Late Night Post #10

Image from an artwork by Matteo Cattonar

How bright the flame is, twisting round my finger, shivering and trembling. How can I stop the fever for if I will descend the stairs to see the rivers of silver I will be blinded from the entrance.

The question is how to change one's life in order to incorporate one's ideals and give a sense of permanent happiness, let me rephrase, and actually give permanent happiness. Baudelaire comes to my mind with one of his poems, we should "Get drunk and stay that way. / On what? / On wine, poetry, virtue, whatever. / But get drunk". Compromises are like weights for the soul, the more of them you make the fatter you feel, I know because I've made some myself. The world as it is doesn't come with a helping hand, most of the times it just kicks you back into place, but that's alright 'cause in the end only the strong survive. I am your helping hand fellow travelers through this world of the absurd.

Filler: Rainbow - "Catch the Rainbow" live in 1977

From the Past: Queen Marie of Romania

Queen consort Marie of Romania was a fundamental figure in the history of Romania remaining close to her people in the times of great struggle and despair of World War One and also making a reality the centuries long dream of the Greater Romania. 

Daughter of Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia, she was born on 29 October 1875 as a member of the British royal family and titled Princess Marie of Edinburgh. In order to secure the succession to the throne of Crown Prince Ferdinand, King Carol I of Romania accepted the proposal of Grand Duchess Maria (her mother) to arrange a meeting between the two. They eventually got married in Sigmaringen Castle on 10 January 1893 in three ceremonies, one civil, one Catholic and one Anglican with Karl von Wendel, the German Emperor, being the first of the witnesses to sign the marriage act. On 11 October 1914 she and Ferdinand were proclaimed king and queen, their coronation had to wait till 15 October 1922 due to the war.

From the Past: Five Races of Mankind

Published in 1911 by a German magazine, this poster is a sad, yet artistically interesting, example of European exceptionalism and racism. Originating in the Age of Discovery, this Eurocentric mentality flourished in the Age of Reason and imposed itself on the world with the start of the Industrial Revolution. The Chinese Empire and the Muslim world have witnessed both their own periods of growth, development, stagnation and regress. The illustration was made by G. Ellka.

Nelina Trubach-Moshnikova and Erja Lyytinen

		The relation between the song and the paintings is not like the one between two shades of red, which would have made the duo more united and also dull. It's more like red and violet, the fiery and intense emotions of the music are like a hand offered to the viewer in order to help him enter a fine realm of imagination.

Nelina Trubach-Moshnikova

Nelina was born in Belarus in a family that originated from Poland. She took up art college in Minsk after which she moved to Yalta in the Crimea peninsula. Nelina's art is a voyage in color beyond the obvious reality. Her subject-matter, while not surreal, hides a certain element of mystery that is intriguing and alluring.

Filler - Ratt "Round and Round"

Ratt released this song in 1984 and rapidly became one of their most powerful hits. The music video is very interesting for a song that, in my opinion, doesn't ask for much when it comes to imagery. You basically have a rich family hosting a rock band in the attic of their house, the band starts playing and so annoys the rich and arrogant owners right when they were starting dinner. The one girl that's drawn by the music (also a member at the dinner table) eventually goes to the attic and along with the butler are the two that go through some sort of metamorphosis.

This is after all a filler, so feel free to browse the site.

From the Past: Tzar Nicholas II at two factories

On 20 April 1915, Tzar Nicholas II visited as factory in Bryansk which was making explosives. What began as a sawmill grew with time into a factory specialized in metals and minerals, then railways and now locomotives. At present it is called BMZ.

This image could prove more interesting. I don't know when it was taken but it shows Tzar Nicholas II in a visit at Putilov Works in Petrograd, back then it was one of the largest factories in the world. During the war it was awarded a state order for artillery of around 113 million ruble (60 million dollars at the 1914 exchange rate), The factory could not keep with the huge demands and its owner supposedly benefited from part of the money. This meant that in 1917 the factory was bankrupt, on 18 February 20 000 workers went on strike, the following day the total number of strikers went up to 90 000 with over 850 factories closed. Such events were not isolated they escalated in intensity and spread like a wildfire, ultimately marking the start of the February Revolution that preceded the October Revolution.

Filler: black and white

artist: Piotr Pardiak
title: Point of View
country: Poland

Nightly Poem #5

Between lips, in times of rain somebody was saying, sometime, maybe, that our hearts stopped beating that our minds are welded to long beams of steel. The long girders, columns of silence.

Printre buze, printre ploi, cineva spunea, cândva, poate, că Inimile noastre au încetat să bată, că mințile noastre sunt sudate de grinzi lungi de oțel. Grinzile lungi, ale mincinoaselor coloane.

Late Night Post #9

Self portrait by Ella Ruth

- One Man Tango by Axel Manrico Heilhecker from the album "Fishmoon"

In the backyard of your house, a small stream is flowing, a stream that acts as the blood of society. You will rarely be conscious of it but it's water is priceless.

Our world is composed of segregated groups who no longer talk to each other or tolerate each other. We managed to arrive here in around ten years of important technological developments in the field of, ironically, communication. Our mentalities are unleashed, petty instincts dictate our actions, obsessions dictate our motives. What is to be done? Learn to refrain, to see yourself as a vehicle of change, if you can't build, at least don't destroy.

There are links connecting all of us, it would be foolish to poison these streams that nourish our lives, this however is exactly what we do, usually out of ignorance or unmanaged feelings.

From the Past: Battle scenes and Aspras from Angkor Wat

Photo by

Jason Eppink

More about the Angkor Wat bas-reliefs can be read here.

Photo by Sunny Merindo, Apsara depicted on the Angkor Wat.

In Hindu and Buddhist mythology an Apsara is a female spirit of the clouds and water. Sometimes they are compared to Ancient Greek muses because these too are associated with the arts. Beautiful and elegant they are also thought of being sent to ascetics in order to seduce them.

Nightly Poem #4 - Beyond

If you go beyond the park,
through a dusty side-street
next to a wooden bench
with boards now broken,
you'll find a house, a palace,
beautiful, some say
as a Gothic church,
the former temple of a world
that was like a garden.
Just between its walls,
witnesses of change,
on dusty, rusty shelves,
books, waiting to be read,
maybe someone from the past
for only he can understand
their thoughts, forgotten.

Our world: Zinaida Serebriakova and Vladimir Kuzmin

This Duo is again dedicated to the wonderful art that emerged from the Russian space, let it bring us together, breaking the barriers some want to create.

Vladimir Kuzmin (Russian: Влади́мир Борисович Кузьмин) is a Russian rock artist born on May 31, 1955. After gaining a degree in a musical college he became lead guitarist in various VIA bands. In 1981 he became a member of Carnival releasing one album. From 1982 till the present he plays with Dynamic. Apparently in 2011 he was awarded by President Medvedev. The song's title is Семь морей and means Seven Seas.

Zinaida Yevgenyevna Serebriakova (Russian: Зинаи́да Евге́ньевна Серебряко́ва) was a Russian painter born on 12 December 1884. She grew up in Kharkov (which is now situated in Ukraine) into a refined family, descendants of the Benois family. Her grandfather (Nicholas Benois) was the chairman of the Society of Architects and a member of the Russian Academy of Science, her uncle (Alexandre Benois), a famous painter himself and founder of the Mir iskusstva art group and her father, Yevgeny Nikolayevich Lanceray, was a well known sculptor. These are just a few highlights.

After graduating the gymnasium she went to an art school founded by Princess M. K. Tenisheva. In 1901 she studied under Repin, followed by Osip Braz from 1903 to 1905. Like all aspiring artists she went for a year to Italy in 1902. After completing her education in Russia she continued to study in Paris. Life was pleasant and fruitful up till the Bolshevik revolution. In 1919 her husband died of typhus contracted in jail and so was faced without any income, with four children and her sick mother. Things however began to improve after long moments of hunger and poverty. Even in the most difficult of periods she was lucky, her grandfather's apartment in Petrograd (in which she moved in December 1920) was shared with artists from the Moscow Art Theater. This sharing of private apartments was forced upon their owners who never had a say on who will be assigned to them.

In 1924 she went to Paris after receiving a commission. It is not entirely clear if she wanted or not to return to the Soviet Union, what is known is that out of her four children she managed to bring to Paris only two in 1926 and 1928. She went on to explore Africa arriving in Morocco for a limited period. In 1947 she became a French citizen. Only after Khrushchev came to power she was allowed to come back to the Union.

Her work was exhibited in the Soviet Union in 1966 in cities like Moscow, Leningrad and Kiev. She enjoyed a complete success with millions of albums sold. Zinaida died a year later in Paris and is buried at the Russian cemetery.

Gallery

1909 - Self portrait