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2 Grand Street Parade veterans stand in front of Needs.. they are looking forward to seeing Queen Annapolisa and the Apple Blossom Princesses in the Kentville Grand Street Parade that will soon be coming down Main Street .
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Following a 2 year absence due to Covi,, the 2022 Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival. (and Parade) will be held as per usual this year.. Unfortunately the Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess competition has had to be postponed until next year due to time constraints.
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Shocking news from ABF,
* There's been a stunning development at ABF. *
Apparently in a new younger generation there are those who harbor resentment towards our nations history, for English colonialism, and even for the Monarchy ? Other minority groups have voiced discontent over the diversity and inclusion issue ? And so it seems that the current ABF Board of Directors has listened to the concerns and complaints of a few small minority groups while apparently ignoring and excluding the overwhelming majority of Valley residents ? And it appears that this current Board of Directors chose to resolve such discontent by simply moving to implement and execute the nuclear option and the final solution ? And therefore after a highly successful lengthy run of 87 consecutive years in a row, the extremely anticipated, very popular, family oriented, inclusive and diverse, multi village Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess Pageant along with the prestigious Royal Coronation crowning ceremonies held in Wolfville have all been terminated forever by this current board of Directors ?
Will a drag Queen replace an apple blossom Queen in Kentville ? www.nsbuzz.ca/life/kentville-all-ages-drag-show-draws-pro...
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-----------------------It's The End of an Era-----------------------------
"We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep."
Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival 2023 - ABF Board of Directors has announced drastic new changes in format and even deeper cut-backs to the annual People's Festival ? Concerns over ceremony, symbolism, the monarchy and colonialism, along with some complaints over inclusion and diversity may have had an influence on the current ABF board of Directors and they have seen a need to update the long running Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess pageant in order to bring it up to a standard they view as being more relevant to the current times ? And so the Directors must have held an extremely private 'think tank' last Winter, and without notifying, caring, considering or consulting with any of the long time participating Valley communities, they had decided that rather than trouble themselves any further with this pesky issue, why not just take the easy way out and simply get rid of it ? And so it seems they made a final decision in private last Winter and moved to execute the final and fatal solution to their problem by ordering that the iconic 87 year old Pageant competition be immediately shut down and terminated forever ? And therefore, as a result of an uninclusive and uncontested decision made in private, one of the longest running, popular, identifiable, well known, highly anticipated, most inclusive and diverse, proud all family events that has ever benefited Valley residents of every age, has just been taken away ?
This unconditional act of finality will now end the long running 88 year reign of her royal Heinous Queen Annapolisa and will terminate all participation of the 7 to 10 Apple Blossom Princess contestants and their child attendants that represent 7 to 10 local Valley communities ? It will also mean the end of the many beautiful hand crafted award winning Princess floats that always highlight Grand Street Parade, and it will also signal the end of the ultra glamorous Queen and Ladies-in-waiting Crowning ceremonies held annually and televised each year from Acadia University in Wolfville ? This also puts an end to the many popular community Princess Tea events, and also ends all Royal Party visitations to local Schools, hospitals and old folks homes that are so welcome and appreciated by Students, Seniors and shut-ins ? This also signals the end of Royal Party appearances at Kentville Children's Parade, at the Memorial Park Friday night open air concert and fireworks, and all Royal attendances at many other events held annually throughout the Valley and the Province ?
It appears now that current ABF Officials led by President Logan Morse along with Kentville town rep Lindsey Young have not only interrupted the Pageant in 2022 when they temporarily postponed it, but have now in 2023 moved to terminate this prestigious event forever explaining that their radical decision has been made to improve, include, modernize and evolve the famed beauty pageant ? This final act of termination ends almost 90 years of royal pageantry and also leaves a huge gap in the Festival itself ? It will also negatively affect so many of the nearby Valley communities who always participate and enter contestants in the Pageant ? The ending of such an important multiple community event and the taking away of the better half and Star of the Apple Blossom Festival brings forth the question of what replacement is planned, and what are local towns and villages that always play major roles in both the Queen and Princess competition suppose to do now ? And what about Valley youth and the childhood dreams of one day becoming a child attendant or an Apple Blossom Princess or even a Queen ?
You have to marvel at the level of ego and disrespect shown by this latest Board of Directors who have dared appoint themselves as the ones that will end the Pageant and then to think that Valley residents are stupid enough to believe that by cancelling and taking away a cherished and long running event, that they have in some perverted way of thinking moved the Valley forward or improved and modernized anything ? It seems far more likely that they have taken the Valley on a giant step backwards and they have robbed the people of a much beloved, long running, multi community, all inclusive, local production that has always been a highly anticipated all Valley highlight for the past almost 90 consecutive years ?
Why current ABF Management who have applied themselves to be the stewards who are in charge and responsible for the promotion and presentation of this event, appear as unable to perform their duties and do the job they are compensated to do and do what their predecessors have always done so well before them each and every year for the past 87 years often in far more trying circumstances and in far less prosperous times, is hard to understand ? And you have to wonder, Whatever happened to the # 1 rule in business that says that if you can't do the job because of inexperience, immaturity, inability, incompetency, bias, or just plain stupidity, then,, You're all FIRED ! (and a Class action recovery suit may be forthcoming ?)
Logan Morse and a bold revolutionary ABF Board of Directors break the hearts of families and especially the Children all over the Valley when they terminate the historic Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess Pageant forever after an 88 year run ? Directors show no remorse, only saying that bold action was needed to improve, evolve and modernize the pageant ? www.pressreader.com/canada/annapolis-valley-register/2023...
May 26, 2023 - We Are the Ones ! An unusual display of disrespect shown when the beloved Valley proud Peoples Pageant is cancelled without consideration or consultation ? A new modern generation of ABF Directors with new ideas have proclaimed themselves to be the generation that is to interrupt and end 88 years of wonderful multi Valley village Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess pageant history ?
www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/apple-blossom-festival...
Without warning, the Valleys' beloved Peoples Pageant has suddenly been cancelled without giving notice, consideration, consultation, respect, or compassion ? Directors say they are taking the bold action that is necessary to improve, evolve and modernize the Valley's favorite and most well known yearly event ? www.saltwire.com/atlantic-
Valley residents lose a long time major public entertainment event after the popular Apple Blossom Festival Airshow is terminated ? The traditional ABF Greenwood Airshow will be no more. Fast forward to Aug 24, 2024, and corporate greed ? Air Show Atlantic Inc. now charges big bucks to see taxpayer owned aircraft in an inferior airshow ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/52345513615
Kentville,, an identity crisis , help, Can a Superhero emerge to save Kentville ? www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/51811175986/in/album-7...
The controversial 2017 Grand Street Parade - Has Kentville once again become a target for exploitation ? After Warden Brothers, (Greenwood ) and Liberal MP L Glavine (Kingston) had all but hijacked Waterville Airport and then relocated it to their own home riding in the Kingston/Greenwood area, it seems that the town of Kentville must face yet another attack from the Kingston area when Alxys Chamberlain, the Kingston Apple Blossom Princess, and ABF Directors attempt to take yet another major source of revenue and major attraction away from the town of Kentville ?
Et tu, Madama Chamberlain ? The unconscionable attempted hijacking and recovery of Kentvilles's most beloved yearly event ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/18506181065
2023 Kentville Grand Street Parade - Disregard for safety shown as unrestrained Senior citizens are precariously perched atop an unshaded, no sided, stop and go, large unstable jerking motion moving platform ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/53900780519/in/album-7...
Exploiting a Queen in a photo op ? Politicians at the official opening of the 2023 Apple Blossom Festival pretend there's still a Pageant while knowing full well that Queen Annapolisa has been terminated forever and will no longer be a part of the Festival ? www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/53755100811/in/album-7...
2023 Kentville Grand Street Parade ABF stewards defy the Trudeau call for inclusion and diversity ? Many participating Valley towns that always normally attend are now excluded from the parade ? The subsequent denial of so much valued diversity has also been felt ? Where is Canning, Digby, Annapolis Royal, Hantsport Greenwood, Windsor ? Where's Queen Annapolisa ? Where's the Apple Blossom Princesses and all of the individual Town floats including Princess Kentville ? To view the complete 2023 Kentville Grand Street Parade press here, www.dailymotion.com/video/x8lchie www.dailymotion.com/video/x8lchie
It's the sad ending of an Era ? Organizers create a non diverse and non inclusive 89th Kentville Grand Street Parade May 27th 2023 - www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/52934419451
Facebook, Friends of Kentville - The site Administrator, a new arrival from PEI, says she wants to see Kentville as the queerest town in all of Nova Scotia ? www.facebook.com/groups/2588266877982288
Will a drag Queen replace an apple blossom Queen in Kentville ? www.nsbuzz.ca/life/kentville-all-ages-drag-show-draws-pro...
Nov 16 2023 - Apple Blossom Princesses call for a return of Queen Annapolisa,
www.saltwire.com/atlantic-canada/communities/former-apple...
The Town of Kentville has moved to cut back and terminate more of the Towns long time public entertainment ? The citizens of Kentville are once again punished by cost saving cut backs and cancellations made to numerous days of long time outdoor public entertainment events that are always held at Memorial Park as a major part of the Apple Blossom Festival celebrations ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/52094784785
A medley of guest Tribute bands that have performed at Memorial Park Kentville - Always free of charge in the past at the Apple Blossom Festival : Petty Larceny, Fleetwod Mix, Keep the Faith, Stones Tribute, Green River Revival, Viscious, Eddy's Basement, Matt Minglewood,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x5hqti9
Mean corporate greed shown by ABF directors in this years Apple Blossom Festival ? Instead of providing a free guest Tribute band at the free Memorial Park Friday night concert, it's now going to cost you 50.00 pp to see the 'Queen' Tribute band performance. that's 50.00 per ticket in 2025 ? acadiau.universitytickets.com/
Town of Kentville rips off its own citizens ( and right at Apple Blossom Festival time) ? A cool, unfriendly attitude and new extreme form of cheapness is shown by the Town and the current ABF directors ? Citizens are to be burdened with a charge of TWENTY DOLLARS each just to attend an outdoor dance held on the taxpayer owned public streets of downtown Kentville during the Apple Blossom Festival ? Is there no shame ? www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54546051832/in/photost...
She's Ruined It ! Our great Festival is no longer even recognizable ? How could anyone take a world class event and turn it into something that can only be described as stupid ? President Erica Gillis has to be the worst ever ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54493011308/in/dateposted
A brief 45-minute and very limited Kentville Grand Street Parade this year ? zero large marching street bands and majorettes invited , no Scottish pipers, zero Royalty and royal floats, many regular Valley village participants were missing, zero horse and wagon , zero from the military, etc etc, ? And yet the Guest parade announcer proclaims in,, quote @ 29:17, " this parade is the largest in Canada, incl Toronto - it's the longest with the largest route and has the most entries. " wha-a-a-t wth, ?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQuaIdrQi00
2025 Kentville Grand Street Parade - A New Royal Rider rolls down Main Street at Apple Blossom Time ? The new Mayor of KVille graces the royal throne on the Kentville Apple Blossom Princess float ? 'somebody get that king a crown and scepter '
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54557663677/in/dateposted
they've ruined it part 2 ? May 31st, 2025 Grand Street Parade - From 100,000 down to 10,000, Parade attendance shrinks and hits all time low, www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54568017261/in/photost.... Also see, They've ruined the Festival and the Parade too ?
ABF Directors may disapprove and have terminated the beloved Queen Annapolisa pageant and multiple village Apple Blossom Princess competition but Valley residents will always admire, support, respect and remain fond of the British Monarchy. The majority of Valley citizens are delighted to hear that his Majesty King Charles III and Queen Camilla are invited and will be coming for a royal visit to Canada on May 26 and 27, 2025. This year's incomplete and now Royal-less ABF starts on the 28th, www.cbc.ca/news/politics/king-charles-canada-visit-1.7524946
The long proud history of past Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess winners has been removed from sight and erased from the official Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival website ? A special honorary history page devoted to acknowledge all previous Queen Annapolisa winners from 1933 thru 2019 has been taken down and apparently replaced with jumbo size portraits of the newcomer President and ABF directors that have taken over and ruined the world famous Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival ? www.appleblossom.com/history/past-queens
Meet the directors,
May 30th, 2025 - High level security enforced at this years Memorial Park Friday night rock concert ? must have taken up most of the budget ? Town of Kentville brings in outside police, closes roads, and sets up manned traffic guard posts to provide extra tight security for their Friday night Memorial Park Apple Blossom outdoor concert that in the past had always featured guest rock bands, interesting displays, and a Royal visit following a prestigious coronation ceremony in Wolfville, but is now severely cut back and has deteriorated into some kind of an outdoor romper room type family show featuring food trucks, fireworks and minimal live local entertainment ? Reports that a parking violator was apprehended thanks to the high level of security and strict traffic control set up around the event route perimeter ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54558198569
May 30th, 2025 Memorial Park Kentville - Seniors and those with disabilities are made to walk long distances in order to reach this year's vastly downsized Princess and Royalty-less ABF Friday night rock Concert that didn't bring in a rock band, nor much of anything else ? www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54558198569/in/photost...
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An Identity Crisis ;
Can an identity crisis be looming in the town of Kentville ?
A proud, neighborly salt of the earth working class community with generous hard working friendly citizens and a rich historic Railroad, agriculture and farming background is losing many of its longtime local traditions, themes and trademarks while elected Town officials, many of them new arrivals, just stand still, watch, and even enable ? Having always been identified as a main Provincial railroad center ever since the old Dominion Rail days dating back to 1869, the town has since lost all of its passenger and freight train rail service in and out including a modern passenger Dayliner service that traveled back and forth to Halifax every day ? And after the railway had been shut down it seemed they couldn't clear out the now useless brand new station, dig up the tracks and demolish the old roundhouse fast enough ? And so now, in what seems to be cruel mockery, the only railroading in Kentville left over from past glory days and from what was once the largest and most important and active railroad center west of Halifax, is just an old and faded hand painted train mural etched onto the weather beaten side of one of the downtown business establishments ?
Unfortunately the loss of the railway wasn't the last humiliating major transportation loss forced on the people of a small rural town as Kentville was soon to become even more isolated from the outside World when for no apparent logical, rational or reasonable reason the aviation community at Waterville municipal Airport CCW3 were told to get out when they had done nothing wrong and had no where else to go ? This long time invaluable contributor to the local area economy was lost when an established municipal airport, a well known Canadian sky diving facility, and an internationally known pilot training and licensing academy, and many privately owned aircraft with local owners, and many other established aviation businesses were told to get out ? The cold hearted eviction also left our young Air Cadets over at Camp Aldershot without a base to train on and so now the next generation has to grow up without their nearby aviation training and education facility ?
And so, a group of out-of-towners that mostly don't even live in this community had transformed an active thriving local Aviation business center that had taken decades to build and establish, into a barren and useless place where unsupervised Michelin children now ride bikes and dodge weeds poking their heads thru a deteriorating asphalt runway that was once a platform for private and commercial aircraft to fly in and out of the local area on a daily basis ? To add salt to the wound, this unwarranted calculated forced closure and loss of a vital member of the local economy was to be hailed by the executioners at Kings Council, ( and also by the prestigious Ivany Report Committee ) as being a bold and brilliant business decision that will greatly improve and benefit the local area ?
After months of homelessness and uncertainty over the future, a few evicted tenants found new sites elsewhere and relocated at their own expense to start all over again, while others just quit, while others were finally redirected to a new location in Greenwood which just happened by chance to be the Kings Council County Warden's home riding ? And so, in the end this devastating loss for Kentville and local area became a windfall for the Kingston Greenwood area, and, Kentville was left to carry on without either a Railway or an Airport ?
When the original KCA town School closed down, existing high school students were separated from their home school and had to be bused to the nearby town of Canning ? This would leave only the Grade 1 to 8 age groups to now identify Kentville as their home school, an education reality that still exists in Kentville ? There is no longer a movie theater in Kentville as the downtown movie theater has been closed forever, and the popular Edge sports bar, eatery and pool hall also closed down and never replaced ? Harvey's Hamburgers drive thru closed down and it never was replaced ? The longtime bowling alley in New Minas was bought out by developers, torn down, and replaced with a business office complex ? We lost the local salvage, reclamation and disposal site in South Alton when ordered shut down by the Provincial Government, but these same people who shut it down never ever offered to replace it with another leaving the community without this vital facility ? One day a portion of roof blew off the long time town funeral home and it never re-opened leaving only one such establishment left in town ? And, just as the citizens of Kentville were learning that both the Apple Blossom Princess and the Queen Annapolisa pageants were to be cancelled after 87 consecutive years, at the same time there was an all age Drag Queen show getting ready to entertain at the Kings Arms Pub in a total flip flop from the popular Irish Rovers or Scottish pipers that most Kentville citizens identify with at this time of year ? Numerous local restaurants and small businesses have all come and gone - mostly gone - and the main town supermarket Jasons IGA had a fire and was forced to close down for over a year so there was no supermarket to provide groceries for the local citizens ? The ever popular multi venue Wandlyn Inn burned down with all venues now lost to the community ? It wasn't replaced after the fire and now there's just a fast food MacDonald's take out to replace all of Wandlyn's many facilities including hotel rooms, indoor swimming pool, whirlpool and sauna, nightclub, dual convention centers and dual restaurants ? Not a very good exchange for the community ?
The traditional July 1st Canada Day town sponsored party event of fun, food,speeches and local entertainment held each year at the wading Pool was curtailed by the Town due to budget considerations ? And so now, if you want to enjoy July 1st entertainment or fireworks you have to go to New Minas, Hantsport or Berwick ? Access to clean drinking water is well known as one of the most identifiable entitlements provided by a town ? Billions are currently being spent by the Canadian taxpayer to provide First Nations people with free safe drinking water ? Yet the Kentville water commission charges the customer 10,000 dollars just to turn their town water on at roadside ? And then after this rather large up front financial layout paid for by the brand new customer, he will still have to pay for all of his yard trenching and household plumbing work ? And in return for this large initial forced surcharge, the valued new customer will be rewarded with a water bill courtesy of the town of Kentville each month hereafter ?
They even managed to take away Kentville's most famous of all and most instantly identifiable town landmark in the hotel name Cornwallis Inn ? Cornwallis Inn is a well known trademark hotel name that is synonymous World wide with the name of Kentville, and this name represents a multitude of fond memories for the local area residents and for other residents living all over the Valley ? It was hard to understand why the Town would ever allow this historic name to change,, and also hard to understand why a previous Town of Kentville planning dept would ever allow subsidized apartment units to be built onto the side of such a respected Town centerpiece and also block the access lane to the rear parking lot while doing it ? The Cornwallis Inn will always be an important Valley landmark and a future protected Canadian heritage site ?
They have even changed well known identifiable names of some Streets and even the local traffic bridge traversing the Cornwallis River ? And so now many local residents and delivery drivers don't know what they're talking about when these stupid new names are used ? This name change is especially hard on Kentville's Seniors who can become confused with such absurd name changes and has in some cases, created safety hazards ?
In 2017 ABF Directors tried to move Kentville's 87 year old yearly Grand Street Parade to different location in the Valley, and the town was forced to claw and battle its way just to get its own local yearly parade returned back home to them after hosting it for the last 90 years ? And in yet another major step backwards that same year, ABF and the Town decided to cease and desist all public ABF Wednesday, Thursday and weekends of fun, food, music, displays, amusements, local student performances, etc. etc. held at Memorial Park during the Apple Blossom festival week ? No explanation was given and no replacement or apology was ever offered by the Town for such a devastating loss to be absorbed by the citizens of Kentville ? Kentville has now lost its most identifiable of all citizens, that being their beloved Apple Blossom Princess Kentville, when newcomer ABF Directors had shown an uncommon degree of disrespect, as well as their disregard and insensitivity when presuming to appoint themselves as the ones entitled to end the long running iconic 88 year old iconic Queen Annapolisa and Apple Blossom Princess competition ? This termination means all public Royal party appearances including the Princess Teas, Kentville Children's Parade, all Royal visitations to schools, shut-ins, Seniors, and hospital attendances that are normally made by Queen Annapolisa and the Royal Princesses are now cancelled and no longer take place ?
In 2022 the Kentville Grand Street Parade was quite understandably very limited and downsized following the 2 previous Covi year cancellations, but this year's 2023 effort wasn't much better ? The immense contribution and the wonderful diversity supplied by nearby Valley communities from Windsor to Digby was no longer included in the Parade ? Apple Blossom royalty and all Princess floats were no longer included in the Parade ? And many local residents expressed disappointment when Apple Blossom Princess Kentville and her child attendant were no longer seen or to be included in the Town Parade ? It seemed that Kentville had lost yet another identifiable citizen and wonderful Ambassador that always performed her official duties including advertising, promoting the town and representing Kentville with charm, grace, dignity, talent and beauty wherever she went ?
After the long running 3 consecutive Apple Blossom weekdays of afternoon and evening mid week entertainment at the Park were all cancelled and Apple Blossom Week entertainment was cut down to a bare bone single Friday night affair, ( which btw will no longer include the highlight of the evening Royal Party visitation and rock music by Eddy's Basement ), it seems Officials were still unsatisfied and found yet another way to take away even more ? And this year they want to charge inflation stressed locals a fee to see entertainers like Matt Minglewood and Kevin Davison at private shows when in the past these entertainers appeared on a public stage free of charge ? Cut backs were also apparent in fireworks, (which btw will no longer be started by Queen Annapolisa at her official Royal Party visitation to the Park following Coronation ceremonies in Wolfville) ?
And so, in summing up, the citizens of Kentville are frustrated with cutbacks, the many steps backwards, and the cancellations and closures that never seem to be replaced once gone ? Both the Provincial Railway and municipal Airport are now permanently closed down and even Acadia Van lines inter provincial bus transit no longer stops ? The Wandlyn Inn complex and all of its popular hotel and restaurant services were lost by fire and never replaced ? Extreme cut backs were made to the historic Apple Blossom Festival that saw a week long fun filled period of public entertainment at Memorial Park reduced to one minimal Friday night affair followed the next day by a shortened mundane parade of less than an hour ? Concerns also remain about the absence of an in-Town High School for Teens, the loss of a key funeral home, the loss of the Pool Hall, the absence of a movie theater, the loss of Harveys drive thru burgers, the loss of one of the 2 dt Tim Hortons, the loss of the dt pizza parlor, the loss of Chinese food take out, the loss of the local fruit and vegetable market, the absence of a 7/24 convenience store, the closure of the bakery, and also the loss of the local disposal site when no replacement was ever offered by the Government that shut it down ? There was also the shocking cancellation and heartbreaking termination of her royal heinous the Apple Blossom Princess Kentville and the end of the pretigious Acadia U Coronation ceremonies in Wolfville ? There was also the erasing of, and then the changing of the name of Kentville's biggest most identifiable internationally known Cornwallis Inn name logo that is instantly recognizable world wide and symbolically married for decades to the Town name of Kentville ? There remains the problem of a serious local shortage of rental rooms and local dining spots for tourists created when the Wandlyn hotel complex burned down and when not one of these many hospitality, business, tourist, restaurant, hotel, night club, and recreational venues were ever replaced ?
And now, in a more recent issue, we are seeing more and more small businesses located all over the Valley that have not only provided local employment but also served as popular meet and greet gathering spots for friends and neighbors for years and years now, changing hands after being bought out and turned over to total strangers that are not from Halifax or from N.S. nor even Canada but have come here from another Continent ? A strange new phenomenon of foreign take-overs has arrived in the Valley that includes replacing the management, assuming full control of the business and taking over the labor force of many traditional Valley fast food, gas, and coffee businesses ? Some of these now include : the Petrocan in New Minas, many Valley Tim Hortons, the Subway, KFC, DQ, Burger King, and the Mary Brown's in New Minas to name a few ? And in another concern, because many newcomer employees are unfamiliar with the currency it is advisable to count your change carefully if paying by cash ? There are also some indications that nepotism is now being shown in the hiring of employees once these establishments are taken over by new foreign management, and that our local students can't get Summer jobs any more ? Another major local employer, Eassons Trucking, also seems affected by the current influx of new foreign workers with some reports of untrained, unlicensed, unqualified, (and Government subsidized) drivers behind the wheel, and rumors of some units with multiple drivers on board having a hole drilled in the floor of the sleeper cabin to accommodate a long piece of ABS plumbing pipe used to transfer raw shidzen sewage directly from the interior of the truck down onto the open highway below to avoid pit stops at the Big Stop ?
And, from the looks of a recent Town municipal election, most candidates that ran are relatively new to this area and as such might be unfamiliar with the Town's long time traditions, customs, character, and past history ? Some candidates had even naively described the town as a kind of happy go lucky, blissful, Hallmark or Who-ville movie set place that is teaming with busy villagers and joyful munchkins frolicking up and down picturesque cobblestone streets lined by colorful quaint shops and internationally known boutiques and eateries which does not present an accurate description of the Town ?
And apparently the new Mayor who is also a new local business owner, appears to have befriended ex- Kings County Warden Brothers who doesn't live in Kentville but resides in the Kingston/Greenwood area and who had previously sold out Kentville when leading the charge to shut down and evict the local municipal Airport, the well known skydiving academy, the international flight training academy and many other prosperous Waterville airport aviation businesses ? And then there's the Mayors' recent New Year's message of congratulating himself on enlarging the size of his downtown retail store and expressing his own personal happiness over a new (taxpayer funded) installation of a brand new sidewalk in front of it, but failing to mention town issues like the terrible poverty and youth unemployment, the drug problems, the cost of living crisis, the homeless problem, the devastating cancellation of the historic Princess Kentville competition, the vacationers concerns about no place to stay, and the much needed indoor town recreation facility, (no one wants to get their daily exercise by hiking down crude outdoor trails while attacked by mosquitos or witnessing a homeless user shoot up in the privacy of the forest) ? There was also the recent eradication of the Apple Blossom Festival and decimation of the world famous Grande Street Parade ? And there's also the current Town housing crisis, the high increases in rent, and the alarming rate of downtown business failures, and also the need to honor Kentvilles glorious past railroading history with a museum and outdoor display of some sort ? Adding to this there appears to be a newly elected Town Council that has immediately started to cancel and cut back on important traditional town public events when, ( due to a drop of rain ) they cancelled this year's Military march-on and (best in the area) outdoors Remembrance Day ceremonies traditionally held at the Memorial Cenotaph on Park Street ? There was also this years' poor presentation of a Grande Street Parade and one unsafe situation in the newcomer Parade where normal residents (incl Seniors) were seen perched precariously aboard a stop and go, open air, jerking motion, no sided vehicle without restraining devices, water or protection from the sun ? There was also the ridiculous changing of many of the long time well known town names including the most famous of them all the Cornwallis Inn ? There's also the local residents plea to 'bring our high school students back home again' , and some complaints about the Town failure to provide public outdoor entertainment events exceeding the grade school level ? There was also the controversy over the hanging up of the biggest pride flag money can buy above the main entrance to the honored heritage site Cornwallis Inn, and of course, there was also the recent down town flood crisis ? The mayor did not address the question of why a Provincial Government would force the local reclamation and disposal site to permanently close down its operation and then those who caused this major loss, did not offer to replace it but just left the area without such a facility ? And, there was no mention of the need for an inquiry into the exorbitant five figure fee charged to the customer by Kentville water commission just to turn water on at the road ? And there are also concerns over the recent rash of sudden and unopposed takeovers of small businesses by newly arrived foreigners from Asia when locals here can't find work ? And what about growing concerns over the recent issue of the formation of an exclusive Ontarioville newcomer type town growing within an already established town ? There were also many concerns over the Spring pothole epidemic that had made some of the streets unfit to drive on, at a time when a brand new double lane sidewalk was being installed in front of Phinneys that was smooth as a baby's bum ?? And then there was the refusal by the Town to help citizens with expensive auto repairs caused by their dangerous unattended potholes ? And there was also the inadequate street lighting and residential streets and sidewalks still in need of attention ? There was also the inconvenience felt by local residents when ultra slow motion repairs on Canaan Ave moved at a three legged turtle racing speed causing this vital access route to remain closed to traffic, incl emergency vehicles, for many many Months, (very much unlike the speedy workmanship and high priority given to the new downtown sidewalk installation in the front of Phinneys) ?
And so, can it be time to stop newcomer mentality, and to make it mandatory for all candidates bidding on these important Town governing positions to be born and raised and reside in Kentville in an effort to respect, protect and retain the Town's unique character, history, diversity, identity, and many longtime local traditions ?
OUCH ? ( could someone please remove the daggers from our back ), Et tu, Warden Brothers and u tu Leo ? March 10th 2014 - A Date That Will Live on in Infamy - Warden Brothers, (Greenwood riding) and the Kings County Council use a calculated forced eviction to shut down the Waterville Airport aviation complex and then relocate some components to the Kingston/Greenwood area ?
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/28588465413/in/album-7...
Newcomer ABF directors trying to erase history ? The page showing all past Queens and Apple Blossom Princesses has been removed from the official Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival site ? The popular history page honoring all past Queen Annapolisa winners 1933-2018 with photos and bios has been taken down and apparently replaced with huge portraits of the newcomer directors ?
Meet the newcomer directors,
Kentville IS the Cornwallis Inn and the Cornwallis Inn IS Kentville ! If you were to google the 2 words Cornwallis Inn you will get over 600,000 entries with almost all of them married to the word Kentville.. (what a great promotional tool) . The world famous Cornwallis Inn is the source of many fond memories for local and Valley residents.. "It was the centre of everything’: The past and present of Kentville’s iconic Cornwallis Inn"
www.saltwire.com/nova-scotia/lifestyles/it-was-the-centre...
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On the recent 2023 edition of the Grand Street Parade :
"it looked as if some spectators along the route just joined in and began to walk along and make themselves a part of the parade ? "
May 27th, 2023 - Dismay, disillusion and extreme disappointment prevail in Kentville over shocking changes and many missing regular entrees in this years 2023 Grand Street Parade ? Where is our famous Queen Annapolisa and where are the many Apple Blossom Princesses and their child attendants riding in their beautiful hand crafted decorated floats ? Where's the town criers ? And what about the dazzling majorette groups, the Scottish pipers and large multi instrumental marching bands that always come ? And where are the Hantsport and Windsor floats and their large delegations ? And where are Digby, Aylesford, Annapolis Royal, Canning, Middleton, Wolfville, and more ? Why are so many towns and villages that normally participate in the parade not included this year ? It was also a major disappointment when for the first time ever Kentville's own Apple Blossom Princess, (aka Miss Kentville) was no longer included in the parade as many toen residents young and old identify with their chosen Apple Blossom Princess at this time of year ? However the now royalty-free Princess float was still used to transport a grouping of normal everyday town residents sitting around together in a social scene meant to identity Kentville as being a diverse and inclusive place ? The New Minas float also did not include an Apple Blossom Princess for this year, however her float was transformed into an advertisement for the famous New Minas UFO incident which all New Minions identify with. The Berwick float didn't include a Princess Berwick this year either. but was altered to proudly identify with the town's upcoming Centennial celebrations. And the Kingston float was also missing an Apple Blossom Princess this year but was instead promoting their long running Kingston Steer Barbecue that all Kingstonians readily identify with. It was good to see an RCMP contingent again although they sent far less officers this year than usual ? And it was notable that only 1 other large marching band appeared in the parade when usually 4 or more big bands, many with many pipers usually attend after traveling up from places like Cape Breton, Bridgewater, Dartmouth etc ? And where have all of the pets and animals gone ? There's no horse teams, wooden wagons, riders or livestock this year ? Even the usual greyhound dogs weren't there ? Also noticed that some spectators must have just joined in and began walking along within the parade, and others must have come over from the Children's parade with their strollers to join in ? There was a variety of advertisers, most from out of town but some local ? There were various Political parties represented with the largest delegation coming from the Liberals ? All in all, this Year's parade seemed a bare minimum weak effort that was really missing the usual royal pageantry and 7 to 10 spectacular Princess floats, and the large marching bands and majorette groups that usually enter, and the usual agriculture horticulture and livestock component, and the very popular Scottish pipers bands that always attend, and the many large out of town contingents that always participate ? This was not the famous grand street parade that patrons are accustomed to and did not come near to the high standards and professionalism set by previous Grand Street Parades ? It became clearly obvious that what they were hailing as a newer, bolder, more inclusive and more diverse parade was instead the exact opposite ? This Grand Street Parades has lost the inclusion, diversity and major contribution given by the many Valley communities and their Princess contestants with Child attendants that come to participate in the Queen Annapolisa competition, the Friday evening coronation gala at Acadia University in Wolfville, the Princess Teas and Royal attendances at schools hospitals, senior citizen homes and shut-ins, as well as the Friday night Memorial Park outdoor concert, the Saturday morning Children's Parade and the Royal trip down Main street Kentville in the famous Grand Street parade ?
And so, to quickly sum up, can this strange, incomplete, hastily thrown together, shortened, newcomer mentality version of our world famous Kentville Grand Street Parade that is now missing all of the Queen Annapolisa Royalty and missing all 7 to 10 Apple Blossom Princesses and their 7 to 10 beautifully handcrafted individual Town Princess floats, and also missing the unique character and diversity brought forth by the many absent Valley villages and communities that are no longer included in the parade, and that had also failed to include many out of town large marching bands and pipers that usually attend, and that had also been lacking in the representation of local farming, agriculture and livestock displays, now signal the end of the once glorious Grand Street Parade era ?
Previous parades :
2011 Grand Street Parade Kentville 79th ABF
www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVgh3Dh2xn8&t=208s
2012 Grand Street Parade Kentville www.youtube.com/watch?v=VB1VBx50b18
2014 Kentville Grand Street Parade www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEo14IZKxp8&t=11s
2015 Kentville Grand Street Parade
www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBifeG2SdPY&t=47s
2016 Kentville Grand Street Parade www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2wedvN5_Iw&t=8s
2017 Kentville Grand Street Parade www.youtube.com/watch?v=JozwyGpvfSY&t=1978s
2018 Kentville Grand Street Parade www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOK1GmiLmNk&t=986s
2019 Kentville Grand Street Parade www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMdEx8Zf-q0&t=1492s
The exclusion of so many participants and denial of diversity have marred the 2023 edition of Kentville Grand Street Parade ? Many nearby Valley communities were missing when these longtime participants weren't included in this year's parade ? Where is Canning, Digby, Annapolis Royal, Hantsport Greenwood, Windsor ? Where's our Queen Annapolisa ? Where's the Apple Blossom Princesses and all the individual Town floats including Princess Kentville ? To view a complete (newcomer version) of the world famous Kentville Grand Street Parade press here www.dailymotion.com/video/x8lchie www.dailymotion.com/video/x8lchie
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Public entertainment held at Memorial Park Kentville during the Apple Blossom Festival ;
A medley of some of the bands that have performed at Memorial Park Kentville, Apple Blossom Festival - Petty Larceny, Fleetwod Mix, Keep the Faith, Stones Tribute, Green River Revival, Viscious, Eddy's Basement, Matt Minglewood,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x76pn9b
www.dailymotion.com/video/x5hqti9
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Fleetwood Mix;
in concert 2015,
www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbltesRRCNk&t=390s
Don't Stop www.dailymotion.com/video/x3o6auu
Gold Dust Woman
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3o5xbg
Edge of Seventeen
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3lpjb7
Everywhere
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3lo7rz
I don't wanna know
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2t85mg
Sisters of the Moon
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2gfold
Fleetwood Mix medley - 2015
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2sfjm1
Seven Wonders
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxnas
The Chain
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxnao
Rainbows End
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxnaq
Just like a runaway girl
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxnau
Tusk
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxnfs
Viscious comes to Kentville ;
www.dailymotion.com/video/x8blaup
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Green River Revival at the 2012 A B F ;
studio.youtube.com/video/Q2rO8pG5Mkk/edit
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2rO8pG5Mkk
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Eddy's Basement in Kentville Thursday at the Park,,
Just another brick in the Wall
www.dailymotion.com/video/x7u402l
No Time, Comfortably Numb, Tied to the Whipping Post, Sin City, Twilight Zone, Roller, Smokin,, Money, Just Another Brick in the Wall..
www.dailymotion.com/video/x7u672h
Comfortably Numb,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3lmbgf
Sin City,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3ot59g
Roller,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3lm5z5
Whippin Post
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3o5o5o
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Bluesmobile in Kentville ; ;
Forget About It,,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x4f58y3
25 or 6 to 4,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x4lfjyc
Knock on wood, Proud Mary,, etc = Memorial park Friday night show
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_f8WN0_OHz8&t=37s
Without Love
www.dailymotion.com/video/x4f1rgs
Caledonia_by Uncle D
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv7ua
Superstitious
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv7xy
All about the base
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv7qs
No woman no cry
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv7xw
Mustang Sally
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv7y0
Bluesmobile on stage Gimme some luvin
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv74i
Friday Bluesmobile on stage Memorial Park 1/2 hour
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jv6s0
2016 Bluesmobile on stage Friday Memorial Park Pt 1
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxo5m
2016 Bluesmobile on stage Friday Memorial Park pt 2
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jxnhm
Bluesmobile in Kentville - 25 or 624
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9k6cma
An ABF Guest Tribute band,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x81qbxd
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Keep the Faith,
We got it going on,,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2fs7xm
Its my Life,,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2yxwbw
Keep the Faith in Kentville medley 3 songs
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9jvbli
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Petty Larceny
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2gq64d
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Matt Minglewood at Kentville Memorial Park ABF 2018, -
www.dailymotion.com/video/x6y6tww
2016 84th Apple Blossom Festival ;
The traditional Royal Party visitation to Memorial Park in Kentville following the Coronation Ceremonies at Acadia University in Wolfville,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x8zb7zg
Some bad news - Drastic cutbacks to public entertainment by the Town of Kentville will punish citizens and end the enjoyment of these guest Tribute band performances ? In an ongoing decline in content and quality of Kentville town entertainment, all normal mid-week public displays and entertainment that were always held at Memorial Park during the Apple Blossom Festival week have been curtailed by a new generation of administrators ? These Cost saving frugal decisions will conserve Town money by inflicting public entertainment cut-backs on citizens ?
More bad news, Drastic cutbacks by the Town of Kentville will end a long-time tradition of mid week Apple blossom open public entertainment normally held each year during the Apple Blossom Festival down at Memorial Park ? And so ever since these major entertainment cancellations backs in 2017, instead of an interesting and fun filled evening for the residents of Kentville, there's just a silent empty Park on Wednesdays and Thursdays at Kentville's Memorial Park during the Apple Blossom Festival ? No explanation, replacement, substitution or apology was ever offered ?
A Thursday at the Park,,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x81qbxd
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/52087619256
Thursday at the Park - local students
www.dailymotion.com/video/x8blaur
Thursday at the Park - local music students performing at ABF
www.dailymotion.com/video/x8blaus
Annapolis Valley Apple Blossom Festival Theme
www.dailymotion.com/video/x2gq8bx
Queen Annapolisa at the Park
www.dailymotion.com/partner/x15x1lv/media/video/details/x...
Thursday at the Park 20m Central Kings High drum core, www.dailymotion.com/partner/x15x1lv/media/video/details/x...
www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/52091143986/in/album-7...
Thursday at Memorial Park - Kentville Grade school kids perform,
www.dailymotion.com/video/x9k6c5c
Celebrate www.flickr.com/photos/74039487@N02/54544345629
Kentville is an incorporated town in Nova Scotia. It is the most populous town in the Annapolis Valley. As of 2021, the town's population was 6,630.
The photo is executed in technique «LightGraphic » or «The painting of light», that assumes illumination of model by small light sources in darkness on long endurance.
Thus, all lightcloth (composition) - is one Photo Exposition, is embodied on a matrix of the camera in one click of a shutter.
Sketches from the series "Reflections ..."
Short story (in russian) here:
Belmont Abbey, just outside Hereford, is a working Roman Catholic Benedictine monastery, home to a community of monks. What is less well known is that it was also a cathedral for much of it's life, serving the Catholic Diocese of Herefordshire and South Wales, but was stripped of that status in 1920 and has been simply an Abbey church ever since.
The buildings were begun in 1854 and the church largely finished by 1858 to the designs of Pugin Jnr. It follows a cruciform plan with an impressive central tower giving the effect of a cathedral in miniature.
Inside the furnishings generally date from the late 19th century with an unsurprising but well executed sequence of windows by Hardman Studios, whilst in the north transept is the canopied tomb of the first bishop.
The Abbey today is a very welcoming place in an attractive and very secluded spot, with the church kept open for visitors.
The Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a Baroque palace at the Fürstengasse in the 9th District of Vienna, Alsergrund . Between the palace, where the Liechtenstein Museum was until the end of 2011, and executed as Belvedere summer palace on the Alserbachstraße is a park. Since early 2012, the Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a place for events. Part of the private art collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein is still in the gallery rooms of the palace. In 2010 was started to call the palace, to avoid future confusion, officially the Garden Palace, since 2013 the city has renovated the Palais Liechtenstein (Stadtpalais) in Vienna's old town and then also equipped with a part of the Liechtenstein art collection.
Building
Design for the Liechtenstein Garden Palace, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in 1687/1688
Canaletto: View of Palais Liechtenstein
1687 bought Prince Johann Adam Andreas von Liechtenstein a garden with adjoining meadows of Count Weikhard von Auersperg in the Rossau. In the southern part of the property the prince had built a palace and in the north part he founded a brewery and a manorial, from which developed the suburb Lichtental. For the construction of the palace Johann Adam Andreas organised 1688 a competition, in the inter alia participating, the young Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. Meanwhile, a little functional, " permeable " project was rejected by the prince but, after all, instead he was allowed to built a garden in the Belvedere Alserbachstraße 14, which , however, was canceled in 1872.
The competition was won by Domenico Egidio Rossi, but was replaced in 1692 by Domenico Martinelli. The execution of the stonework had been given the royal Hofsteinmetzmeister (master stonemason) Martin Mitschke. He was delivered by the Masters of Kaisersteinbruch Ambrose Ferrethi , Giovanni Battista Passerini and Martin Trumler large pillars, columns and pedestal made from stone Emperor (Kaiserstein). Begin of the contract was the fourth July 1689 , the total cost was around 50,000 guilders.
For contracts from the years 1693 and 1701 undertook the Salzburg master stonemason John and Joseph Pernegger owner for 4,060 guilders the steps of the great grand staircase from Lienbacher (Adnet = red) to supply marble monolith of 4.65 meters. From the Master Nicolaus Wendlinger from Hallein came the Stiegenbalustraden (stair balustrades) for 1,000 guilders.
A palazzo was built in a mix of city and country in the Roman-style villa. The structure is clear and the construction very blocky with a stressed central risalite, what served the conservative tastes of the Prince very much. According to the procedure of the architectural treatise by Johann Adam Andreas ' father, Karl Eusebius, the palace was designed with three floors and 13 windows axis on the main front and seven windows axis on the lateral front. Together with the stems it forms a courtyard .
Sala terrene of the Palais
1700 the shell was completed. In 1702, the Salzburg master stonemason and Georg Andreas Doppler took over 7,005 guilders for the manufacture of door frame made of white marble of Salzburg, 1708 was the delivery of the fireplaces in marble hall for 1,577 guilders. For the painted decoration was originally the Bolognese Marcantonio Franceschini hired, from him are some of the painted ceilings on the first floor. Since he to slow to the prince, Antonio Belucci was hired from Venice, who envisioned the rest of the floor. The ceiling painting in the Great Hall, the Hercules Hall but got Andrea Pozzo . Pozzo in 1708 confirmed the sum of 7,500 florins which he had received since 1704 for the ceiling fresco in the Marble Hall in installments. As these artists died ( Pozzo) or declined to Italy, the Prince now had no painter left for the ground floor.
After a long search finally Michael Rottmayr was hired for the painting of the ground floor - originally a temporary solution, because the prince was of the opinion that only Italian artist buon gusto d'invenzione had. Since Rottmayr was not involved in the original planning, his paintings not quite fit with the stucco. Rottmayr 1708 confirmed the receipt of 7,500 guilders for his fresco work.
Giovanni Giuliani, who designed the sculptural decoration in the window roofing of the main facade, undertook in 1705 to provide sixteen stone vases of Zogelsdorfer stone. From September 1704 to August 1705 Santino Bussi stuccoed the ground floor of the vault of the hall and received a fee of 1,000 florins and twenty buckets of wine. 1706 Bussi adorned the two staircases, the Marble Hall, the Gallery Hall and the remaining six halls of the main projectile with its stucco work for 2,200 florins and twenty buckets of wine. Giuliani received in 1709 for his Kaminbekrönungen (fireplace crowning) of the great room and the vases 1,128 guilders.
Garden
Liechtenstein Palace from the garden
The new summer palace of Henry of Ferstel from the garden
The garden was created in the mind of a classic baroque garden. The vases and statues were carried out according to the plans of Giuseppe Mazza from the local Giovanni Giuliani. In 1820 the garden has been remodeled according to plans of Joseph Kornhäusel in the Classical sense. In the Fürstengasse was opposite the Palais, the Orangerie, built 1700s.
Use as a museum
Already from 1805 to 1938, the palace was housing the family collection of the house of Liechtenstein, which was also open for public viewing, the collection was then transferred to the Principality of Liechtenstein, which remained neutral during the war and was not bombed. In the 1960s and 1970s, the so-called Building Centre was housed in the palace as a tenant, a permanent exhibition for builders of single-family houses and similar buildings. From 26 April 1979 rented the since 1962 housed in the so-called 20er Haus Museum of the 20th Century , a federal museum, the palace as a new main house, the 20er Haus was continued as a branch . Since the start of operations at the Palais, the collection called itself Museum of Modern Art (since 1991 Museum of Modern Art Ludwig Foundation ), the MUMOK in 2001 moved to the newly built museum district.
From 29 March 2004 till the end of 2011 in the Palace was the Liechtenstein Museum, whose collection includes paintings and sculptures from five centuries. The collection is considered one of the largest and most valuable private art collections in the world, whose main base in Vaduz (Liechtenstein) is . As the palace, so too the collection is owned by the Prince of Liechtenstein Foundation .
On 15 November 2011 it was announced that the regular museum operating in the Garden Palace was stopped due to short of original expectations, visiting numbers remaining lower as calculated, with January 2012. The Liechtenstein City Palace museum will also not offer regular operations. Exhibited works of art would then (in the city palace from 2013) only during the "Long Night of the Museums", for registered groups and during leased events being visitable. The name of the Liechtenstein Museum will no longer be used.
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palais_Liechtenstein_(F%C3%BCrstengasse)
Nikon Coolpix 5600 handheld cha-cha. Best viewed large size.
When I was viewing the Sutton Hoo archaelogical site which has been used as a burial ground since ancient times, a guide raised the cover over a burial pit containing the bodies of condemned people - executed centuries ago and preserved in the earth. Typically of their time the victims were hacked to death by dismemberment.
To view sit 2-3 feet from your monitor. Slightly cross eyes. The left eye looks at the right image. The right eye looks at the left image. Don't strain or go bug-eyed. Relax. A central image giving stereo depth will appear.
Historical and sickeningly disturbing. Part of the Bandits, Badges & Bars exhibit at the Arkansas Old State House Museum. Partial list of executees here.
aside: Chair was unplugged for a period of time in the 1970's and "used for giving haircuts"
Another aside: The oldest chair (on the left) "was manufactured from the wood of the state gallows which it replaced in 1913."
Situated beside the Kirkintilloch to Kilsyth Road, about a mile from the Kirkintilloch boundary, sits this monument to two executed Covenanters, John Wharry and James Smith, who were put to death for their faith.
700 Uighurs executed, 16.000 imprisoned... who stands up for language, culture and religion of the Uighures gets marked as "Terrorist" by the Chinese government. Alone since March 23, at least 760 Uighures were arrested.
Occupied in 1949, East Turkestan is just one of the countries (besides Tibet and Inner Mongolia) that has been overrun by the Chinese Army more than half a century ago and now gets claimed to always have been Chinese...
At least Chinese authorities try everything that it once will be "really" Chinese. In 1949 only five percent of the population of East Turkestan was Chinese.. By official Chinese statistics, Xinjiang (as East Turkestan got named by the Chinese) now has 8.7 million Uighurs and 7.5 million Chinese. In reality the number of Chinese is supposed to be even larger than of the Uighurs.
Furthermore, every year children are being brought to China mainland to get "educated" there, or rather re-educated or "brainwashed", as Rebiya Kadeer says.
If that all wasn't enough girls and women get taken away from their homeland, under false pretenses to provide them with work... which is less than half the truth, because in labor camps they have work, but also don't have a choice to leave, not to mention other rights. This is the way how the Chinese government wants to increase these people's population...
The Treatment Rooms, a mosaic work by Baroness Carrie von Reichardt, Fairlawn Grove, Chiswick. The garden wall is a memorial to Luis Ramirez who was executed by the state of Texas.
While rereading what I originally wrote for this post back in 2014, I couldn't help but feel that I had left so much out. Only part of the story was told, so I feel it only makes sense to rewrite this, and give Barbie's friends the spotlight they deserve. It's also fitting since the original photograph was also redone, to better represent the vision we originally had, but couldn't execute. There are two parts to this tale--how it all began, and what it became when I started collecting dolls as an adult. Early on, I was enamored by the friends of Barbie. Teresa, Kira, Christie, Midge, and those random one off characters always captured my attention. It was these characters of various ethnic representations who stood out to me. As a blonde little girl, I wasn't interested in playing with a doll that looked like myself. No, instead I desired to live vicariously through my plastic companions. So it became a trend very early on in my life that I collected/hunted down Barbie's friends.
The very first friend of Barbie I owned was a Sun Jewel Kira. She wasn't a doll I picked out myself--instead she was chosen by my sister. It was Colleen's birthday, most likely in 1994, when Dad took her out to the store to choose a doll. Of course since I was so young, Dad and Mom wanted to make sure I wouldn't get jealous of Colleen's new dolly, so Dad had her get one for me too. Colleen was drawn to the sparkling Sun Jewel line--for herself she elected Barbie, and for me, she opted to choose Kira. Why Kira? Colleen knew of my deep obsession for princess Jasmine, and Kira's black hair was reminiscent in a very small way of my favorite Disney character (that and her huge earrings). Colleen picked well, because for a while, until I got a real Jasmine doll, Kira was my stand in. While I can no longer remember the specifics of those early days, Colleen recalls the times she caught me red handed with some of her Jasmine doll's things on my "hideous" Kira doll. Kira was notorious for stealing Jasmine's golden necklace...and probably dating Colleen's Aladdin doll who I also "borrowed" without permission (which is how his head came off). Kira took a beating, despite being my very first store bought doll. Unlike her comrades of the olden days, she is no longer here. Somehow my secondhand friends outlived her. Kira's earrings broke off, her face paint rubbed away, her body became so limp it couldn't hold a pose....and there was that dreaded mullet hairdo I gave her for some reason. Of course I can't forget to mention Kira's decapitation--that time I let a little girl at the beach borrow her, and she lost Kira's head in the water. Instead of helping us search, she promptly handed me Kira's body and walked away. Luckily, Colleen and I were able to retrieve Kira's head in the murky pond waters somehow. Even with all my current knowledge of doll restoration, there was no way I could have possibly breathed life into my dear old friend. But I'm grateful to have a reincarnation of her, shown in this photo--a lucky flea market boxed find from years ago! Kira will always be a pillar in my doll collection, and as I re-immersed myself in to the world of dollies, I was quick to add more of her to my growing hoard. Even though she's not always the doll I find the most aesthetically pleasing, I can't help but feel a great attachment to Kira. Like my WNBA girl, who I longed for as a kid since she reminded me of my favorite figure skater, Kristi Yamaguchi. There was also Ocean Friends Kira, who I found in 2013 still sealed in her box. She was another one of those childhood dreams, who I almost picked over Barbie. But Barbie, aka Deenie, won out simply because she was packaged with the Orca whale, my favorite animal.
Kira was the doll who started it all for me, but there were other friends of Barbie who strengthened this obsession. I'd say that Christie was one of the very first characters I ever went out of my way to collect. Although I would have denied being a collector back then, as it felt like a stuffy, money motivated word to my younger self, that's precisely what I was doing. My Bathtime Fun Kelly and my American Girl Addy sparked an interest in African American dolls within me at a very young age. I still recall my fantasies of owning a dark skinned Barbie to pair with little Kelly, aka Kelsey. I finally got my hands on my dream doll, Pearl Beach Christie, after I managed to save $8 of my allowance up for her. So she wasn't the fanciest Christie I could have picked, but the fact that she was from a beach collection just like Kira, was a major bonus. For a time, it was this Christie who reigned supreme....until a woe begone Dentist Barbie came into my life and stole the spotlight. But Christie did regain popularity in several waves over the years, which is how she ended up with this short bob haircut that you can see in the photo. I wanted her to have a "summer" inspired hairdo...it was a terrible idea, but I love her nonetheless. From there I built up a trio of Christie dolls, which included Glam 'n Groom, Pearl Beach, and Happenin' Hair (who I picked out for my eighth birthday). Only my original Pearl Beach Christie still survives...the other two were given away during a regretful doll purge in the early 2000s. By the age of eleven, it became routine for me to pick Christie dolls out on those Friday night pizza/doll runs with Dad. His way of handling the loss of Mom was to constantly be out of the house, and to make up for his rageful outbursts by buying each of us dolls on the weekends. During those first few years without Mom, I collected Sunsation, Rain or Sun, Chair Flair, Rio de Janeiro, Hollywood Nails, and Dance Flex Christie. Most are still part of my collection, although a few of them were sold off at a yard sale in 2011. There were also the African American dolls who I thought were Christie, who turned out to be just an ethnic variation of Barbie, like the infamous Bead Blast "Christie." Oh how I pined for that doll, ever since the day I got a McDonald's miniature of her with my Happy Meal. It wasn't until 2015, when one finally came my way. I know she's technically Barbie, but Bead Blast will always be Christie in my heart.
I had many other favorite friends of Barbie growing up. Teresa was the beauty queen in my young eyes. Although Christie was usually the one I bought from a line first, I played more with Barbie's Hispanic friend. I had quite the hoard of Teresa dolls back then, even after giving away several of my dolls. There was also my Generation Girl binge of the late 90s, which was ignited when I first laid eyes on Chelsie at Toys 'R' Us, the same day I picked out Happenin' Hair Christie for my birthday. I spent over a year, closer to two, tracking down all six original Generation Girls. To this day, the Generation Girl line is one of my absolute favorites to ever exist, and I still squeal with delight when I find a Gen Girl I don't already own. There was also my Happy Family bender of 2003/2004--I quickly became obsessed with Midge, Alan, and their little family. In a very short span of time, I managed to get my hands on quite a few dolls/playsets. Strangely though, I think of all the heavily played with Barbie friends of my childhood years, it was a random character who left the greatest impact. Becky was a doll that only appeared three times over the years---Paralympic, Share a Smile, and I'm the School Photographer (I have all three now). I was at a friend's house one afternoon when I spotted a unique redhead in her messy pile of dolls. This gal was extra exotic since she was marketed with a wheelchair. By the end of the afternoon, I knew it was my destiny to get my very own Becky. In the coming months, Becky finally came to fruition. I saved my allowance up for her, and picked her out at a local Toys 'R' Us, the day Colleen chose Awesome Skateboard Janet. In an ironic twist of fate, my very own Becky doll just didn't do it for me like my friend's had. I don't know if perhaps my doll was just less attractive, or maybe the novelty had worn off. But she was cast aside not long after acquiring her. Little did I know that Colleen was secretly green with envy over Becky. She was always one who had a morbid fascination with illnesses and handicaps. I recall being very young and forced to be the make believe character in a wheelchair, to suit Colleen's inner medical daydreams. Sometime in 2001, we started one of our most infamous doll games of all time--the "Refugee Game." It was during this role that Becky stole the show, and Colleen got to rewrite her script. It began innocently enough--my beloved Tarzan Jane doll was cast as the older sister to Colleen's AA Kid Kore Katie, Holly. She ran a salon from inside the house, and a host of odd personalities always showed up to have their hair done. Jane's crazy, ditzy friend Ariel worked at the salon with her. Colleen decided to make Becky one of the rude clients. While at the house, Becky revealed her dirty little secret...she could walk after all! She made herself pizza in the kitchen and took a long, relaxing bubble bath while chowing down on her snack. Somehow, Becky became a "good guy" when the dolls had to run away to escape the villain, Barbie (Holiday Singing Sister), who was out to imprison Kid Kore Katie for being a "Fakian." Instead of turning Jane in for having a clone sister, she joined Ariel, Jane, and Katie in the Golden Dream Motorhomes as they fled for safety. This is where the inspiration for this photo was derived from. In the coming years, Becky became a staple in our doll family--she was older sister to Leroy, aka Water Jewel Magic Aladdin. Of course Colleen decided to make Becky authentically disabled in later scenarios. She spent much of her time wearing our doll hospital gown, grousing in the makeshift french fry box bed, constantly complaining of her many ailments.
The dolls of my younger years are the foundation for my interest in Barbie's friends. However, surprisingly the one I feel the deepest fondness for was not one of these ladies. Interestingly enough, the friend of Barbie who tugs at my heart strings the most would have to be Francie. Francie came and left the Barbie world long before I was even born. I don't know that I had any prior knowledge of her existence, until that fateful day my 1996 reproduction joined the family. It must have been sometime in 2004 when I spotted a mint in box Francie repro at a huge indoor flea market we frequented back then. I can't really say what it was about this doll, but I was compelled by her. Dad offered to get me Francie, but I politely declined for whatever reason....I probably didn't know what I'd do with her. Fate had a different plan for me though, because several minutes later, I happened upon an authentic, vintage Francie house. Being an absolute sucker for Barbie playsets, especially very old ones, I HAD to get Francie's case style vinyl house. Before leaving the flea market, Dad insisted that we double back and buy the boxed Francie. His logic was, "Well you need the Francie doll to go with the house!" It's a moment in time that has been frozen, and just thinking about it brings me to tears. I'm not sure what it is about my repro Francie, but nobody can quite hold a candle to her, much like that random Jammin' in Jamaica Nolee doll Dad bought me in 2003, when I had to have teeth pulled for braces. In that minute, it didn't seem like a big deal, just another occasion in which Dad wanted to spoil me rotten with dolls. Francie didn't even get played with until I was a teenager. It was a secret affair--Colleen and I conspired to break out the dolls when Dad was sick a few years later, probably when I was eighteen. We hadn't touched our plastic friends in several years, but for whatever reason we were compelled to do so. Francie took on the role of "Sara" and dated Pet Pals Kevin, aka Charlie. Although I don't remember much about the given scenario anymore, Francie kept her Sara persona after that game. Of course it's not shocking that as an adult collector, my fondness for Francie has grown. In the early days, I found Malibu and "Baggy" Francie in the "70s Bin" which we acquired on New Year's Day 2012...most likely the last flea market dolls Dad ever bought us when he was alive. Every time I stumble upon a Francie doll, I can't help but feel a certain sense of nostalgia and magic. I have a tendency to save ones that probably aren't worth while...like one of my blonde bendable leg gals who has a pixie cut, split legs, and missing eyelashes (ironically, she's one of my faves). There was also the day I found my dream doll, the 1965 "Straight Leg" Francie. I had seen others of her before, but they were far too expensive. I found my gal tucked away in a stinky, vintage Barbie case with a handful of ancient, authentic clothes, for just $5/$6. The reason I was so drawn to this particular doll was because of her resemblance to my beloved repro. Despite her yellowing face and the fact that I don't own a stitch of her original outfit, she's one of my personal favorites in my collection.
Barbie's friend circle is absolutely massive, so it's impossible to give each character I've connected with her own stage time. So while this passage highlights some of the most memorable, many dolls weren't mentioned, and some have their very own separate "My Story" write ups (like My Scene). There was also Ballerina Cara, who wooed me from an eBay listing at the tender age of 12. Her arms fell off immediately upon arrival in the mail, and it wasn't until 2012 that she was fixed. I think of all the African American characters ever created, Cara is the most breathtaking. Let's not forget about Jazzie, Barbie's oddly sized cousin who first captured my attention when I found the Sun Sensation one in a scruffy container of dolls at the flea market. She took on the name of Leanne, and I was set on adding more of her kind to my collection as an adult. Likewise there is Shani and co., much like the S.I.S. line of more modern times. Reading about Shani in my doll books made me covet my own that much more--I'll never forget Father's Day 2012, when I found Sun Jewel Shani and "1st Edition" Asha while at a huge outdoor flea market with Dad's best friend. The Mystery Squad drew me in when the dolls first hit store shelves in 2002. Kenzie became a childhood favorite, even after I made the mistake of brushing out her kinky curls (luckily I figured out how to fix them as an adult). I still recall the day that Dad bought me Kenzie, and then I was stuck going to a sleepover at a friend's house. How I longed to be at home with Colleen and her favorite Katie, playing dolls instead (or going to see a movie in theaters with Dad and Colleen). In my adult years, P.J. wormed a special place in my heart. I was magnetically drawn to her gorgeous, closed lipped head mold and her bold, wide eyes. Words cannot describe how hard I fell for Malibu P.J., the day I found her entangled in the "70s Bin" with a bunch of re-bodied dolls. I can never resist buying P.J. dolls whenever we cross paths at flea markets. Summer and Raquelle were two of the few store bought Barbies I purchased since my resurgence back into dolls. Although initially disinterested in the Life in the Dreamhouse franchise, I soon found myself lusting for them....and when they went on sale, I just couldn't help myself! There were also the Fairytopia friends, who once upon a time I found ever so creepy. I recall tossing Crystal into the garbage bag when we found her stained with mold in the "Lagoona bin" of 2013. But something called me back to her, and after a bath and stain removal treatment, she became one of my most prized possessions. Monster High dolls made me see that the Fairytopia friends really weren't all that bizarre, and now I look forward to adding more of these colorful creatures to my collection whenever they turn up in lots. Whether it is a one time appearance friend, or a character that spanned the decades, they are all wonderful in their own ways. While I do feel a certain affection for the dolls that graced store shelves in my childhood, I also feel the same nostalgia for characters like Francie, Whitney, Miko, and Jazzie who all preceded my youth, but were part of my childhood too. While I don't purchase many Barbies brand new these days, that doesn't mean I don't love her new generation of friends just the same. While it is sad to not see familiar faces like Christie and Kira, I will say that the likes of Summer, Raquelle, and Nikki get me just as excited. My love and devotion to the friends of Barbie is as eclectic as the dolls themselves--each decade, each generation brought something new and refreshing to the table, and without them all, Barbie's world would be a lot less colorful!
This plaque in Llandovery town marks the spot of Llewelyn ap Gruffydd Fychan's death. He had led the army of King Henry IV on a 'wild goose chase' under the pretence of leading them to a secret rebel camp and an ambush of Owain Glyndwr's forces. Henry had him half hanged, disembowled in front of his own eyes, beheaded and quartered - the quarters salted and dispatched to other towns for public display. There is also a magnificent faceless 16ft high statue (unveiled in 2001) of Llewelyn on the north side of Llandovery Castle, overlooking the place of his execution in 1401 (see below).
The Postcard
A high-definition early view of a misericord in Chichester Cathedral on a postally unused postcard by Raphael Tuck & Sons Ltd.
Given that it is well over 600 years old, it is a very stylish and imaginative piece of carving which could almost be a piece of modern sculpture.
Misericords
Prayers in early medieval churches were often said standing with uplifted hands. The old and infirm could use crutches or, as time went by, misericordia (literally, an act of mercy).
Seating was constructed so that when the seats were turned up, the undersides were provided with a small shelf, thereby giving a person a small degree of comfort by leaning against it. The carving is always executed out of sight on the underside of the small shelf.
Misericords, which are usually skilfully carved, date in England from the 13th century.
The earliest existing set can be found in the choir stalls of Exeter Cathedral, and they contain the earliest-known image in the UK of an elephant.
The majority of English misericords date from the 14th. and 15th. centuries, and curiously most often represent pagan images and scenes - they can be quite at variance with the building in which they are located, the above image being a good example of this.
The scene depicted in the photograph is quite mild - it would probably best be described as cheeky - some misericords are downright salacious. Good examples of these are shown in Wikipedia in relation to Tréguier Cathedral in Brittany, France.
'An Arundel Tomb'
'An Arundel Tomb' is a poem by Philip Larkin, written and published in 1956, and subsequently included in his 1964 collection The Whitsun Weddings. It describes the poet's response to seeing a pair of recumbent medieval tomb effigies with their hands joined in Chichester Cathedral.
It is described by James Booth as "one of Larkin's greatest poems".
The Tomb
The tomb monument in Chichester Cathedral is now widely identified as that of Richard FitzAlan, 10th. Earl of Arundel (d. 1376) and his second wife, Eleanor of Lancaster (d. 1372).
The couple were buried in the chapter house of Lewes Priory, and their monument was probably fashioned by the master mason Henry Yevele: documentary evidence relates to the shipping of two "marble" tombs in January 1375 from Poole Harbour to London at Yevele's behest.
Having first been erected at Lewes Priory, the effigies were probably moved to Chichester following the priory's dissolution in 1537. The earliest certain record of their presence in the cathedral dates from 1635.
The male figure wears armour, and bears a lion rampant (the arms of the FitzAlan family) on his coat armour, and a lion's head couped as a crest on the helm beneath his head.
The female figure wears a veil, wimple, long gown and a mantle, all characteristic of the 14th. century; while beneath the gown, her legs are crossed.
In a feature common to many English tombs of this period, the knight has a lion at his feet, while the lady has a dog: the lion indicates valour and nobility, the dog loyalty. He has his right hand ungloved, and her right hand rests on his.
By the 19th. century, the Arundel effigies had become badly mutilated, and also separated from one another, being placed against the north wall of the northern outer aisle of the Cathedral, with the woman at the feet of the man.
In 1843 Edward Richardson (1812–1869) was commissioned to restore them. It was Richardson who was responsible not only for reuniting them side by side, but also for carving the present joined hands, the originals having been lost.
His research was conscientious, and the evidence would suggest that his restoration was reasonably faithful to the original pose. Nevertheless, it was Richardson who was responsible for the precise form of the hands.
An additional detail that may have been Richardson's own choice was to depict the knight's empty right-hand gauntlet held in his left hand.
The monument is not inscribed, and it is likely that Larkin's reference to "the Latin names around the base" was inspired by a card label placed by the cathedral authorities – which probably, in accordance with the thinking of the time, misidentified the couple as Richard FitzAlan, 11th. Earl of Arundel (d. 1397) and his countess.
Although many modern observers have – like Larkin – read the linking of hands as a sign of romantic love and affection, it seems more likely that the gesture's primary meaning was to signify the formal, legal, and sacramental bonds of matrimony.
The Poem
Larkin visited Chichester Cathedral with his lover Monica Jones in January 1956. He later claimed to have been very moved by the monument; while in an audio recording of the poem, he stated that the effigies were unlike any he had ever seen before, and that he had found them "extremely affecting".
The poem was completed on the 20th. February, and first published in the May 1956 issue of the London Magazine.
Larkin draws inspiration from the figures to muse on time, mortality, fidelity, and the nature of earthly love. In a letter to Monica written while the poem was still in progress, he identified his chief idea as that of:
"The two effigies lasting so long, and
in the end being remarkable only for
something they hadn't perhaps meant
very seriously".
Andrew Motion describes Larkin as:
"Using the detail of the hands as the
focus for one of his most moving
evocations of the struggle between
time and human tenderness".
The poem is as follows:
'Side by side, their faces blurred,
The earl and countess lie in stone,
Their proper habits vaguely shown
As jointed armour, stiffened pleat,
And that faint hint of the absurd—
The little dogs under their feet.
Such plainness of the pre-baroque
Hardly involves the eye, until
It meets his left-hand gauntlet, still
Clasped empty in the other; and
One sees, with a sharp tender shock,
His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.
They would not think to lie so long.
Such faithfulness in effigy
Was just a detail friends would see:
A sculptor’s sweet commissioned grace
Thrown off in helping to prolong
The Latin names around the base.
They would not guess how early in
Their supine stationary voyage
The air would change to soundless damage,
Turn the old tenantry away;
How soon succeeding eyes begin
To look, not read. Rigidly they
Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths
Of time. Snow fell, undated. Light
Each summer thronged the glass. A bright
Litter of birdcalls strewed the same
Bone-riddled ground. And up the paths
The endless altered people came,
Washing at their identity.
Now, helpless in the hollow of
An unarmorial age, a trough
Of smoke in slow suspended skeins
Above their scrap of history,
Only an attitude remains:
Time has transfigured them into
Untruth. The stone fidelity
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.'
The final line is among the most quoted of all of Larkin's work. When read out of context, it may be understood as a sentimental endorsement of love enduring beyond the grave.
However, the poem as a whole is rather more nuanced, and challenges a simple romantic interpretation, even if in the end it is conceded to have:
"An inevitable ring of truth – if only
because we want so much to hear it".
James Booth describes it as possessing:
"A mix of stark pessimism
and yearning despair".
Larkin himself wrote at the end of the manuscript draft of the poem:
"Love isn't stronger than death just
because statues hold hands for six
hundred years."
However he later commented in an interview:
"I think what survives of us is love, whether in
the simple biological sense or just in terms of
responding to life, making it happier, even if it's
only making a joke."
Larkin wrote in a letter to Monica Jones, shortly after the poem's first publication, that he found it "embarrassingly bad!", because it was trying to be too clever.
In another letter to Robert Conquest he described it as "a bit timey" (i.e. with too much emphasis on time).
Larkin later reiterated that he never really liked the poem, partly because it was unduly romantic, and partly for other reasons:
"Technically it's a bit muddy in the
middle – the fourth and fifth stanzas
seem trudging somehow, with awful
rhymes like voyage/damage.
Everything went wrong with that poem:
I got the hands wrong – it's right-hand
gauntlet really – and anyway the hands
were a nineteenth-century addition, not
pre-Baroque at all."
Larkin was disappointed to learn that the hand-joining gesture was not as unusual as he had thought:
"A schoolmaster sent me a number of
illustrations of other tombs having the
same feature, so clearly it is in no way
unique."
Legacy
The poem was one of three read at Larkin's memorial service in Westminster Abbey in February 1986. Its two final lines are also inscribed on the memorial stone to Larkin unveiled in December 2016 in Poets' Corner in the Abbey.
It has been a busy few weeks, planning and executing a seven part project for one of my favorite clients and squeaking in other work between those shoots. Between at project and my other responsibilities, I have pulled almost a month (maybe more, who can remember) for 7 day work weeks. So, I am headed up to lake Bruin with a few friends for a much-needed couple of days off.
Before I go, I thought I’d throw a few images up on the site that were outtakes from the recent shoots. It’s been a fun project where I had a lot of creative latitude. I feel extraordinarily fortunate to be able to make a living doing something I really love, namely taking pictures. But, when I am doing client work, I am sometimes restricted in what I can post. Such is the life of the freelancer.
Although I do plan on doing some work on a wedding that I recent photographed, this weekend will be more about play than work. Depending on the conditions, I would like to get some shooting in while I am up there. Readers of this blog won’t be surprised to know that I love north Louisiana and the photographs I am occasionally able to capture from the mystical, empty place.
I hope you all have a good weekend and just to keep this site active (I’ve been slack about posting, I know). Here are some of the shots I took recently but which probably won’t make the cut with the client.
Check out more at my blog, for lots of photos, recipes, tech talk, travel writing and other ramblings. I appreciate any feedback but, please do not post graphic awards or invitations in the comments, I'm just not crazy about them. Also, if you want to use any of my Commercial Commons licensed photos please link the attribution back to my blog (listed above) and use my full name, Frank McMains. Thanks! Sorry, but you have to pay to use fully copyright protected photos.
The Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a Baroque palace at the Fürstengasse in the 9th District of Vienna, Alsergrund . Between the palace, where the Liechtenstein Museum was until the end of 2011, and executed as Belvedere summer palace on the Alserbachstraße is a park. Since early 2012, the Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a place for events. Part of the private art collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein is still in the gallery rooms of the palace. In 2010 was started to call the palace, to avoid future confusion, officially the Garden Palace, since 2013 the city has renovated the Palais Liechtenstein (Stadtpalais) in Vienna's old town and then also equipped with a part of the Liechtenstein art collection.
Building
Design for the Liechtenstein Garden Palace, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in 1687/1688
Canaletto: View of Palais Liechtenstein
1687 bought Prince Johann Adam Andreas von Liechtenstein a garden with adjoining meadows of Count Weikhard von Auersperg in the Rossau. In the southern part of the property the prince had built a palace and in the north part he founded a brewery and a manorial, from which developed the suburb Lichtental. For the construction of the palace Johann Adam Andreas organised 1688 a competition, in the inter alia participating, the young Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. Meanwhile, a little functional, " permeable " project was rejected by the prince but, after all, instead he was allowed to built a garden in the Belvedere Alserbachstraße 14, which , however, was canceled in 1872.
The competition was won by Domenico Egidio Rossi, but was replaced in 1692 by Domenico Martinelli. The execution of the stonework had been given the royal Hofsteinmetzmeister (master stonemason) Martin Mitschke. He was delivered by the Masters of Kaisersteinbruch Ambrose Ferrethi , Giovanni Battista Passerini and Martin Trumler large pillars, columns and pedestal made from stone Emperor (Kaiserstein). Begin of the contract was the fourth July 1689 , the total cost was around 50,000 guilders.
For contracts from the years 1693 and 1701 undertook the Salzburg master stonemason John and Joseph Pernegger owner for 4,060 guilders the steps of the great grand staircase from Lienbacher (Adnet = red) to supply marble monolith of 4.65 meters. From the Master Nicolaus Wendlinger from Hallein came the Stiegenbalustraden (stair balustrades) for 1,000 guilders.
A palazzo was built in a mix of city and country in the Roman-style villa. The structure is clear and the construction very blocky with a stressed central risalite, what served the conservative tastes of the Prince very much. According to the procedure of the architectural treatise by Johann Adam Andreas ' father, Karl Eusebius, the palace was designed with three floors and 13 windows axis on the main front and seven windows axis on the lateral front. Together with the stems it forms a courtyard .
Sala terrene of the Palais
1700 the shell was completed. In 1702, the Salzburg master stonemason and Georg Andreas Doppler took over 7,005 guilders for the manufacture of door frame made of white marble of Salzburg, 1708 was the delivery of the fireplaces in marble hall for 1,577 guilders. For the painted decoration was originally the Bolognese Marcantonio Franceschini hired, from him are some of the painted ceilings on the first floor. Since he to slow to the prince, Antonio Belucci was hired from Venice, who envisioned the rest of the floor. The ceiling painting in the Great Hall, the Hercules Hall but got Andrea Pozzo . Pozzo in 1708 confirmed the sum of 7,500 florins which he had received since 1704 for the ceiling fresco in the Marble Hall in installments. As these artists died ( Pozzo) or declined to Italy, the Prince now had no painter left for the ground floor.
After a long search finally Michael Rottmayr was hired for the painting of the ground floor - originally a temporary solution, because the prince was of the opinion that only Italian artist buon gusto d'invenzione had. Since Rottmayr was not involved in the original planning, his paintings not quite fit with the stucco. Rottmayr 1708 confirmed the receipt of 7,500 guilders for his fresco work.
Giovanni Giuliani, who designed the sculptural decoration in the window roofing of the main facade, undertook in 1705 to provide sixteen stone vases of Zogelsdorfer stone. From September 1704 to August 1705 Santino Bussi stuccoed the ground floor of the vault of the hall and received a fee of 1,000 florins and twenty buckets of wine. 1706 Bussi adorned the two staircases, the Marble Hall, the Gallery Hall and the remaining six halls of the main projectile with its stucco work for 2,200 florins and twenty buckets of wine. Giuliani received in 1709 for his Kaminbekrönungen (fireplace crowning) of the great room and the vases 1,128 guilders.
Garden
Liechtenstein Palace from the garden
The new summer palace of Henry of Ferstel from the garden
The garden was created in the mind of a classic baroque garden. The vases and statues were carried out according to the plans of Giuseppe Mazza from the local Giovanni Giuliani. In 1820 the garden has been remodeled according to plans of Joseph Kornhäusel in the Classical sense. In the Fürstengasse was opposite the Palais, the Orangerie, built 1700s.
Use as a museum
Already from 1805 to 1938, the palace was housing the family collection of the house of Liechtenstein, which was also open for public viewing, the collection was then transferred to the Principality of Liechtenstein, which remained neutral during the war and was not bombed. In the 1960s and 1970s, the so-called Building Centre was housed in the palace as a tenant, a permanent exhibition for builders of single-family houses and similar buildings. From 26 April 1979 rented the since 1962 housed in the so-called 20er Haus Museum of the 20th Century , a federal museum, the palace as a new main house, the 20er Haus was continued as a branch . Since the start of operations at the Palais, the collection called itself Museum of Modern Art (since 1991 Museum of Modern Art Ludwig Foundation ), the MUMOK in 2001 moved to the newly built museum district.
From 29 March 2004 till the end of 2011 in the Palace was the Liechtenstein Museum, whose collection includes paintings and sculptures from five centuries. The collection is considered one of the largest and most valuable private art collections in the world, whose main base in Vaduz (Liechtenstein) is . As the palace, so too the collection is owned by the Prince of Liechtenstein Foundation .
On 15 November 2011 it was announced that the regular museum operating in the Garden Palace was stopped due to short of original expectations, visiting numbers remaining lower as calculated, with January 2012. The Liechtenstein City Palace museum will also not offer regular operations. Exhibited works of art would then (in the city palace from 2013) only during the "Long Night of the Museums", for registered groups and during leased events being visitable. The name of the Liechtenstein Museum will no longer be used.
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palais_Liechtenstein_(F%C3%BCrstengasse)
* defrocked, later executed by firing squad for his participation of the "copper baron" uprising in 1978, his body was never found, but two fellow priests bodies were found in a shallow grave near an abandoned bottling plant, evidence showed this to be the original execution site.
p.s. this sketch rendering frm a post card I own.
The Bridge and Cascade.
Grade I listed.
Cascade I Bridge and cascade. Designed with a single arch by Robert Adam in 1761. Redesigned, with three arches in 1764. Executed 1770- 1771. Ashlar. The bridge has three round-arched spans with moulded hoodmoulds. Fluted roundels in the spandrels. Projecting piers with apsed niches and moulded sill band. The tops of the piers with swags. Fluted frieze and dentil cornice. Balustraded parapet the balusters divided into three units per span. Cast iron balusters. Steep road approaches with the end walls curving outwards and downwards. End piers. Rubblestone cascade to east.
Listing NGR: SK3126840716
historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1335352
The Bridge by Robert Adam
Kedleston Hall is an English country house in Kedleston, Derbyshire, approximately four miles north-west of Derby, and is the seat of the Curzon family whose name originates in Notre-Dame-de-Courson in Normandy. Today it is a National Trust property.
The Curzon family have owned the estate at Kedleston since at least 1297 and have lived in a succession of manor houses near to or on the site of the present Kedleston Hall. The present house was commissioned by Sir Nathaniel Curzon (later 1st Baron Scarsdale) in 1759. The house was designed by the Palladian architects James Paine and Matthew Brettingham and was loosely based on an original plan by Andrea Palladio for the never-built Villa Mocenigo. At the time a relatively unknown architect, Robert Adam was designing some garden temples to enhance the landscape of the park; Curzon was so impressed with Adam's designs, that Adam was quickly put in charge of the construction of the new mansion.
World War II
In 1939, Kedleston Hall was offered by Richard Curzon, 2nd Viscount Scarsdale for use by the War Department.[1] Kedleston Hall provided various facilities during the period 1939–45 including its use as a mustering point and army training camp. It also formed one of the Y-stations used to gather Signals Intelligence via radio transmissions which, if encrypted, were subsequently passed to Bletchley Park for decryption.
National Trust
In the 1970s the estate was too expensive for the Curzon family to maintain. When Richard Nathaniel Curzon, 2nd Viscount Scarsdale died, his cousin Francis Curzon, 3rd Viscount Scarsdale offered the estate to the nation in lieu of death duties. A deal was agreed with the National Trust that it should take over Kedleston while still allowing the family to live rent-free in the 23-room Family Wing, which contained an adjoining garden and two rent-free flats for servants or other family members.
External design
The design of the three-floored house is of three blocks linked by two segmentally curved corridors. The ground floor is rusticated, while the upper floors are of smooth-dressed stone. The central, largest block contains the state rooms and was intended for use only when there were important guests in the house. The East block was a self-contained country house in its own right, containing all the rooms for the family's private use, and the identical West block contained the kitchens and all other domestic rooms and staff accommodation. Plans for two more pavilions (as the two smaller blocks are known) of identical size, and similar appearance were not executed. These further wings were intended to contain, in the south east a music room, and south west a conservatory and chapel. Externally these latter pavilions would have differed from their northern counterparts by large glazed Serlian windows on the piano nobile of their southern facades. Here the blocks were to appear as of two floors only; a mezzanine was to have been disguised in the north of the music room block. The linking galleries here were also to contain larger windows, than on the north, and niches containing classical statuary.
If the great north front, approximately 107 metres in length, is Palladian in character, dominated by the massive, six-columned Corinthian portico, then the south front (illustrated right) is pure Robert Adam. It is divided into three distinct sets of bays; the central section is a four-columned, blind triumphal arch (based on the Arch of Constantine in Rome) containing one large, pedimented glass door reached from the rusticated ground floor by an external, curved double staircase. Above the door, at second-floor height, are stone garlands and medallions in relief. The four Corinthian columns are topped by classical statues. This whole centre section of the facade is crowned by a low dome visible only from a distance. Flanking the central section are two identical wings on three floors, each three windows wide, the windows of the first-floor piano nobile being the tallest. Adam's design for this facade contains huge "movement" and has a delicate almost fragile quality.
Gardens and grounds
The gardens and grounds, as they appear today, are largely the concept of Robert Adam. Adam was asked by Nathaniel Curzon in 1758 to "take in hand the deer park and pleasure grounds". The landscape gardener William Emes had begun work at Kedleston in 1756, and he continued in Curzon's employ until 1760; however, it was Adam who was the guiding influence. It was during this period that the former gardens designed by Charles Bridgeman were swept away in favour of a more natural-looking landscape. Bridgeman's canals and geometric ponds were metamorphosed into serpentine lakes.
Adam designed numerous temples and follies, many of which were never built. Those that were include the North lodge (which takes the form of a triumphal arch), the entrance lodges in the village, a bridge, cascade and the Fishing Room. The Fishing Room is one of the most noticeable of the park's buildings. In the neoclassical style it is sited on the edge of the upper lake and contains a plunge pool and boat house below. Some of Adam's unexecuted design for follies in the park rivalled in grandeur the house itself. A "View Tower" designed in 1760 – 84 feet high and 50 feet wide on five floors, surmounted by a saucer dome flanked by the smaller domes of flanking towers — would have been a small neoclassical palace itself. Adam planned to transform even mundane utilitarian buildings into architectural wonders. A design for a pheasant house (a platform to provide a vantage point for the game shooting) became a domed temple, the roofs of its classical porticos providing the necessary platforms; this plan too was never completed. Among the statuary in the grounds is a Medici lion sculpture carved by Joseph Wilton on a pedestal designed by Samuel Wyatt, from around 1760-1770.
In the 1770s, George Richardson designed the hexagonal summerhouse, and in 1800 the orangery. The Long Walk was laid out in 1760 and planted with flowering shrubs and ornamental trees. In 1763, it was reported that Lord Scarsdale had given his gardener a seed from rare and scarce Italian shrub, the "Rodo Dendrone".
The gardens and grounds today, over two hundred years later, remain mostly unaltered. Parts of the estate are designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest, primarily because of the "rich and diverse deadwood invertebrate fauna" inhabiting its ancient trees.
Outfit:
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Top: Mighty Fine Disney's The Little Mermaid Ariel Ombre Flower Crown Tank Top
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Bottom: Boohoo Claire Super Short Acid Wash Denim Hotpants
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Shoes: Vans 'Authentic Lo Pro - Neon' Sneaker (Women)
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Bag: Hawaiian Beach Flower Travel Tote Bag
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Hat: KENZO Wave-Print Cap
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Watch: Toy Watch Velvety Camo Silicone Watch
Diego Velázquez (1599-1660, Spanish) - Temptation of St. Thomas, 1632, oil on canvas, 244x203 cm, Museo Diocesano de Arte Sacro de Orihuela, provincia de Alicante, Spain.
The Temptation of St. Thomas is a painting by the Spanish Baroque painter Diego Velázquez, executed in 1632 and housed in the Museum of Sacred Art of Orihuela Cathedral, southern Spain.
The work, for a period, was attributed to Murcian painter Nicolás de Villacis, until it was recognized as Velázquez's in the 1920s. It portrays the episode of the life of Saint Thomas Aquinas when, as a novice, he resisted the temptation represented by a prostitute, who is visible in the background door. The saint is held by an angel, while another is preparing to dress him with a white ribbon, representing chastity.
Temptation of St. Thomas is among Velázquez's better-known paintings.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temptation_of_St._Thomas_(Vel%C3%A1zquez)
Diego Velazquez was born in Seville, Spain, in 1599. His artistic talent became evident when he was apprenticed to the artist Francisco Pacheco. He was very young, eighteen years old, when he married Pacheco's daughter and started to develop his own style which displayed a startling realism. Most of his early sketches orn paintings were naturalistic still life compositions. In 1622, he moved to Madrid and became the official painter at the court of King Philip IV. These were fertile years when he produced his finest paintings. At the royal court, he happily dedicated himself to portraiture, his speciality, as well as group portraits and religious paintings. He made two trips to Italy to study the High Renaissance artists.
He died in 1660 of a fever and was buried in the church of San Juan. Unfortunately, the church was destroyed by Napoleon's troops in 1811, and the location of the grave is lost.
Velazquez produced a total of 244 paintings, many of which can be admired in museums and galleries in Europe and USA. The El Prado Museum in Madrid has the lion's share of Velazquez paintings while many are on display in diverse London galleries.
His earliest works are group compositions such as "The Water-seller of Seville" of 1618 and "Adoration of the Magi", 1619. In Madrid, he painted many formal portraits in his role of court painter, including portraits of King Philip IV in 1628. A trip to Italy in 1629 inspired two large paintings: "Joseph's Tunic" and "The Forge of Vulcan", both painted in 1630. Many other portraits followed, including more of the king. In 1634-1635 he produced a series of beautiful, dynamic, prancing equestrian paintings. His famous self-portrait dates from 1640, the same year as the Michelangelo-inspired "Mars Resting". A second trip to Italy inspired more portraits in 1650, including the compelling painting of Pope Innocent X. In his later royal court years, 1650-1660, he painted several pictures of royal ladies: Mariana of Austria, the queen of Spain, and of the Infanta Margarita, as well as "Las Meninas" and the equally famous "The Spinners".
Baroque art flourished roughly between 1600 and 1750 and Velazquez was one of the main exponents of this highly dramatic artistic style. Indeed, a sense of drama and an emotional response in the viewer were the main aims of Baroque art. Other notable painters of around this time included Da Vinci and Michelangelo from the Renaissance, plus Caravaggio, who was closer to the time of Velazquez.
www.diegovelazquez.net/paintings/
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Ispitirea Sfântului Toma este un tablou al pictorului baroc spaniol Diego Velázquez, realizat în 1632 și aflat acum în Muzeul de Artă Sacră din Catedrala Orihuela, sudul Spaniei.
Pentru o perioadă opera i-a fost atribuită pictorului din regiunea Murcia Nicolás de Villacis, până când a fost recunoscută ca fiind a lui Velázquez în anii 1920. Pictura înfățișează episodul din viața sfântului Toma de Aquino când, novice fiind, a rezistat tentației reprezentate de o prostituată, care este vizibilă la ușa din fundal. Sfântul este ținut de un înger, în timp ce altul se pregătește să-l îmbrace cu o panglică albă, reprezentând castitatea.
Ispitirea Sfântului Toma este una dintre picturile cele mai cunoscute ale lui Velázquez. (wiki)
The Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a Baroque palace at the Fürstengasse in the 9th District of Vienna, Alsergrund . Between the palace, where the Liechtenstein Museum was until the end of 2011, and executed as Belvedere summer palace on the Alserbachstraße is a park. Since early 2012, the Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a place for events. Part of the private art collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein is still in the gallery rooms of the palace. In 2010 was started to call the palace, to avoid future confusion, officially the Garden Palace, since 2013 the city has renovated the Palais Liechtenstein (Stadtpalais) in Vienna's old town and then also equipped with a part of the Liechtenstein art collection.
Building
Design for the Liechtenstein Garden Palace, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in 1687/1688
Canaletto: View of Palais Liechtenstein
1687 bought Prince Johann Adam Andreas von Liechtenstein a garden with adjoining meadows of Count Weikhard von Auersperg in the Rossau. In the southern part of the property the prince had built a palace and in the north part he founded a brewery and a manorial, from which developed the suburb Lichtental. For the construction of the palace Johann Adam Andreas organised 1688 a competition, in the inter alia participating, the young Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. Meanwhile, a little functional, " permeable " project was rejected by the prince but, after all, instead he was allowed to built a garden in the Belvedere Alserbachstraße 14, which , however, was canceled in 1872.
The competition was won by Domenico Egidio Rossi, but was replaced in 1692 by Domenico Martinelli. The execution of the stonework had been given the royal Hofsteinmetzmeister (master stonemason) Martin Mitschke. He was delivered by the Masters of Kaisersteinbruch Ambrose Ferrethi , Giovanni Battista Passerini and Martin Trumler large pillars, columns and pedestal made from stone Emperor (Kaiserstein). Begin of the contract was the fourth July 1689 , the total cost was around 50,000 guilders.
For contracts from the years 1693 and 1701 undertook the Salzburg master stonemason John and Joseph Pernegger owner for 4,060 guilders the steps of the great grand staircase from Lienbacher (Adnet = red) to supply marble monolith of 4.65 meters. From the Master Nicolaus Wendlinger from Hallein came the Stiegenbalustraden (stair balustrades) for 1,000 guilders.
A palazzo was built in a mix of city and country in the Roman-style villa. The structure is clear and the construction very blocky with a stressed central risalite, what served the conservative tastes of the Prince very much. According to the procedure of the architectural treatise by Johann Adam Andreas ' father, Karl Eusebius, the palace was designed with three floors and 13 windows axis on the main front and seven windows axis on the lateral front. Together with the stems it forms a courtyard .
Sala terrene of the Palais
1700 the shell was completed. In 1702, the Salzburg master stonemason and Georg Andreas Doppler took over 7,005 guilders for the manufacture of door frame made of white marble of Salzburg, 1708 was the delivery of the fireplaces in marble hall for 1,577 guilders. For the painted decoration was originally the Bolognese Marcantonio Franceschini hired, from him are some of the painted ceilings on the first floor. Since he to slow to the prince, Antonio Belucci was hired from Venice, who envisioned the rest of the floor. The ceiling painting in the Great Hall, the Hercules Hall but got Andrea Pozzo . Pozzo in 1708 confirmed the sum of 7,500 florins which he had received since 1704 for the ceiling fresco in the Marble Hall in installments. As these artists died ( Pozzo) or declined to Italy, the Prince now had no painter left for the ground floor.
After a long search finally Michael Rottmayr was hired for the painting of the ground floor - originally a temporary solution, because the prince was of the opinion that only Italian artist buon gusto d'invenzione had. Since Rottmayr was not involved in the original planning, his paintings not quite fit with the stucco. Rottmayr 1708 confirmed the receipt of 7,500 guilders for his fresco work.
Giovanni Giuliani, who designed the sculptural decoration in the window roofing of the main facade, undertook in 1705 to provide sixteen stone vases of Zogelsdorfer stone. From September 1704 to August 1705 Santino Bussi stuccoed the ground floor of the vault of the hall and received a fee of 1,000 florins and twenty buckets of wine. 1706 Bussi adorned the two staircases, the Marble Hall, the Gallery Hall and the remaining six halls of the main projectile with its stucco work for 2,200 florins and twenty buckets of wine. Giuliani received in 1709 for his Kaminbekrönungen (fireplace crowning) of the great room and the vases 1,128 guilders.
Garden
Liechtenstein Palace from the garden
The new summer palace of Henry of Ferstel from the garden
The garden was created in the mind of a classic baroque garden. The vases and statues were carried out according to the plans of Giuseppe Mazza from the local Giovanni Giuliani. In 1820 the garden has been remodeled according to plans of Joseph Kornhäusel in the Classical sense. In the Fürstengasse was opposite the Palais, the Orangerie, built 1700s.
Use as a museum
Already from 1805 to 1938, the palace was housing the family collection of the house of Liechtenstein, which was also open for public viewing, the collection was then transferred to the Principality of Liechtenstein, which remained neutral during the war and was not bombed. In the 1960s and 1970s, the so-called Building Centre was housed in the palace as a tenant, a permanent exhibition for builders of single-family houses and similar buildings. From 26 April 1979 rented the since 1962 housed in the so-called 20er Haus Museum of the 20th Century , a federal museum, the palace as a new main house, the 20er Haus was continued as a branch . Since the start of operations at the Palais, the collection called itself Museum of Modern Art (since 1991 Museum of Modern Art Ludwig Foundation ), the MUMOK in 2001 moved to the newly built museum district.
From 29 March 2004 till the end of 2011 in the Palace was the Liechtenstein Museum, whose collection includes paintings and sculptures from five centuries. The collection is considered one of the largest and most valuable private art collections in the world, whose main base in Vaduz (Liechtenstein) is . As the palace, so too the collection is owned by the Prince of Liechtenstein Foundation .
On 15 November 2011 it was announced that the regular museum operating in the Garden Palace was stopped due to short of original expectations, visiting numbers remaining lower as calculated, with January 2012. The Liechtenstein City Palace museum will also not offer regular operations. Exhibited works of art would then (in the city palace from 2013) only during the "Long Night of the Museums", for registered groups and during leased events being visitable. The name of the Liechtenstein Museum will no longer be used.
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palais_Liechtenstein_(F%C3%BCrstengasse)
This piece is entitled "self portrait of ones entire life". I executed this piece with the a theory I developed that is called Dimensionalism . This theory has its inspiration form my experiences with pre-seizure events for I have epilepsy. In this state I become detached from reality and see time in a different construct,that of a hyper intensity. A hyper awareness of a moment and everything that constructs it from sounds,thoughts,things tactile . While in these pre seizure states, some instances time is slowed down/speed up or frozen. While in other instances I am forced away form all comprehension of what is in my present environment and reality takes on a totally foreign existence where all has to be re learned.
For the viewers of my piece all of life is in dimensions and how one moves through these dimensions of either large dimensional constructs such as ones life or to the minute dimensional construct of a simple word. Thus giving the viewer this new perspective of time and space. The suspended animation of the piece is only dynamic as the viewer views the piece from the narrower sides form either end where a visible play of time sequencing exists and ones eye is drawn into the piece...
A perspective of a Dimesionalist where one has a view of a moment with a gods eye/time traveler or a pure energy source . From looking at a simple word to a memory one has. All is captured in dimensions. There are other branches of my theory that further portray my experiences. Demensionalising and facitile dimensionalism. These ideas also play with the constructs of how one sees time/moment.I hope to execute these ideas in the future...........
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
This piece is entitled "self portrait of ones entire life". I executed this piece with the a theory I developed that is called Dimensionalism . This theory has its inspiration form my experiences with pre-seizure events for I have epilepsy. In this state I become detached from reality and see time in a different construct,that of a hyper intensity. A hyper awareness of a moment and everything that constructs it from sounds,thoughts,things tactile . While in these pre seizure states, some instances time is slowed down/speed up or frozen. While in other instances I am forced away form all comprehension of what is in my present environment and reality takes on a totally foreign existence where all has to be re learned.
For the viewers of my piece all of life is in dimensions and how one moves through these dimensions of either large dimensional constructs such as ones life or to the minute dimensional construct of a simple word. Thus giving the viewer this new perspective of time and space. The suspended animation of the piece is only dynamic as the viewer views the piece from the narrower sides form either end where a visible play of time sequencing exists and ones eye is drawn into the piece...
A perspective of a Dimesionalist where one has a view of a moment with a gods eye/time traveler or a pure energy source . From looking at a simple word to a memory one has. All is captured in dimensions. There are other branches of my theory that further portray my experiences. Demensionalising and facitile dimensionalism. These ideas also play with the constructs of how one sees time/moment.I hope to execute these ideas in the future...........
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
There are other branches of my theory that further portray my experiences. Demensionalising and facitile dimensionalism. These ideas also play with the constructs of how one sees time but deals more with dynamic movement .I hope to execute these ideas in the future...........
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
April 12
I'm certainly no botanist, but my understanding is that sometimes things happen, and petals fall to the ground. It's a completely natural process, although sometimes it isn't. Regardless of the specifics, when the "Czar" variation of the camellia japonica experiences this process the ground ends up blanketed in flowers as whole and vibrant as their siblings still attached above. Somewhere in the recesses of my noggin one could hear the *ding* of a plan being formed. I prefer to leave scenes like this undisturbed - what a shame it would be to rob others of the same visual experience I was lucky enough to enjoy - but measured selfishness is necessary for happiness, so I picked 3 favorites from the piles on the ground and spirited them home. Heist complete, work began on my first ever photos with staged lighting.
I started experiencing an itch last summer. In the long carpools from home to work and work to home we managed to diagnose it as years of little creative outlet. Ideas for alleviating this itch were discussed, concepts extensively written in notes apps, zero progress ever made. This photo, conceived in a minute and executed within the hour, was a victory.
Cutter, a military working dog, sniffs for mock explosives along a road while his handler, Cpl. Justin B. Trujillo, directs him July 2 in the Central Training Area. MWDs and their handlers executed improvised explosive device detection training, where the dog teams patrolled through areas with odors typically associated with IEDs. The goal in the training was to make it through the lane without missing any of the indicators. Trujillo is a Los Alamos, New Mexico, native and military working dog handler with 3rd Law Enforcement Battalion, III Marine Expeditionary Force Headquarters Group, III MEF. Cutter is a specialized search dog with the battalion. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Drew Tech/Released)
Approximately two weeks ago, Sergeant Rob Long and John Davidson of the Hanceville Police Department conducted what initially seemed to be a routine traffic stop within the city limits of Hanceville. During the traffic stop interaction, Long established the likelihood that an illegal drug component was part of the incident.
Hanceville Police Department Narcotics Investigators were summoned to the scene.
Based upon evidence acquired during this traffic stop and subsequent questioning, Narcotics Investigator and Assistant Chief of Police Adam Hadder pursued a lengthy, ongoing investigation that took him across the county line into Blount County.
A single suspect with prior felony convictions involving narcotics possession and trafficking was the target of the investigation. Hadder pursued the likelihood that the individual may have once again been involve in the unlawful distribution of a controlled substance.
That multi-day investigation allowed Hadder to develop a crime profile that indicated that significant amounts of narcotics and other illegal drugs - directly tied to this traffic stop - were potentially being trafficked into Hanceville, Cullman County, and surrounding communities from a residential location in the Blountsville area.
On Monday evening (December 19th) around 9:00 pm, Hadder along with the aforementioned Long, Lieutenant Brannon Hammick and Chief of Police Bob Long arranged for the purchase of one ounce of ICE methamphetamine in Blount County from a white male believed linked to the suspected trafficking mentioned above.
During the pre-arranged drug buy, the suspect became agitated just prior to the transaction. He departed the transaction location in a motor vehicle. Hadder surreptitiously followed the suspect in an unmarked vehicle.
The situation soon escalated with Hadder and other members of HPD pursuing the individual into downtown Blountsville with as full show of blue lights. Ultimately, the suspect vehicle was boxed in after a short chase by HPD cruisers and the unmarked car.
The suspect was taken into custody at the location with one ounce of ICE methamphetamine in his possession.
In the meantime, from research information provided by the Hanceville Police Department, Sgt. Kirkland of the Blount County Sheriff's Office conducted a multiple hours surveillance of the suspect's presumed home.
Upon the detainment of the suspect, a search warrant was generated by the Blount County Sheriff's Office to enter the subject's dwelling. Hanceville and Blount County Investigators discovered a residential interior heavy with the smell of marijuana. The residence was sparsely decorated and believed to be a 'stash house'.
The following items were discovered inside the home:
• Approximately 110 pounds of high-grade marijuana buds
(street valued at $3,500 per pound)
• Approximately 2 pounds of ICE Methamphetamine
• Approximately 3 ounces of Cocaine
• Numerous pills of suspected of being controlled substances (Ecstacy)
• Multiple firearms
• A Ballistic Vest
• Various drug paraphernalia and apparatus
• Cash currency amounts believed to be between $90,000 and $110,000
As a result of the above, Hanceville Police arrested:
BRADLEY NEAL STEELE (33) of Blountsville
The above items were seized and Steel was taken to the Blount County Jail.
Steele will be charged with:
• Trafficking of Controlled Substance (3 counts)
~ Marijuana
~ Methamphetamine
~ Cocaine
Additional charges made be pending in relation to this arrest such as Attempting to Commit A Controlled Substance Crime, Attempting to Elude and Unlawful Possession of a Controlled Substance.
The total estimated street value of all street drugs seized is well over $350,000.
Bond will be set at $3,000,000.00.
Hanceville Chief of Police Bog Long had these thoughts following a press conference explain the arrest and charges:
"The important thing about this entire incident is that a very large amount of illegal drugs won't be available on the streets. I would like to acknowledge that the officers of Hanceville Police Department did a fantastic job. I also want to express my sincere gratitude to Blount County Sheriff Lloyd Arrington and the Blount County Sheriff's Office for all their hard work and dedication on this case."
Further information on this case is expected in the near future from the Blount County Sheriff's Office and Blount County District Attorney Pamela Casey (who is currently reviewing the circumstances of the case).
For the full story with images and press conference, please see:
cullmantoday.com/2016/12/21/hanceville-police-execute-lar...
Elle est exécutée par Emmanuel Fremiet, qui prend comme modèle Aimée Girodn, une jeune Lorraine de 18 ans, et inaugurée en 1874. Le piédestal est dessiné par l'architecte Paul Abadie. Cette statue de bronze est fondu par la Fonderie Thiébaut Frères. Une autre version de la statue, financée par le mécène Osiris, est exécutée en 1889 par Frémiet pour la ville de Nancy, sur la place Lafayette. Le cheval est réduit de taille, en 1899, Frémiet remplace le cheval de Paris par le modèle de Nancy, ce qui provoque une polémique. La version de Frémiet de Jeanne d'Arc à cheval est reproduite en de nombreux exemplaires, on la retrouve entre autres à Lille, Compiègne, Saint-Étienne, La Nouvelle-Orléans, Philadelphie, Portland et Melbourne.
The Equestrian Statue of King Louis XIV is a late sculpture designed and partially executed by the Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Bernini first discussed the project while in France in the mid-1660s, but it did not start until later in the decade, when back in Rome. It was not completed until 1684, and then shipped to Paris in 1685. Louis XIV of France was extremely unhappy with the end result and had it placed in a corner of the gardens of the royal palace at Versailles. Eventually, the sculpture was modified by François Girardon and altered into an equestrian sculpture of the ancient Roman hero Marcus Curtius. Today’s equestrian statue is a reproduction in cast lead around a stainless steel armature and was put in place in the southwest quadrant of the courtyard near the Pyramide du Louvre created by I. M. Pei. / East of Carrousel Garden, the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel and Place du Carrousel is a large open Courtyard surrounded by the Palais du Louvre on three sides. It is known as the Cour Napoléon et Louvre Pyramide (Napoleon Courtyard and Louvre Pyramid).
This piece is entitled "self portrait of ones entire life". I executed this piece with the a theory I developed that is called Dimensionalism . This theory has its inspiration form my experiences with pre-seizure events for I have epilepsy. In this state I become detached from reality and see time in a different construct,that of a hyper intensity. A hyper awareness of a moment and everything that constructs it from sounds,thoughts,things tactile . While in these pre seizure states, some instances time is slowed down/speed up or frozen. While in other instances I am forced away form all comprehension of what is in my present environment and reality takes on a totally foreign existence where all has to be re learned.
For the viewers of my piece all of life is in dimensions and how one moves through these dimensions of either large dimensional constructs such as ones life or to the minute dimensional construct of a simple word. Thus giving the viewer this new perspective of time and space. The suspended animation of the piece is only dynamic as the viewer views the piece from the narrower sides form either end where a visible play of time sequencing exists and ones eye is drawn into the piece...
A perspective of a Dimesionalist where one has a view of a moment with a gods eye/time traveler or a pure energy source . From looking at a simple word to a memory one has. All is captured in dimensions. There are other branches of my theory that further portray my experiences. Demensionalising and facitile dimensionalism. These ideas also play with the constructs of how one sees time/moment.I hope to execute these ideas in the future...........
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
There are other branches of my theory that further portray my experiences. Demensionalising and facitile dimensionalism. These ideas also play with the constructs of how one sees time but deals more with dynamic movement .I hope to execute these ideas in the future...........
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
After executing a fleeing Guardsman, Commissar Arehn starts to see the dead man's phantom – what does it mean, and will it lead him to enlightenment or disaster?
The photo is executed in technique «LightGraphic » or «The painting of light», that assumes illumination of model by small light sources in darkness on long endurance.
Thus, all lightcloth (composition) - is one Photo Exposition, is embodied on a matrix of the camera in one click of a shutter.
The sketches very often executed in such a way further are drawn in the graphic editor as it would be on a canvas a brush. Plug-ins and filters are not used.
The photo is executed in technique «LightGraphic » or «The painting of light», that assumes illumination of model by small light sources in darkness on long endurance.
Thus, all lightcloth (composition) - is one Photo Exposition, is embodied on a matrix of the camera in one click of a shutter.
The sketches very often executed in such a way further are drawn in the graphic editor as it would be on a canvas a brush. Plug-ins and filters are not used.
Short story (in russian):
The Bridge and Cascade.
Grade I listed.
Cascade I Bridge and cascade. Designed with a single arch by Robert Adam in 1761. Redesigned, with three arches in 1764. Executed 1770- 1771. Ashlar. The bridge has three round-arched spans with moulded hoodmoulds. Fluted roundels in the spandrels. Projecting piers with apsed niches and moulded sill band. The tops of the piers with swags. Fluted frieze and dentil cornice. Balustraded parapet the balusters divided into three units per span. Cast iron balusters. Steep road approaches with the end walls curving outwards and downwards. End piers. Rubblestone cascade to east.
Listing NGR: SK3126840716
historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1335352
The Bridge by Robert Adam
Kedleston Hall is an English country house in Kedleston, Derbyshire, approximately four miles north-west of Derby, and is the seat of the Curzon family whose name originates in Notre-Dame-de-Courson in Normandy. Today it is a National Trust property.
The Curzon family have owned the estate at Kedleston since at least 1297 and have lived in a succession of manor houses near to or on the site of the present Kedleston Hall. The present house was commissioned by Sir Nathaniel Curzon (later 1st Baron Scarsdale) in 1759. The house was designed by the Palladian architects James Paine and Matthew Brettingham and was loosely based on an original plan by Andrea Palladio for the never-built Villa Mocenigo. At the time a relatively unknown architect, Robert Adam was designing some garden temples to enhance the landscape of the park; Curzon was so impressed with Adam's designs, that Adam was quickly put in charge of the construction of the new mansion.
World War II
In 1939, Kedleston Hall was offered by Richard Curzon, 2nd Viscount Scarsdale for use by the War Department.[1] Kedleston Hall provided various facilities during the period 1939–45 including its use as a mustering point and army training camp. It also formed one of the Y-stations used to gather Signals Intelligence via radio transmissions which, if encrypted, were subsequently passed to Bletchley Park for decryption.
National Trust
In the 1970s the estate was too expensive for the Curzon family to maintain. When Richard Nathaniel Curzon, 2nd Viscount Scarsdale died, his cousin Francis Curzon, 3rd Viscount Scarsdale offered the estate to the nation in lieu of death duties. A deal was agreed with the National Trust that it should take over Kedleston while still allowing the family to live rent-free in the 23-room Family Wing, which contained an adjoining garden and two rent-free flats for servants or other family members.
External design
The design of the three-floored house is of three blocks linked by two segmentally curved corridors. The ground floor is rusticated, while the upper floors are of smooth-dressed stone. The central, largest block contains the state rooms and was intended for use only when there were important guests in the house. The East block was a self-contained country house in its own right, containing all the rooms for the family's private use, and the identical West block contained the kitchens and all other domestic rooms and staff accommodation. Plans for two more pavilions (as the two smaller blocks are known) of identical size, and similar appearance were not executed. These further wings were intended to contain, in the south east a music room, and south west a conservatory and chapel. Externally these latter pavilions would have differed from their northern counterparts by large glazed Serlian windows on the piano nobile of their southern facades. Here the blocks were to appear as of two floors only; a mezzanine was to have been disguised in the north of the music room block. The linking galleries here were also to contain larger windows, than on the north, and niches containing classical statuary.
If the great north front, approximately 107 metres in length, is Palladian in character, dominated by the massive, six-columned Corinthian portico, then the south front (illustrated right) is pure Robert Adam. It is divided into three distinct sets of bays; the central section is a four-columned, blind triumphal arch (based on the Arch of Constantine in Rome) containing one large, pedimented glass door reached from the rusticated ground floor by an external, curved double staircase. Above the door, at second-floor height, are stone garlands and medallions in relief. The four Corinthian columns are topped by classical statues. This whole centre section of the facade is crowned by a low dome visible only from a distance. Flanking the central section are two identical wings on three floors, each three windows wide, the windows of the first-floor piano nobile being the tallest. Adam's design for this facade contains huge "movement" and has a delicate almost fragile quality.
Gardens and grounds
The gardens and grounds, as they appear today, are largely the concept of Robert Adam. Adam was asked by Nathaniel Curzon in 1758 to "take in hand the deer park and pleasure grounds". The landscape gardener William Emes had begun work at Kedleston in 1756, and he continued in Curzon's employ until 1760; however, it was Adam who was the guiding influence. It was during this period that the former gardens designed by Charles Bridgeman were swept away in favour of a more natural-looking landscape. Bridgeman's canals and geometric ponds were metamorphosed into serpentine lakes.
Adam designed numerous temples and follies, many of which were never built. Those that were include the North lodge (which takes the form of a triumphal arch), the entrance lodges in the village, a bridge, cascade and the Fishing Room. The Fishing Room is one of the most noticeable of the park's buildings. In the neoclassical style it is sited on the edge of the upper lake and contains a plunge pool and boat house below. Some of Adam's unexecuted design for follies in the park rivalled in grandeur the house itself. A "View Tower" designed in 1760 – 84 feet high and 50 feet wide on five floors, surmounted by a saucer dome flanked by the smaller domes of flanking towers — would have been a small neoclassical palace itself. Adam planned to transform even mundane utilitarian buildings into architectural wonders. A design for a pheasant house (a platform to provide a vantage point for the game shooting) became a domed temple, the roofs of its classical porticos providing the necessary platforms; this plan too was never completed. Among the statuary in the grounds is a Medici lion sculpture carved by Joseph Wilton on a pedestal designed by Samuel Wyatt, from around 1760-1770.
In the 1770s, George Richardson designed the hexagonal summerhouse, and in 1800 the orangery. The Long Walk was laid out in 1760 and planted with flowering shrubs and ornamental trees. In 1763, it was reported that Lord Scarsdale had given his gardener a seed from rare and scarce Italian shrub, the "Rodo Dendrone".
The gardens and grounds today, over two hundred years later, remain mostly unaltered. Parts of the estate are designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest, primarily because of the "rich and diverse deadwood invertebrate fauna" inhabiting its ancient trees.
Mural designed by Eric Okdeh and executed by members of the community and inmates at the State Correctional Institution – Phoenix. The mural is located at 1108 Sansom Street in the Center City area of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Drone photo by James aka @urbanmuralhunter on that other photo site.
Edit by Teee.
The Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a Baroque palace at the Fürstengasse in the 9th District of Vienna, Alsergrund . Between the palace, where the Liechtenstein Museum was until the end of 2011, and executed as Belvedere summer palace on the Alserbachstraße is a park. Since early 2012, the Liechtenstein Garden Palace is a place for events. Part of the private art collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein is still in the gallery rooms of the palace. In 2010 was started to call the palace, to avoid future confusion, officially the Garden Palace, since 2013 the city has renovated the Palais Liechtenstein (Stadtpalais) in Vienna's old town and then also equipped with a part of the Liechtenstein art collection.
Building
Design for the Liechtenstein Garden Palace, Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach in 1687/1688
Canaletto: View of Palais Liechtenstein
1687 bought Prince Johann Adam Andreas von Liechtenstein a garden with adjoining meadows of Count Weikhard von Auersperg in the Rossau. In the southern part of the property the prince had built a palace and in the north part he founded a brewery and a manorial, from which developed the suburb Lichtental. For the construction of the palace Johann Adam Andreas organised 1688 a competition, in the inter alia participating, the young Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach. Meanwhile, a little functional, " permeable " project was rejected by the prince but, after all, instead he was allowed to built a garden in the Belvedere Alserbachstraße 14, which , however, was canceled in 1872.
The competition was won by Domenico Egidio Rossi, but was replaced in 1692 by Domenico Martinelli. The execution of the stonework had been given the royal Hofsteinmetzmeister (master stonemason) Martin Mitschke. He was delivered by the Masters of Kaisersteinbruch Ambrose Ferrethi , Giovanni Battista Passerini and Martin Trumler large pillars, columns and pedestal made from stone Emperor (Kaiserstein). Begin of the contract was the fourth July 1689 , the total cost was around 50,000 guilders.
For contracts from the years 1693 and 1701 undertook the Salzburg master stonemason John and Joseph Pernegger owner for 4,060 guilders the steps of the great grand staircase from Lienbacher (Adnet = red) to supply marble monolith of 4.65 meters. From the Master Nicolaus Wendlinger from Hallein came the Stiegenbalustraden (stair balustrades) for 1,000 guilders.
A palazzo was built in a mix of city and country in the Roman-style villa. The structure is clear and the construction very blocky with a stressed central risalite, what served the conservative tastes of the Prince very much. According to the procedure of the architectural treatise by Johann Adam Andreas ' father, Karl Eusebius, the palace was designed with three floors and 13 windows axis on the main front and seven windows axis on the lateral front. Together with the stems it forms a courtyard .
Sala terrene of the Palais
1700 the shell was completed. In 1702, the Salzburg master stonemason and Georg Andreas Doppler took over 7,005 guilders for the manufacture of door frame made of white marble of Salzburg, 1708 was the delivery of the fireplaces in marble hall for 1,577 guilders. For the painted decoration was originally the Bolognese Marcantonio Franceschini hired, from him are some of the painted ceilings on the first floor. Since he to slow to the prince, Antonio Belucci was hired from Venice, who envisioned the rest of the floor. The ceiling painting in the Great Hall, the Hercules Hall but got Andrea Pozzo . Pozzo in 1708 confirmed the sum of 7,500 florins which he had received since 1704 for the ceiling fresco in the Marble Hall in installments. As these artists died ( Pozzo) or declined to Italy, the Prince now had no painter left for the ground floor.
After a long search finally Michael Rottmayr was hired for the painting of the ground floor - originally a temporary solution, because the prince was of the opinion that only Italian artist buon gusto d'invenzione had. Since Rottmayr was not involved in the original planning, his paintings not quite fit with the stucco. Rottmayr 1708 confirmed the receipt of 7,500 guilders for his fresco work.
Giovanni Giuliani, who designed the sculptural decoration in the window roofing of the main facade, undertook in 1705 to provide sixteen stone vases of Zogelsdorfer stone. From September 1704 to August 1705 Santino Bussi stuccoed the ground floor of the vault of the hall and received a fee of 1,000 florins and twenty buckets of wine. 1706 Bussi adorned the two staircases, the Marble Hall, the Gallery Hall and the remaining six halls of the main projectile with its stucco work for 2,200 florins and twenty buckets of wine. Giuliani received in 1709 for his Kaminbekrönungen (fireplace crowning) of the great room and the vases 1,128 guilders.
Garden
Liechtenstein Palace from the garden
The new summer palace of Henry of Ferstel from the garden
The garden was created in the mind of a classic baroque garden. The vases and statues were carried out according to the plans of Giuseppe Mazza from the local Giovanni Giuliani. In 1820 the garden has been remodeled according to plans of Joseph Kornhäusel in the Classical sense. In the Fürstengasse was opposite the Palais, the Orangerie, built 1700s.
Use as a museum
Already from 1805 to 1938, the palace was housing the family collection of the house of Liechtenstein, which was also open for public viewing, the collection was then transferred to the Principality of Liechtenstein, which remained neutral during the war and was not bombed. In the 1960s and 1970s, the so-called Building Centre was housed in the palace as a tenant, a permanent exhibition for builders of single-family houses and similar buildings. From 26 April 1979 rented the since 1962 housed in the so-called 20er Haus Museum of the 20th Century , a federal museum, the palace as a new main house, the 20er Haus was continued as a branch . Since the start of operations at the Palais, the collection called itself Museum of Modern Art (since 1991 Museum of Modern Art Ludwig Foundation ), the MUMOK in 2001 moved to the newly built museum district.
From 29 March 2004 till the end of 2011 in the Palace was the Liechtenstein Museum, whose collection includes paintings and sculptures from five centuries. The collection is considered one of the largest and most valuable private art collections in the world, whose main base in Vaduz (Liechtenstein) is . As the palace, so too the collection is owned by the Prince of Liechtenstein Foundation .
On 15 November 2011 it was announced that the regular museum operating in the Garden Palace was stopped due to short of original expectations, visiting numbers remaining lower as calculated, with January 2012. The Liechtenstein City Palace museum will also not offer regular operations. Exhibited works of art would then (in the city palace from 2013) only during the "Long Night of the Museums", for registered groups and during leased events being visitable. The name of the Liechtenstein Museum will no longer be used.
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palais_Liechtenstein_%28F%C3%BCrste...
The monument, executed by Sir William Goscombe and erected in 1933, to Evan & James James.
Evan James (Bardic name Ieuan ap Iago), was a weaver and poet. His son James James (Bardic name Ieuan ap Iago), is said to have thought up the tune for Hen Wlad fy Nhadau (Land of My Fathers) as he walked along the bank of the River Rhondda one day in 1856. He gave the tune to his father Evan, who composed the lyrics. The song became the National Anthem of Wales.
The monument depicts two Celtic figures, a boy playing a harp representing music, and a girl representing poetry. The faces of Evan & James are between the figures. Evan is shown as younger than his son, due to these being the only photographs available to the sculptor. In front of the group is the coped ledger stone from Evan's grave. When the Carmel Chapel was demolished, the remains of Evan and his wife Elizabeth were transferred to the foot of the monument, with the stone.
This piece is entitled "self portrait of ones entire life". I executed this piece with the a theory I developed that is called Dimensionalism . This theory has its inspiration form my experiences with pre-seizure events for I have epilepsy. In this state I become detached from reality and see time in a different construct,that of a hyper intensity. A hyper awareness of a moment and everything that constructs it from sounds,thoughts,things tactile . While in these pre seizure states, some instances time is slowed down/speed up or frozen. While in other instances I am forced away form all comprehension of what is in my present environment and reality takes on a totally foreign existence where all has to be re learned.
For the viewers of my piece all of life is in dimensions and how one moves through these dimensions of either large dimensional constructs such as ones life or to the minute dimensional construct of a simple word. Thus giving the viewer this new perspective of time and space. The suspended animation of the piece is only dynamic as the viewer views the piece from the narrower sides form either end where a visible play of time sequencing exists and ones eye is drawn into the piece...
A perspective of a Dimesionalist where one has a view of a moment with a gods eye/time traveler or a pure energy source . From looking at a simple word to a memory one has. All is captured in dimensions. There are other branches of my theory that further portray my experiences. Demensionalising and facitile dimensionalism. These ideas also play with the constructs of how one sees time/moment.I hope to execute these ideas in the future...........
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
All these ideas/theories have a direct correlation with present day society...from the over abundance of information that is transferred by different technologies to the ways these technologies directly affect our existence and how it adds other dimensions of time to our lives.
I will be placing more info online in the future. and creating a temp website that fully explains all the details and shows examples of these theories as well as go into more details..
If you are interested in more info please feel free to contact ...efj@sbcglobal.net
Best best
Efj.
Poet, arrested at age 15, executed in Solovetski in 1937.
Exhibition about the Gulags in the Verzetsmuseum
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote the following in his Gulag Archipelago:
“Thus many were shot — thousands at first, then hundreds of thousands. We divide, we multiply, we sigh, we curse. But still and all, these are just numbers. They overwhelm the mind and then are easily forgotten. And if someday the relatives of those who had been shot were to send one publisher photographs of their executed kin, and an album of those photographs were to be published in several volumes, then just by leafing through them and looking into the extinguished eyes we would learn much that would be valuable for the rest of our lives. Such reading, almost without words, would leave a deep mark on our hearts for all eternity.
In one household I am familiar with, where some former zeks live, the following ceremony takes place: On March 5, the day of the death of the Head Murderer, they spread out on the table all the photographs of those who were shot and those who died in camps that they have been able to collect — several dozen of them. And throughout the day solemnity reigns in the apartment — somewhat like that of a church, somewhat like that of a museum. There is funeral music. Friends come to visit, to look at the photographs, to keep silent, to listen, to talk softly together. And then they leave without saying good-bye.
And that is how it ought to be everywhere. At least these deaths would have left a small scar on our hearts.
So that they should not have died in vain!
And I, too, have a few such chance photographs. Look at these at least:
Viktor Petrovich Pokrovsky — shot in Moscow in 1918.
Aleksandr Shtrobinder, a student — shot in Petrograd in 1918.
Vasily Ivanovich Anichkov — shot in the Lubyanka in 1927.
Aleksandr Andreyevich Svechin, a professor of the General Staff — shot in 1935.
Mikhail Aleksandrovich Reformatsky, an agronomist — shot in Orel in 1938.
Yelizaveta Yevgenyevna Anichkova — shot in a camp on the Yenisei in 1942.”
Elizabethan and Stuart
The Chideock Martyrs are executed for their faith - statues by Elisabeth Frink. Fire strikes the town in 1613 - design by St Osmund's Middle School pupils. Puritan Rector John White founds the Nappers Mite Almshouses and Grammar School, and sends a Pilgrim ship to the New World.
Top left represents Elisabeth Frink's statues of two Elizabethan Catholic martyrs facing Death. The statues are in South Walks, near the site of the old gallows.
The Great Fire of 1613 destroyed much of the largely wooden medieval town. Pupils from St Osmund's Middle School designed the fire.
Dorchester has been altered rather than rebuilt and the town holds layers of hidden history in many of its buildings.
Puritan Rector of Dorchester, Reverend John White founded the Nappers Mite Almshouses, the Boys Grammar School and girls schools. He arranged for one of the first Pilgrim Fathers' ships, the Mary and John, to sail to the New World.
The Dorchester 700 Community Tapestry was designed by Suzanne Finch and embroidered, painted and quilted by local volunteers and children from Dorchester's middle schools.
It was created to mark the 700th Anniversary in 2005 of Dorchester's recognition as the County Town of Dorset in the Charter of King Edward I.
It was executed between September 2005 and December 2006 and is on permanent display in the foyer to the Corn Exchange, although it is not displayed in a good way at all and its doubtful that so many people in Dorchester are even aware of it.
What bright spark in the Town Council thought this would be the best place?
Still, its slightly more accessible than the John Hodgson's Dorchester Historical Illustrations conveniently on display in the Waitrose staff dining room.
Apologies if I'm breaking any copyright laws, but if this wonderful tapestry was displayed correctly perhaps I wouldn't feel it necessary to post it here.
Postcards of the tapestry can be bought at various locations in Dorchester including the Tourist Information centre and the Dorset County Museum
Title: It! The Terror From Beyond Space
Year Of Release: 1958
Running Time: 69 minutes
DVD Released By: MGM Home Entertainment
Directed By: Edward L. Cahn
Writing Credits: Jerome Bixby
Starring: Marshall Thompson, Shawn Smith, Kim Spalding, Ann Doran, Dabbs Greer, Paul Langton, Robert Bice
Taglines:
1. It breathes, it hunts…It Kills!
2. IT!...Reaches through space!...Scoops up men and women!...Gorges on blood!
3. The revelation shocker of things to come!
Alternate Titles:
It! The Vampire from Beyond Space (1958)
The Terror from Beyond Space (1958).
Review Date: 12.12.04 (updated 1.1.10)
The film opens with a thundering musical theme and a title that threatens to bust out of the screen and into our third spatial dimension. After the credits end, we get a view of the Martian surface. In the distance we see the wreckage of a crashed rocket ship. A voice belonging to Colonel Edward Carruthers begins to narrate, relating how the ship he commanded cracked up on landing six months previously and how he is now the only survivor from that doomed expedition, the crew encountering some strange force on the Red planet they came to know only as death. The camera slowly pans over the landscape and a second rocket ship is revealed, albeit intact and standing erect. Carruthers says that he will now be going back to face his superiors on Earth and possibly another kind of death.
Now we see the capitol building in Washington D.C., which quickly fades to a door marked, “Science advisory committee. Division of interplanetary exploration.” No doubt down the hall are the offices for the division on Radiation-Enlarged Insects and Lizards. Inside this room a government official is conducting a press conference and releasing information on the second rocket ship sent to Mars. He talks about how Colonel Carruthers has been found alive, but is the only survivor from the initial expedition. The Colonel will be returned to Earth to face trial for the murders of the rest of the first ship’s crew.
Back on Mars, we see the Challenge-142 preparing to lift off. Before they can depart, Van Heusen notices an open compartment. It seems Lt. Calder was dumping some crates (littering) and forgot to close it. The open hatch is closed remotely, but as it slides shut, an ominous shadow moving about nearby alerts us to the fact that something has managed to get aboard while it was open. We hear a few growls and even get a close up of IT’s feet as it moves about. I gotta say, this guy needs some serious corrective footwear. Talk about a slewfoot! What is even more hilarious is that the shadow we see on the wall seems to be made by the actor in the monster suit, but not the monster mask. His facial features seem pretty clear in silhouette.
After a name check, Van Heusen begins the launch countdown at ten, while strapped into what appears to be a lawn chair! Where was the budget blown for this ship? No trash recycling systems and cheap chairs! The contractor must have spent it somewhere, but it obviously wasn’t on this ship!
Once in space and safely on the way home, Van Heusen (who will henceforth be referred to simply as Van – some of the characters did it, why not me) begins acting like an asshole, ridiculing Carruther’s story of a monster. He tells Carruthers (seemingly with great delight) that they have enough evidence to put him in front of a firing squad. They head up one level and Van shows him a human skull they found on the surface of Mars. Dental records revealed it to be a Frank Kenner, one of Carruther’s crew. The skull has an obvious bullet hole in it and Van says, “There’s only one kind of a monster that uses bullets.” There is an ominous musical cue. Carruthers walks away and the film fades out.
Sometime later the crew is cleaning up after a meal. Correction: the women are cleaning up after a meal. Yes, in this futuristic year of 1973, women – despite being doctors and presumably vital members of the crew – are still assigned the laborious task of cleaning up after meals and making sure all the lazy, fat-ass males have fresh, hot coffee in their cups and are supplied with cigarettes. I wonder if these guys made them cook the meal as well.
So this group has finished a meal and are relaxing. The usual light banter is exchanged before the topic of Colonel Carruthers and his monster comes up. Royce (the other Royce will always be referred to as Doctor Royce for purposes of this review) says that he doesn’t disbelieve or believe the story. Along about that time Carruthers arrives and is greeted with a smart-ass comment from Van. He gets some coffee from Ann and retreats back up one level. Van then states that before they reach Earth, he will have Carruthers’ confession on tape. What is he going to do, beat it out of him?
Some more time passes and Ann brings Carruthers a plate of food. She admits that she has only heard the story of what happened to the crew of the Challenge-141 from Van and would like to hear it straight from Carruthers. He relates to her how they landed, went out exploring and then got caught in a sandstorm. Something in the storm began taking the crew and in the confusion shots were fired, one apparently killing Kenner by mistake. Carruthers was the only one who made it back to the ship. Subsequent searches turned up no signs of his crew or the thing that took them.
Van continues to act like a dick. Ann - with whom he seems to have some sort of relationship beyond work - tells him that he owes it to Carruthers to treat him like a fellow officer and not an animal, and that it is not his place to decide whether he is guilty.
More time passes. Royce and Carruthers are playing chess while Van looks on, smoking a cigarette. Calder is nearby scribbling in a notebook – probably “I won’t leave outer hatches open before lift-off” a hundred times, enforced by Van for his lamebrain mistake. Elsewhere, Keinholz is sitting alone at a desk, looking bored. He hears their stowaway bumbling around the cargo hold. He goes to investigate and is killed, the attack shown as shadows on a wall. The monster lifts Keinholz over his head and brings him smashing to the floor, where he proceeds to pelt the unfortunate crewmen with a barrage of blows…or in this case, cartwheeling its arms and bitch-slapping the guy to death.
Above, Carruthers has heard the commotion and wonders what is going on. No one else seems to have heard anything. He still insists on performing a head count and when Keinholz comes up missing, everyone begins searching the ship for him. While everyone is split up, Gino Finelli is captured by the beast when he stops to pilfer some cigarettes from a storage locker.
Everyone convenes again and Van is in disbelief as there just isn’t a place on the ship a man could hide. Carruthers asks where Gino is and Bob says that he was right behind him. He looks back down the ladder to the deck below and calls out to Gino, but all is silent below. He, Van and Carruthers all go back down where they find Gino’s unused cigarette on the floor, but no Gino. Now everyone is calling out for Gino in addition to Keinholz. Soon after, Keinholz’s body is located in an air duct.
Everyone comes running and arrives as Keinholz is removed from the duct. Bob wonders if Gino is inside the duct, but Carruthers looks and sees nothing. Major Purdue volunteers to go in to look for Gino as he claims to know the layout. He crawls on in, but doesn’t see anything at first. Then he re-orients himself and sees Gino at the end of the passage. Gino is looking pretty bad, like he was in a fight with an Avon lady who applied her make-up samples to him. Purdue yells out that he found Gino and begins to crawl toward him. He shakes Gino, trying to rouse him but Gino just shakes his head limply. Then there is a shadowy movement nearby and IT arrives on the scene, no doubt pissed to find someone playing with his food. IT growls and claws at Purdue, who screams before pulling out a revolver and squeezing off a few shots. This makes the monster roar and outside in the storage room, Carruther’s face is one of dread – he knows that roar all too well, it seems.
Purdue comes barreling out of the duct and Carruthers sneaks a glance inside before he and Van replace the cover over the entrance. Bob, naturally has a fit, upset that his brother is being left behind. He is removed by Royce and Carruthers yells to the cowering women to run and get a head start. A head start for where? You’re on a spaceship, not the open plains of Iowa. Carruthers then spots a crate of grenades and suggests that they wire them up to the hatches, thus blowing IT up if it decides to leave the duct. So Van, Carruthers and Calder wire up these grenades, then gather up Keinholz’s body (which seemed to magically aid them in picking itself off the floor) and retreat to one of the upper levels.
Next we see a table loaded with guns, rifles and ammunition. It looks like a NRA convention! It is at this point that I must point out the sheer stupidity of these people. They are on a spaceship, which is traveling through the vacuum of space. Rupturing the hull of the ship in any way would be extraordinarily bad. I’d imagine that great pains would be taken to minimize the chances that such an event ever took place. Yet these fools insist on firing projectile weapons within the confines of the ship. Not only that, but they have grenades ready to detonate below. Now, what kind of tests did these people have to pass in order to be selected for this mission? Cuz smarts don’t seem to be a requisite. Not once does any one of them stop to consider the chances that such an explosion might actually harm the bloody ship! No, they just fire away. Either these people are colossal idiots, or they are confident in the construction and engineering of the ship – but given the lawn chairs adorning the place, I would not exactly be willing to bet my life on the latter possibility.
So the men are taking stock of the weapons while the ladies apply the most idiotic looking bandage to Purdue’s head. Royce tries to console Bob by telling him there was nothing they could have done for Gino, but Bob is pissed that they didn’t even try to rescue his brother.
Meanwhile, Van is asking Carruthers if he knows what IT is. This must have just galled the guy to no end. Here he was all ready to break Carruthers and get a confession, and now he must admit that the other man was right all along. Time passes and the gang is pacing up and down, waiting for IT to leave the ducts and trip the grenade trap. They all gather around the intercom and listen as IT busts through the grate covering the duct and sets off the grenades. All those grenades detonate and we are treated to an explosion that looks like it was made by a box of firecrackers.
They still hear the monster growling, so they know that the plan has failed. Without a word, they hoist their firearms, open the central stair hatch and head down to investigate further…well, all the guys do. The women stay up above, no doubt prepping coffee. The guys gather around the door to C and open it up. A lot of smoke passes through the doorway, obscuring their vision. Calder, who is carrying the biggest gun, goes in first. Well, actually Van was in the lead, but when he couldn’t get the lights activated, he motions for Calder to go first. Chickenshit bastard. Calder barely gets through the door when IT lunges out of the smoke, grabs his rifle and bends it, Superman-style, over its head. Calder, Royce and Bob then run like hell up the stairs while Van and Carruthers fire their pistols at the beast. They retreat up the stairs, firing all the way, while IT tears the door to C compartment open wide enough to get through. Once safely up the stairs, the crew closes the central stair hatch.
Next gas grenades are used in an attempt to kill the beast. This fails to work as well and Van comes out of the engagement with an injured foot, scraped up something bad when the monster grabbed him.
Dr. Royce has completed the autopsy on Keinholz, discovering that “there is not a molecule of oxygen or a drop of water” left in his body. Blood, bone marrow, glandular secretions – everything, is gone. She theorizes that since there are no puncture marks on the body, that this was accomplished through some type of osmosis process. Keep in mind that the Human body is sixty to seventy percent water. Now, we got a pretty good view of the dead Keinholz earlier. Sure, his body was shriveled, but if all the moisture in his body had been removed, then would not he have looked more like a dried up prune, and been the size of a cabbage patch doll? Van Heusen hasn’t joined the cadaver club yet, though his wound is infected and nothing Dr. Royce can do helps it any.
They open the central hatch and peer down. IT is two levels down, but they can see it breaking through the center hatch onto the level directly below them, which will grant it access to the next level. They realize that if IT can get through the center hatches, they are royally SCREWED. Ann approaches Carruthers and tells him that he was right and they were all wrong. They hold hands and share a Kodak moment.
Royce pipes in about now with an idea he and Bob have worked out. He proposes that two men exit through the control room airlock and then space walk down the side of the ship and re-enter through the airlock on the motor level – below the current location of the creature. This would enable them to surprise the monster, but they aren’t sure what to surprise it with. Carruthers says he’s been thinking and has an idea, so he and Calder suit up and make their way down the hull to the bottom of the ship. They reach the airlock on the motor level and the others above begin talking loud at the proper time, distracting the monster from what is occurring below it. Carruthers and Calder sneak out onto the motor level and set an electrical trap on the stairs that lead to the upper level where IT is located.
The two then take cover behind some induction pumps and open the center hatch, which is noticed by the creature. It begins to descend the stairs and when it gets to the appropriate spot – ZAP. Nothing. The monster is not affected. Carruthers is able to make it safely to the airlock, but Calder takes a blow to the head that tears his vinyl “helmet” and stumbles back, his foot getting caught and the fall breaking his leg. He fires up an acetylene torch and uses it to fend off the monster every time it gets to close to his hiding spot.
Carruthers returns to the others where they try and think of a way to rescue Calder, who can be heard over the radio. Meanwhile the Doctor approaches Royce and tells him that the alien bacteria are attacking bone marrow, resulting in a leukemia-type condition. The drugs she has been using are working too slowly and she needs fresh blood to keep Van and Purdue alive – but there is no more on this level. They will need to descend to the cargo level and retrieve some more.
Royce is preparing to make a run for the blood and Bob decides that it his “turn” now to go. What is this, a ride? I suppose he feels the need to do something in helping kill the monster that murdered his brother. Carruthers decides to accompany them. Calder promises to keep them apprised of the creature’s movements via the intercom. A shadow on the wall tells us that IT is still dragging dead Gino around, and has wandered into the reactor room. After Calder reports this, it gives Carruthers an idea. He remotely closes the reactor room door and asks Calder what the monster does. When no odd behavior is reported, the three men make their descent in search of the blood supply.
Meanwhile Van has awoken again and is trying to get up from his cot. The women try to restrain him but he yells and pushes past them. He has an idea – by unsealing the reactor, the radiation will kill the monster. He flips some controls while the ladies still try and talk sense into him. In the reactor room, the creature is banging on the door to get out when the reactor is unsealed and it gets a face full of radiation. The women call down to warn the men what has happened, inciting Carruthers and Royce to speed things up. Below, Bob is helping Calder up the stairs when IT breaks out of the reactor room. Calder dives back into his hiding spot and Bob fires off his pistol at the beast. He then tries to run up the stairs, but IT is too fast. The monster reaches up and grabs him, pulling him down to the floor and bitch-slapping him to death. Royce and Carruthers haul ass back up the stairs with the blood, having to leave Bob behind. They get back to the laboratory level and then everyone heads on up to the topmost level – the control room.
Everyone is now huddled on the highest level. For some IDIOTIC reason, Carruthers is carrying a bazooka. A bazooka! They pile some heavy crates over the hatch in the floor, hoping to keep IT from busting up through the opening. Nearby Ann and Van are talking and the ever more disconcerted Colonel is remarking on Ann is now “with” Carruthers and how it happened out of the blue. She tries to dismiss it and wants to talk about it later, but he insists that there may be no later considering how their situation is degenerating rapidly. She walks off to help Carruthers and Van continues to mutter to Dr. Royce.
They contact Calder down below, who is still alive. He can see the monster still bumbling around on the motor level. About now IT has decided to find out where everyone else has gone. IT ascends the stairs to the first storage level and begins banging around. Calder warns Carruthers that IT is on its way up. The gang up top makes ready, turning the lights off and preparing for the last fight. Carruthers tells Calder to make his way to the airlock now that IT is no longer nearby and hide there. Then Carruthers picks up the bazooka again and aims it at the hatch.
While waiting, Carruthers happens to glance at a dial on a nearby instrument panel and notices that the oxygen consumption on the ship is far in excess of what it should be. He points this out to Royce and the two theorize that it is due to the monster. With the thin air on Mars it would need a gigantic lung capacity and has thus been hogging all the oxygen on the ship with its Darth Vader breathing style. Carruthers suggest letting all the air out of the ship to kill it. Royce agrees, saying they can build it back up for themselves later.
A mad rush is on now, everyone trying to get into his or her space suit. The monster tears his way up onto the laboratory level, doesn’t even hesitate and then heads up the latter to the top level. IT bangs on the hatch, causing all the boxes sitting atop it to topple over, and then IT peels back the metal of the hatch like wrapping paper and pokes up through the opening like a jack-in-the-box. Everyone has their spacesuits on now, but Carruthers cannot reach the controls to release the air because the monster is in the way. He calls to Royce, who is now holding the bazooka, to drive it back down so he can make his way to the proper control panel. Royce fires the bazooka, but the rocket just bounces off the monster before bouncing around the floor some. No detonation at all! It must have been a dud. Carruthers is trying to reach the controls, but the monster is preventing him from getting too close. Van then jumps up, runs to the controls and hits the correct button. The airlock doors open and the air begins rushing out. The monster has grabbed Van and no doubt given him the squish treatment, as when next we see Van, he is stretched out on the floor.
The ship begins diving. Well, not really…but given that the emergency klaxon blaring away to warn everyone of decompression and air loss sounds just like the diving bell in some old WWII movie, and one can see why it seems like the ship is diving. Everyone hangs on for dear life. Papers start flying around the room, but very few actually get blown out the airlock. The monster growls, writhes around and finally stops moving as the last of the air is removed. Carruthers checks on both IT and Van, but both are still and quiet. I have to wonder how Van didn’t get blown out. Everyone was hanging on, but Van was out cold (or dead). It seems the monster is finally dead. Everyone seems relieved, and the camera zooms in on Ann and Carruthers as they hold hands before fading out…
…Into ANOTHER freakin’ shot of the ship flying through space (number nine). This fades into the room in Washington D.C. that we saw at the very beginning of the film. The same government official is conducting another press release. He has more information to add to the story he gave to the reporters the previous evening. He reads a message from the Challenge-142 received less than an hour ago:
“This is Eric Royce talking. Of the nineteen men and women who have set foot upon the planet Mars, six will return.”
Six? Let’s see…Carruthers, Ann, Royce, Dr. Royce, Purdue and…Calder, I suppose. Calder was hiding in the airlock on the motor level while Van Heusen got beat up by the monster and was laying there pretty still at the end, so I guess he was the one who died. The message continues:
“There is no longer a question of murder, but of an alien and elemental lifeforce. A planet so cruel, so hostile, that man may have to find it necessary to bypass it in his endeavor to explore and understand the universe.”
Well, at least Carruthers has been cleared, but Royce makes out like the planet Mars is so damn dangerous. Excuse me, but were not you guys all safe until you got back on the ship? The planet seemed pretty harmless. It is the native life that proved to be so deadly. Big difference. The message (and the movie) concludes:
“Another name for Mars…is death.”
Fade out. The End.
Structurally, this movie is most similar to The Thing From Another World in that it deals with a small group of people trapped struggling to prevail against a deadly organism from another planet bound and determined to make a snack of them all. Aside from the opening and closing segments set on Earth (which most people conclude were added in order to stretch out the film’s running time) the movie never leaves the crew of the Challenge-142. Once things get rolling, the movie rarely lets up and moves along at a brisk pace, rapidly pushing its characters through one bad situation and into another. While not as intense as later films would be, the approach taken works very well and the viewer begins to detect the sense of danger and desperation that builds as the film progresses.
Sadly, the character development that was so well executed in the Howard Hawk’s The Thing From Another World, is sorely and quite obviously lacking here. We are quickly introduced to a number of people, who for the most part, will be expanded upon very little and examined only long enough to form the vaguest of impressions. With the exception of Carruthers and Van Heusen, who these people are and what motivates them was just not important to the producers. Those two are plainly set up to be at odds with each other, though the conflict is really all on the part of Van Heusen, who is resolute in his belief of Carruther’s guilt. Yet, the film sets up this adversarial dynamic and goes no where with it. Early on during the monster’s rampage, Van Heusen takes a hit and is restricted to bed for the rest of the film, offering up only smartass remarks and a failed attempt at killing the creature thereafter. I suppose one could say that Van Heusen was shown to be in error when it came to the veracity of Carruthers’ story, and that he was pushed aside to make room for latter to take the lead and redeem himself. There could not be two leaders, so one was removed.
While the characters might not be the most fleshed out in film history, they certainly make up for it with their actions. After viewing this movie, one has to wonder what kind of idiots these people truly were. How they ever graduated from some type of training program and granted a position on a ship to Mars is beyond me. In fact, the entire organization seems lacking. There is just so much that betrays them as morons. Like smoking. These people are nicotine fiends who are lighting up non-stop. Someone missing? Have a smoke. The monster kills someone? Have a smoke. Time running out and death looking certain? Have a freaking smoke! I must say that the Challenge-142 must have one HELL of an air recycling system. These folks have the oxygen scrubbers working overtime with all the smoke they exhale.
On top of that, these guys are gun toting, trigger-happy morons who make the Montana militia groups look like the boy scouts. They start squeezing off rounds at the drop of a hat, no worries about ricocheting bullets or friendly fire. I guess the ship, on top of having a first rate air recycling system, also has the sturdiest hull ever manufactured by mankind. It must have, as these guys don’t give a single thought to accidentally rupturing the hull. And they don’t stop with guns! They haul out grenades by the dozen and detonate them and then move on up to firing a bazooka in their ship’s control room!
As far as visual FX are concerned, this film doesn’t have too many. What we do see is adequately done by the standards of the day. The most ambitious shot is the view of Carruthers and Calder walking down the side of the ship as it traverses the stars. Back then it might have looked awesome, but now it is very easy to notice that the actors don’t seem to be covering any ground, despite taking numerous steps as well as the obvious signs of matting them into the footage of the rocket. I’d venture to say that the best looking thing we see, though it is just for a few seconds at the film’s beginning, is the painting that represents the surface of Mars. Sure, it looks nothing like what Mars really looks like, but it is still executed pretty darn well.
Now we come to the one aspect that is both one of the best as well as one of the worst things about the movie: The monster. The monster costume is a glaring source of both potential embarrassment and possible fun. The costume is a rather bulky, rubber affair that bends in all the wrong places, heightening the “cheese” factor and lending a certain air of ridiculousness to the film. The way it lumbers, stumbles and plods around the ship is laughable considering the dire circumstances and danger it supposedly represents. The face is static, except for the tongue that is often protruding from the sizable mouth. This effect was produced by the actor’s chin pushing the “tongue” through the creature’s maw.
Since the movie was filmed on a mere handful of sets, with a single set used to represent the various central chambers of the ship – just re-dressed for each one, director Cahn makes good use of the limited space he has. Thanks to the camera work and the set dressing, the ship comes across as being fairly good sized. Another thing he does rather well in conjunction with cinematographer Kenneth Peach is to hide the monster and utilize shadows to create an atmosphere of dread and creepiness. Whether this was done for artistic reasons or to help hide the often silly-looking monster suit is open for debate, but since the creature is shown quite well on several occasions, and the suit holds up pretty darn well to scrutiny, I personally believe it was the former. There are numerous occasions where all we see is the beast’s shadow on the wall, or a foot moving across the floor. More than one assault on a Human is shown as nothing more than shadows on a wall, which, while lessening the onscreen violence, only makes the attacks more horrifying. This method really helps in firing the imagination, as what the mind conjures up is almost always more frightening than what we ultimately see on screen.
Still, despite all the apparent flaws...indeed, perhaps because of those very flaws, this film has a sizable “fun” quotient. Taking it too seriously will only lessen the enjoyment derived from the proceedings. An enormous grain of salt, along with a large suspension of disbelief will come in handy here, and will help transform the film from an “old 50’s monster movie” into a “classic B-Movie experience.”