web analytics

Autumn Starts with Jablonex Beads

To mark the last day of August, here is a scan from my childhood’s favourite booklet – Jablonex Jewellery Catalogue for 1984. With years I came to realise that some of the photos beamed with sexuality; yet at the time it all looked merely appealing and teasing.

Jablonex - Official 1984 Catalogue
Autumn Season – Jablonex 1984 Jewellery Catalogue

Moscow Parks and Gardens: Biryulyovo Arboretum

An old bridge
Kid’s art

Biryulyovo Arboretum is located faily near to where I live: I only have to walk under the railway bridge, then take a bus, and in a few stops I will be near one of the best contemporary examples of park building.

Birch alley
A pond near the entrance

It all started in 1932, when the first attempt to convert the soil previously used for pasture had been made. It wasn’t successful: all new plants were swarmed by grass. A more serious undertaking was initiated in 1938 by V. Polozov. This time the focus was on cleaning the territory and preparing the soil. After this Polozov suggested to plant more tree seeds into a furrow than was initially recommended. Two results were thus achieved. One, trees were supporting one another, whilst growing. Two, they were continuously dug out and taken to be replanted elsewhere in Moscow city. Only “necessary” trees would stay in their furrows.

Another pond
Sunshine

The park itself was conceived as a combination of a landscape park and a regular park. As a result, what may seem to be an orderly entwining of different alleys is in fact a carefully constructed maze of over 220 tree species. The park constantly evolves, and maple trees change linden and birch trees to give way to pines and larches. Thanks to this, while providing shelter from extreme heat in summer, in autumn the Biryulyovo Arboretum is a feast for eyes, with all its autumnal palette.

Shades of green
Conifers tops

The Arboretum’s selection of conifers is the best one in Moscow, comparable only to the one in the Botanical Gardens. 40% of plants come from North America; another large group originally grows in the Far East, including China and Japan. Typically Russian plants are also well presented, coming from the European part, Siberia, Caucasus, and Central Asian mountains. Most of these plants easily accommodate themselves in the Moscow suburb, adding more decorative elements to the park.

Conifer trees tops: another look
Trees and shadows

  Naturally, the Arboretum in Biryulyovo attracts a lot of citizens who come here to enjoy Nature, solitude, fresh air, and lovely views. But this is also a unique schooling opportunity, and excursions to the Arboretum are regularly organised for pupils. This is the place where a child bonds with Nature and learns to appreciate its beauty, grace, and frailty.

As for me, I visited the Arboretum for the first time in my life a couple of months ago, just before the weather got really hot. One has to point out that, as with any other popular park, this place can get pretty crowded. Nonetheless, a walk up and down alleys, past changing tree species, is unforgettable, inspiring and kind of equivalent to a stroll along an embankment in a seaside town. The fresh air cleanses your head and emotions, the trees calm you down, and altogether this experience opens your eyes, and you quite literally begin to see both forest and its trees.

 

Claude Lelouch – C’Etait un Rendez-Vous (1976)

Before Paris, Je T’Aime was ever conceived, Claude Lelouch declared his love for all three at once – a city, the cinema, and a woman. As the note at the start of his short film says, the footage wasn’t sped up. It was Lelouch himself who drove through a morning city on a neck-breaking speed, to embrace his beloved – and to meet some of Paris’s best-known and loved landmarks and corners. 8mins 39sec of an urban road-movie still feel contemporary and not a bit outdated. Is love?

This brilliant short road-movie inspired many hommages. And in 2006 Mr Lelouch was interviewed about making the film and drove the distance again, which you can enjoy in a new version below. English and French subtitles are available.

Kyiv Fashion: Year 1972 – Part 1

As per announcement, here is a weekly feature on Kyiv Fashion booklets, spanning the period from 1972 till 1990. Be it for my mum’s heritage or some other reason, but there has always been many Ukrainian fashion booklets in our house. The most amazing thing about these booklets is that they all feature sketches and pictures, so you will be able to see how the sketching technique evolved in 20 years. You can view individual photos on Flickr.

http://www.flickr.com/apps/slideshow/show.swf?v=104087

The Dream Journey on the Trans-Siberian Railroad: Map and Routes

Landscape near Irkutsk (by VChokan)

I hope to make one or two journeys along a part of the Trans-Siberian Railroad before the end of 2011. I’m not sure I’ll dare to go on a full journey in winter, but next summer everything is possible. I have not been outside Central Russia, and using a train is as reliable as it is affordable way of exploring the country and its people.

Anyway, here is the map of the Trans-Siberian, Trans-Mongolian, and Trans-Manchurian Railways. Only the first of them – Trans-Siberian – takes you from Moscow to Vladivostok without leaving Russia. Two others connect Moscow with Beijing, Trans-Mongolian going through Mongolia and the Gobi Desert, and Trans-Manchurian going via North-Eastern China.

 

Sergei Esenin Vagankovo Monument and Final Poem Translation

Esenin Memorial in Vagankovo
Esenin Monument in Ivanovo

I had a long walk in Vagankovo Cemetery today, the place where a lot of celebrated Russians were laid to rest. Among them is Sergei Esenin, famous for his village-inspired poetry, a romance with Isadora Duncan, and untimely suicide-murder in Astoria Hotel in St. Petersburg at the age of 30. Back in 2006, on a chilly autumn evening I translated his final poem that he scribbled in blood on a piece of paper.

Farewell, my friend, farewell to thou.
You’ll remain forever in my heart.
We shall meet again one day from now,
And for that we have been meant to part.
Farewell, my friend, see you in time.
Don’t frown in sadness or in grief.
There is nothing new about dying
In this life, like it’s not new to live.

© Julia Shuvalova 2006

Original Russian text: 

До свиданья, друг мой, до свиданья.
Милый мой, ты у меня в груди.
Предназначенное расставанье
Обещает встречу впереди.

До свиданья, друг мой, ни руки, ни слова.
Не грусти и не печаль бровей.
В этой жизни умирать не ново,
Да и жить, конечно, не новей.

1928 г.

The Manege Square Fountain Photo Seen Over 12,000 Times

The Equestrian Fountain in the Manege Square, Moscow, Russia

Since I took this photo in early October 2010, it’s been included in Google Earth and viewed over 12,000 times. I’m astonished and grateful. I used it previously in a post, but I thought it deserved an encore. This is one of the fountains established in the Manezhe Square, to mark 850th anniversary of Moscow in 1997.

Kyiv Fashion Announcement: Two Decades of Soviet Fashion

Kyiv Fashion Models 1974

I grew up flicking through the pages of old fashion booklets and magazines. Although I didn’t realise this at the time, most of those booklets were produced by the Kiev Fashion Model House, the actual models being drawn by the Ukrainian fashion designers. Some of the booklets were also in Ukrainian, so this, together with Nikolai Gogol’s folk stories, was my introduction to the Ukranian language that my maternal grandfather spoke.

Kyiv Fashion Models 1985

Naturally, as the years go by, we start appreciating same things in a different way. As a kid, I felt like missing some of the 1970s air: I loved those sophisticated ladies, a complex mix of innocence and seduction, and handsome men with moustaches, strong, independent, yet elegant. I drew much inspiration from these magazines and booklets throughout my teens, when I made paper dresses for the dolls or wrote romantic stories. To me, 1970s that I never actually saw epitomised the time of whirlwind romances, intrepid gentlemen, and ethereal ladies. Cue in Faye Dunaway, Michael Caine, Barbra Streisand, and Robert Redford, just to begin with.

Kyiv Fashion Models 1988
Kyiv Fashion Models 1987

This is just a teaser of what you can really expect to see and savour over the coming weeks. Apart from throwing tons of lights onto the Soviet fashion, these images are also unique in that they are all hand-drawn sketches representing changing perceptions of female beauty from year to year.

Kyiv Fashion Models 1989

A Birthday Present for Ray Bradbury: Dandelion Wine to Be Filmed

Ray Bradbury

It may be coincidental or not, but Russians must have a particularly soft spot for the American sci-fi classical author. How can you otherwise explain the fact that yet another screen adaptation of the famous Dandelion Wine is based on the script by the Russian actor and film director, Rodion Nakhapetov?

The novel was once adapted for the stage by Bradbury himself, and 1997 had seen the premiere of a Russian adaptation by the late Igor Apasyan (The Sea-Wolf), starring Innokenty Smoktunovsky.

As for Nakhapetov, Dandelion Wine has been one of his favourite books throughout his life. Already in 1980s, while a student at the Cinematography Institute in Moscow, Nakhapetov based his 25-min. short film on the novel. Years later, having got personally acquainted with Bradbury, Nakhapetov was encouraged by the author, who turns 91 today (22 August), to turn the novel into a film script. Not only has Rodion eventually succeeded at adaptation, he and his spouse, Natasha Shliapnikoff managed to get the backing of the Hollywood producers. When Bradbury learnt that the movie was to be made, he said this was the best birthday present he could only wish for.

The producer of the movie is announced to be Mike Medavoy, whose previous films include the Oscar-winning Black Swan and star-studded All the King’s Men.

Dandelion Wine (1957) was described as “haunting and nostalgic”, semi-biographical recollection of the golden era of 1920s, telling about the life in a small town in America in summer of 1928.

 

error: Sorry, no copying !!