Close Encounters with Nordic Arts

 "Close Encounters" is a new online series from Nasjonalmuseet, where we get close to some of the highlights of the paintings and drawings collection.

   - All presentations are in english -

 Part 1 :

 Harald Sohlberg’s “Winter Night in the Mountains”

Get to know what has been called Norway’s “national painting”; Harald Sohlberg’s “Winter Night in the Mountains” from 1914. What does this blue painting of the cold winter night in the mountains symbolize? Did the artist actually paint this outside in the freezing cold? What are the challenges facing the conservators when they wish to preserve this painting for the future? In this live broadcast from the National Gallery's conservation studio, you will meet Thierry Ford, paintings conservator at the National Museum, Mai Britt Guleng, curator at the National Museum and Sohlberg specialist and, not least, the blue winter night itself.

 

 Part 2:

Theodor Kittelsen's "The Black Death"

 

One year ago no one imagined that the dark theme of Theodor Kittelsen's "The Black Death" from the 1890's would become that relevant to us today. It is almost like you can feel her standing next to you when you peer into "Pesta's" hollow face. Why did Kittelsen choose this old, crooked creature as the symbol of the plague that hit Norway in the middle of the 14th century? What inspired the artist in his time? Which techniques did Kittelsen use to convey the sense of gloom in his drawings?

 

 SEE ALSO:

Grim Aural Apocalypse

 Theodor Kittelsen - The Soul of Norway

Forest Enchantment - The Art of Herman August Cappelen

Guests from The Past - A Norwegian painter and a Greek Ethnologist

 

Tip for the St Valentine's Day - The Origins of a Slogan

- Make War Not Love -

In the photo:
Marine Cpl. Michael Wynn in Da Nang (South Vietnam) portrays a proper version of the (back then) famous hippie slogan "make war not love"

 Film still taken from 1968 documentary In the Year of the Pig.

-

 The Origins of "Make Love Not War" slogan

Originally invented by the Hungarian-Jewish writter Gershon Legman and the Homosexual rights activist Rod McKuen. Soon the slogan adopted by the hippie peace movement of the 60s in their anti-war (see pro-communist) rallies.

Other than that, the slogan is used also by John Lennon, Bob Marley and Queen.

-

Knowing all these, OMAIMON PARADOSIS Hails Michael Wynn because he gave the proper answer in a perfect way, time and place!

SEE ALSO:
Long Live The Helter Skelter - Death To Pigs!

The Battle on The Ice

"Peregrinus, expectavi, pedes meos in cymbalis est!
 Vincant arma crucifera! Hostis pereat!"

 

 

After the frozen wastes of the coming scene of battle pointedly evoked by strings, a tramping motion in lower strings and brass depicts approaching Teutonic hordes. The Lating chanting returns, as do a number of motifs heard earlier in the cantata, as in the original film-score. Brass fanfares from the preceding movement mark the Russian counter-attack, and a scherzo-like section, skilfully amalgamated from disparate fragments of the film-score, the mounting excitement of the battle. A pile-driving march episode depicts the Russian victory and terrible loss of life, with a closing allusion to the Nevsky Song as calm descends on the carnage.

Richard Whitehouse

 

 

 

Robert Brasillach - In Memoriam

ROBERT BRASILLACH
31 March 1909 - 6 February 1945

"The Past was so beautiful in short, that we must not blame fate"

 Brasillach saw himself as an intellectual rebel who might further through revolution the victory of the individual — conceived as a unique, creative, feeling animal — over the insensitive, unimaginative, manipulative plebs who threatened to engulf Europe with their mediocrity and their material aspirations in the name of progress and modernization. . .

Brasillach placed his hopes in the rebellion of those under thirty; and he dwelt at length on the virtues of joy and irony bringing about the birth of a post-liberal era. He insisted on the importance of an aesthetic view, rejected both Western corporate capitalism and Soviet bureaucratization, and deplored the rule of commodities over man.

William R. Tucker  - The Fascist Ego: A Political Biography of Robert Brasillach (1975)

More about Robert Brasillach HERE

The Superior Negotiation Skills of Vlad Tepes

 

Watching how the last decades how EU and especially the "Greek" goverment going to "peace talks" (see asslicking) with Turks, oftenly came to my mind how strong rulers of the past reacted to rapant turkish hunger for more european territory. Vlad Tepes knew very well how to treat this old enemy of Europe and the whole Europe must thank him for his ways.

There very little change of Turks since the times of Vlad Tepes but unfortunately Europe changed a lot...

 

("Vlad the Impaler and The Turkish envoys" by Theodor Aman)

 "... Turkish messengers came to [Vlad] to pay respects, but refused to take off their turbans, according to their ancient custom, whereupon he strengthened their custom by nailing their turbans to their heads with three spikes, so that they could not take them off."

 Antonio Bonfini - Historia Pannonica

 

( The Battle with Torches - 17 June 1462 by Theodor Aman)

 
"I have killed peasants men and women, old and young, who lived at Oblucitza and Novoselo, where the Danube flows into the sea, up to Rahova, which is located near Chilia, from the lower Danube up to such places as Samovit and Ghighen. We killed 23,884 Turks without counting those whom we burned in homes or the Turks whose heads were cut by our soldiers...Thus, your highness, you must know that I have broken the peace with him(Sultan Mehmet II)"

Vlad Tepes letter to Corvinus  - 11 February 462