture of a globe with hidden mechanisms, installed in the Vatican in the 1990s

Could the Vatican not have done without this gleaming sphere by Arnaldo Pomodoro? The so-called sculpture was installed back in the 1990s, under John Paul II, which does nothing to mitigate its ugliness. It looks more like some trinket from a metallurgical industry exhibition than a work of art

The fallen winged youth Icarus lies on a rock, two female figures with a lyre bend over him, and a third stands by the water.

Art · London · Humour

“The Lament for Icarus”, a painting by Herbert James Draper from 1898

A Lovely Tan, but at What Price! The Lament for Icarus, a painting by Herbert James Draper, painted in 1898

Architecture · Art · Moscow · Observations · Heritage

The metro station Dobryninskaya (formerly Serpukhovskaya) is adorned with 16 refined bas-reliefs by Elena Janson-Manizer, wife of the author of the bronze sculptures at Ploshchad Revolyutsii station

The marble reliefs depict, for the most part, agricultural workers. This is presumably meant to allude to the chief farming trade of each Soviet republic. Why 16 republics? The Union republics, the RSFSR included, numbered 15 from 1956 onwards; in 1950, when the station opened, there was still the Karelo-

Archive · Art · Moscow · People

Boris Shalyapin, who moved to France, on a walk through Moscow in 1960

Boris Chaliapin in Moscow in 1960. A stroll past the Ryabushinsky mansion, the Church of the Great Ascension at the Nikitsky Gates and along Spiridonovka. The elder son of Feodor Chaliapin, who had moved to France in 1925, visited Moscow several times during the years of the Thaw. An exhibition

Art · Monarchies · People

Napoleon's sabre of 1802 by Boutet, given to Marshal Grouchy before Waterloo

Napoleon's Sabre Sold for $5.2 Million. The sabre was made in 1802 to Napoleon's order, after he had been proclaimed Consul for Life. The work was carried out by the master armourer Nicolas-Noël Boutet, who directed the state arms workshop at Versailles. The blade

Archaeology · Archive · The East · Art · Moscow · Museums · Observations

Exhibition on the Khorezm Expedition combines archive documents and contemporary art

The Museum of the East has lent unique materials from the excavations of the Khorezm Archaeological and Ethnographic Expedition for the exhibition "Neither Together Nor Apart" at GES-2, on the link between archaeology and modernism and on how art can make. The Khorezm Expedition worked from 1937

Faith · Art · Society · Humour

The Nuremberg Peace Banquet, at Which Representatives of the States and Churches Celebrated the Successful Negotiations That Ended the Thirty Years' War in 1649

Protestants are depicted in black attire, Catholics in colours. The feast was also graced by a charming dog.

Art · Books · People

In 1887 Repin painted two portraits of Tolstoy and “The Ploughman” at Yasnaya Polyana

The Ploughman. Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy at the Plough Ilya Repin, 1887. In the course of a week at Yasnaya Polyana in August 1887, Repin painted two large portraits of Tolstoy, made a great many drawings and produced a small picture, "The Ploughman". Repin watched Lev Tolstoy devote entire

Art · Moscow · People · Society Pages

Boris Kocheishvili exhibition with a visit to his studio in Chisty Lane

Today the Andrei Cheglakov Foundation on Prechistenka opens a solo exhibition by Boris Kocheishvili, “Cloud, Lake, Tower”, marking the artist's 85th birthday. Boris Kocheishvili is one of the most important artists of the 1970s generation, a nonconformist and a solitary figure who shuns artistic expediency in his work.

Fresco of a tree with Christ crucified on its trunk, with figures on clouds among the branches against a gold ground and a window in the vault above.

NB! · Architecture · Faith · Art

Tree of Life by Giuseppe Arcimboldo and Giuseppe Meda in Monza Cathedral, 1556

Fresco of the Tree of Life with Christ crucified on its trunk. Painted in 1556 by Giuseppe Arcimboldo, the very same who made portraits out of vegetables, and Giuseppe Meda in the transept of Monza Cathedral, north-east of Milan

NB! · Art

“Tea Service” by Claude Monet, 1872

NB! · Art · Science