Tag: History
-
Art in context
Art in context Last week we looked at hanji paper works made by Chun Kwang Young. Here we look at some more of them, but this time within the spatial context of the venue in which they are exposed. At the Venice Biennale that venue is the Palazzo Contarini Polignac. Chun’s works are still the…
-
A statue of liberty
A statue of liberty In 1674, during a great storm, the nave of the gothic Dom Church in Utrecht collapsed and from the rubble one must have had a view into the choir and apse that were still standing. The nave had fallen to pieces because it had never been properly finished at the time…
-
The lost heroes of Rozenoord
The lost heroes of Rozenoord A monument of empty chairs with nameplates underneath. Names of resistance fighters – mostly – who were executed nearby in the final months of Nazi German occupation of The Netherlands during World War 2.A chair without armrests for the young ones below 30 years of age; for the ones of…
-
‘Hollands Glorie’
‘Hollands Glorie’ ‘The pride of Holland’. In the 17th and 18th century the rich Dutch bourgeoisie built houses like this outside the cities at their newly acquired country estates. These were country houses (‘buitenhuizen’) where the owners would spend the summer months with their families. Between Amsterdam and Utrecht many of these country houses were…
-
Getaway gateway
Getaway gateway A wall in the forest.A tightly closed gate. In my mind’s eye I see a fair maiden,kept in solitary confinement.Waiting for her Prince Charmingto come and carry her off. Photo of the week: Country estate Huis te Manpad, Heemstede, Netherlands 2021
-
Surya
Surya A stream of men, women and childrenmeanders between the Surya temple shrines.A thousand years, day after day, ever different,always the same, as the sun that comes and goes.Aeons … a millennium … today. Photo of the week: Surya (Sun) temple, 9th cent. AD, Katarmal, Uttarakhand, India 2021
-
A wall in Kazimierz
A wall in Kazimierz Broken, mutilated, spread around in disarray,dug up from layers of dust and sand: memory fragments of the departed,fit together as a jigsaw puzzle. Memorial wall to the dead,for the eyes of the living. Photo of the week: 16th cent. Jewish R’emuh Cemetery wall, Kazimierz, Krakow, Poland 2007
-
Anno Mundi 5490
Anno Mundi 5490 The Jewish cemetery at ‘Ouderkerk aan de Amstel’ near Amsterdam is called Beth Haim which means House of Life. This tells us something about the Sephardim philosophy of life – and death. The picture shows a detail of a partly submerged gravestone in which we see a shepherdess with her cattle. A…
-
Watery grave
Watery grave I saw this sculpted marble gravestone at the cemetery of the Portuguese Jewish community in ‘Ouderkerk aan de Amstel’. The Sephardim Jews had started settling in Amsterdam in the 16th century and their cemetery in nearby Ouderkerk dates from 1614. I used to pass and visit it regularly on my walks along the…
-
Death and decay
Death and decay Two headstones, one a bit more pointed than the other, are each covering a corner of two gothic church windows, one a bit more pointed than the other. A harmonious rhythm of corresponding forms that subconsciously may have caught my eye. But I took the picture in the first place because I…
καιρός remembered 