Architecture · Geography · Moscow
Until 1637-40, when Tsar Mikhail Fyodorovich had an earthen rampart raised around Moscow, the ring of suburbs encircling the Kremlin, the Bely Gorod and the Kitay-Gorod was known as Skorodom, or Skorodum. Why? In 1588-1592 the villages around Moscow were hastily enclosed with wooden walls, since an
NB! · Moscow · Observations · Society · Paris · Humour
Paris paving on the rue du Temple sends envious greetings to Moscow's street improvements. Whenever I feel like complaining about some oversight of Sobyanin's, I remember that somewhere in the heart of Europe there is Anne Hidalgo, and, you know, all my discontent vanishes as if
Archive · Moscow · Museums · People · Society Pages
Today, at 25/9 Tverskaya Street in Moscow, the Museum-Apartment of the People's Artist of the USSR Maya Mikhailovna Plisetskaya opened its doors. The apartment in which Plisetskaya lived was donated to the Bakhrushin Theatre Museum by the ballerina's widower, the composer Rodion Shchedrin. Together
NB! · Art · Moscow · Museums · Pop Culture
The beloved Alla Borisovna and Yevgeny Boldin, her husband from 1985 to 1993, in a photograph by Sergei Borisov. The photograph is shown at Borisov's exhibition at the Multimedia Art Museum
NB! · Architecture · Moscow · Humour
Architecture · Moscow
The decorative frieze of the architect Faleyev's house in Gagarinsky Lane. What, one might ask, has a triangle to do with it? Despite the legend that the symbols point to Freemasonry, this is the official emblem of civil engineers in Russia. A similar sign could be found on
Art · Moscow · Museums · Observations · Humour
The statues:
NB! · Architecture · Moscow · Humour
Coming Up · Moscow · Observations · Education
Friends, next Tuesday, 19 July, I am speaking in Moscow. I shall be giving a lecture at the “Pryamaya Rech” lecture hall, on the difference between history and memory, how the two complement each other, and who really shapes our notions of the past. Do come, there are still tickets
Architecture · Moscow · Observations · New York
"What a dreadful building!" I have heard it said more than once of the 2003 business centre on Oruzheyny Lane in Moscow's Tverskoy District (photos 1 and 2). As it happens, I rather like this building by the architect Posokhin. Its style is usually called neo-
Architecture · Moscow · Museums · Heritage
In 2001 a man died when the rear bas-relief fell from the pedestal of the Minin and Pozharsky Monument: a visitor to the capital tried to climb the monument by way of the bas-relief, whereupon the copper structure began to come apart. The man fell, and a substantial
NB! · Archive · Art · Moscow · Museums · Saint Petersburg
This hanging in the Large Dining Room of the collector Sergei Shchukin's house was called the Gauguin iconostasis by the art critic Yakov Tugendhold. At the exhibition in the Hermitage, the iconostasis could be reproduced almost in its entirety