Alfons Maria Mucha

Alfons Maria Mucha (Ivančice, 24 July 1860 – Prague, 14 July 1939), often known in English and French as Alphonse Mucha, was a Czech Art Nouveau painter and decorative artist, known best for his distinct style. He produced many paintings, illustrations, advertisements, postcards, and designs.

Mucha produced a flurry of paintings, posters, advertisements, and book illustrations, as well as designs for jewelry, carpets, wallpaper, and theatre sets in what was termed initially The Mucha Style but became known as Art Nouveau (French for "new art"). Mucha's works frequently featured beautiful young women in flowing, vaguely Neoclassical-looking robes, often surrounded by lush flowers which sometimes formed halos behind their heads. In contrast with contemporary poster makers he used pale pastel colors. Mucha's style was given international exposure by the 1900 Universal Exhibition in Paris, of which Mucha said, "I think [the Exposition Universelle] made some contribution toward bringing aesthetic values into arts and crafts."He decorated the Bosnia and Herzegovina Pavilion and collaborated with decorating the Austrian Pavilion. His Art Nouveau style was often imitated. The Art Nouveau style however, was one that Mucha attempted to disassociate himself from throughout his life; he always insisted that rather than maintaining any fashionable stylistic form, his paintings were entirely a product of himself and Czech art. He declared that art existed only to communicate a spiritual message, and nothing more; hence his frustration at the fame he gained by his commercial art, when he most wanted to concentrate on more artistic projects.

The rising tide of fascism during the late 1930s resulted in Mucha's works and his Slavic nationalism being denounced in the press as 'reactionary'. When German troops moved into Czechoslovakia during the spring of 1939, Mucha was among the first persons to be arrested by the Gestapo. During his interrogation, the aging artist became ill with pneumonia. Though released eventually, he may have been weakened by this event. He died in Prague on 14 July 1939, due to lung infection, and was interred there in the Vyšehrad cemetery.

The Cutty Sark

Kate sent me this lovely card of The Cutty Sark, a British clipper ship. Built on the Clyde in 1869 for the Jock Willis Shipping Line, she was one of the last tea clippers to be built and one of the fastest, coming at the end of a long period of design development which halted as sailing ships gave way to steam propulsion.

The opening of the Suez Canal (also in 1869) meant that steam ships now enjoyed a much shorter route to China, so Cutty Sark spent only a few years on the tea trade before turning to the trade in wool from Australia, where she held the record time to Britain for ten years.

 Improvements in steam technology meant that gradually steamships also came to dominate the longer sailing route to Australia and the ship was sold to the Portuguese company Ferreira and Co. in 1895, and renamed Ferreira. She continued as a cargo ship until purchased by retired sea captain Wilfred Dowman in 1922, who used her as a training ship operating from Falmouth, Cornwall. After his death, Cutty Sark was transferred to the Thames Nautical Training College, Greenhithe in 1938 where she became an auxiliary cadet training ship alongside HMS Worcester. By 1954 she had ceased to be useful as a cadet ship and was transferred to permanent dry dock at Greenwich, London on public display.

Cutty Sark is one of three historical sea vessels in London on the Core Collection of the National Historic Ships Register (the nautical equivalent of a Grade 1 Listed Building) – alongside HMS Belfast and SS Robin. She is one of only three remaining original composite construction (wooden hull on an iron frame) clipper ships from the nineteenth century in part or whole, the others being the City of Adelaide, awaiting transportation to Australia for preservation, and the beached skeleton of Ambassador of 1869 near Punta Arenas, Chile.

The ship was badly damaged by fire on 21 May 2007 while undergoing conservation. The vessel has since been restored and reopened to the public on 25 April 2012.

IJmuiden

IJmuiden is a port city in the Dutch province of North Holland and is the main town in the municipality of Velsen. It is located at the mouth of the North Sea Canal to Amsterdam, and lies approximately 17 kilometres north of Haarlem.

In the picture on this card sent to me by Kitty one can see the IJmuiden's Rear Range lighthouse, a radar reflectoe buoy and the Old water tower.

Marken Lighthouse

The lighthouse on the Peninsula of Marken on the IJsselmeer.
The present lighthouse was built in 1839 and was declared a national monument in 1970. When on a sailing trip at the IJsselmeer, Marken is definitely worth a stop.

Marken is a peninsula in the Markermeer, in the Netherlands and a former island in the Zuiderzee, located in the municipality Waterland in the province North Holland. It is the namesake of the Markermeer, the body of water which surrounds it. The former island is nowadays connected to the North Holland mainland by a causeway. Also, Marken is a well-known tourist attraction, well known for its characteristic wooden houses. For some time during the later 19th and early 20th centuries, Marken and its inhabitants were the focus of considerable attention by folklorists, ethnographers and physical anthropologists, who regarded the small fishing town as a relic of the traditional native culture that was destined to disappear as the modernization of the Netherlands gained pace. Marken was a separate municipality until 1991, when it was merged into Waterland.

Thank you Ina.

Town Hall Square in Tallinn

Raekoja plats (Town Hall Square) is a town square beside Tallinn Town Hall in the center of the Tallinn Old Town in Tallinn, Estonia. It is a venue for numerous small festivals or concerts like Tallinn Old Town Days, and several bars and restaurants are located in the near vicinity. The square also hosts a market regularly, with many stalls selling traditional Estonian items and souvenirs.

There has been a town hall in Tallinn since at least 1322 and a town square next to it ever since then. The hall was rebuilt from 1402 to 1404 into its current form, and a Christmas tree display has been held in the square since 1441, making the Tallinn Christmas tree display over 570 years old.

The Tallinn Town Hall is a building in the Tallinn Old Town, Estonia, next to the Town Hall Square. It is the oldest town hall in the whole of the Baltic region and Scandinavia. The building is located in the south side of the ancient market square and is 36.8 metres long. The west wall is 14.5 metres in length, and the east is 15.2 meters. It is a two-storey building with a spacious basement. The wind vane “Old Thomas” on the top of the Town Hall's tower, that has been there since 1530, has become one of the symbols of Tallinn. The height of the tower is 64 metres.

  

Thank you Ella for this nice card. I am sure you had a lovely break there.

THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN?

AND WHO DOESN'T KNOW ABOUT THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN? 

Now, where is Hamelin you may very well ask. Is it just a fairy tale town or is it a real place?

Hamelin is a town on the river Weser in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Hamelin-Pyrmont and has a population of 58,696 (as at 2006). Hamelin is also the gateway to the surrounding Weserbergland mountains, which are popular with hikers and bikers.

The town is famous for the folk tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, a medieval story that tells of a tragedy that befell the town in the thirteenth century. The version written by the Brothers Grimm made it popular throughout the world; it is also the subject of well-known poems by Goethe and Robert Browning. Although Hamelin has a fine medieval old town with some remarkable buildings, the main attraction is the tale of the Pied Piper. In the summer every Sunday, the tale is performed by actors in the town centre.

The Pied Piper of Hamelin (the Rat-Catcher of Hamelin) is the subject of a legend concerning the departure or death of a great number of children from the town of Hamelin (Hameln), Lower Saxony, Germany, in the Middle Ages. The earliest references describe a piper, dressed in multicolored clothing, leading the children away from the town never to return. In the 16th century the story was expanded into a full narrative, in which the piper is a rat-catcher hired by the town to lure rats away with his magic pipe. When the citizenry refuses to pay for this service, he retaliates by turning his power that he put in his instrument on their children, leading them away as he had the rats. This version of the story spread as folk lore. This version has also appeared in the writings of, amongst others, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the Brothers Grimm and Robert Browning.

The story may reflect a historical event in which Hamelin lost its children. Theories have been proposed suggesting that the Pied Piper is a symbol of the children's death by plague or catastrophe. Other theories liken him to figures like Nicholas of Cologne, who is said to have lured away a great number of children on a disastrous Children's Crusade. The current theory, generally accepted by scholars and historians, ties the departure of Hamelin's children to the Ostsiedlung, in which a number of Germans left their homes to colonize Eastern Europe.

Thank you Claudia for this lovely card. The story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin has enthralled children around the world for ever and ever!

Greetings from Prague zoo

Greetings from Prague zoo

In this zoo enclosure one can take a peek into the life of a gorilla family, whose members are among Prague Zoo’s best-known personalities. They include Richard, a brawny silverback male; Bikira, a gentle female who, in 2012, was voted the number-one celebrity of Czech zoos; and baby gorillas, whose games have the power to put a smile on everyone’s face, it seems.

The gorillas share the pavilion with smaller tamarin monkeys and armadillos.

Thank you Irena from Prague for this lovely card.