The Economist reports: Turkey discovers large gas discovery in the Black Sea, U.S. to require Hong Kong to label exports as “made in China”, and other world news.
Morning News Podcast: Turkey’s Gas Discovery, Hong Kong “China” Labels
Tag Archives: Russia
Top New Travel Videos: “Flight Over Russia” (2020)
Filmed and Edited by: DiamondSky Production
It’s a short video about Russian nature. The places shown in video are Dombay, North Osetia, Dagestan, Kabardino-Balkaria, Altay, Kola Peninsula, lake Baikal, Karelia.
Artist Profiles: The Legacy Of Violinist Isaac Stern
Tuesday, July 21, marks the centennial of the birth of violinist Isaac Stern. He was not only an acclaimed musician, but a devoted teacher who was a mentor to generations of musicians.
Isaac Stern, (born July 21, 1920, Kremenets, Ukraine, Russian Empire—died September 22, 2001, New York, New York, U.S.), Russian-born American musician who was considered one of the premier violinists of the 20th century. Active in organizations promoting the arts, he played a key role in saving New York City’s Carnegie Hall from demolition in 1960 and later became president of the corporation that administered the hall and its cultural programs; he held the post until his death. In 1964 he helped establish the National Endowment for the Arts. Stern was also noted for his encouragement of young musicians, and he aided the careers of Yo-Yo Ma and violinist Itzhak Perlman, among others. The recipient of numerous awards, Stern received the Kennedy Center Honors Award in 1984 and a Grammy for lifetime achievement in 1987.
Artist Profile: Russian Post-Impressionist Vera Rockline (1896-1934)
From Christie’s (July 9, 2020):
Vue de Tiflis is a stunning vision of that city, painted in a manner inspired by Exter’s Cubo-Futurism. Tiflis was renowned then, as it still is now, for a combination of narrow medieval streets and Art Nouveau architecture. In this work, Rockline warps and fragments such features to the point of semi-abstraction: planes intersect and overlap, suggesting the restless energy and bohemian buzz of the Georgian capital.
When she died in April 1934, aged just 37, Vera Rockline was at the peak of her fame. The Russian-born emigrée had made quite a name for herself after moving to Paris in 1921. Obituaries spoke of an ‘incomparable loss’ and a ‘prodigious talent’.
Born in Moscow in 1897 to a Russian father and French mother, Rockline moved to Kiev to apprentice for Aleksandra (or Alexandra) Exter. The latter was a cutting-edge figure whose art fused Cubist and Futurist elements. As civil war racked the former Russian Empire in the wake of 1917’s Bolshevik revolution, however, Vera and her husband fled to Tiflis (modern-day Tbilisi) in Georgia.
Top Aerial Travel Videos: “Serenity 8K” By Vadim Sherbakov (2020)
Filmed and Edited by: Vadim Sherbakov
Remastered in 8K “Serenity” is a non-narrative short drone film, produced with the unique camera angle, facing straight down at -90º at the wonderful texture of earth landscapes.
Because of this and the subjects it captures, you can watch this film both horizontally or vertically. Here is a horizontal version, but you can see the vertical one, on my Instagram or IGTV.
The film itself is a 3 minutes blend of total tranquility and calmness that allows you to escape reality for just a short while. Shot in different places on earth such as Iceland, Norway, Spain, Portugal, Belarus and Russia, it shows the unique and gorgeous landscape at an unusual angle. So bring up the volume or put on headphones and immerse in it.
World News: Joe Biden, Coronavirus Waves & Putin’s Russia (Economist)
A selection of three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week, Joe Biden: Retro or radical? (9:34), the world is not experiencing a second wave of covid-19—it never got over the first (15:25), and a phoney referendum shows that Putin’s legitimacy is fading.
Top New Travel Videos: “Russian Explorers In Dagestan” (Western Asia)
Russian Explorers – a team of Russian travel photographers. Inspired by our native nature we travel to beautiful places in Russia and try to show to people how wonderful and versatile Russian nature is.
Dagestan, officially the Republic of Dagestan, is a federal subject of Russia, located in the North Caucasus region. Its capital and largest city is Makhachkala, centrally located on the Caspian Sea coast.
Artist Profiles: Russian Watercolor Painter Eleanor Mill – “Exacting”
From MyModernMet (May 25, 2020):
“Buildings and constructions once created by people but now fallen into oblivion have an inspirational value for me,” Mill tells My Modern Met. “They are silent witnesses of history. These giants towering over densely populated cities preserve the memories from the moment of their creation until the last stone drops off their walls.”
Russian graphic designer and watercolor painter Eleanor Mill has a knack for capturing the spirit of place. Through her architectural watercolor sketches, she documents buildings with exacting detail. At the same time, Mill imbues her work with the color and light that gives each environment character. This allows viewers to come along with her as she places the memories of her travels down on paper.
Podcast Interview: 56-Year Old British Author Humphrey Hawksley
Humphrey Hawksley is an author, commentator and broadcasters. His work as a BBC foreign correspondent took him all over the world, giving him a global perspective that informs his writing.
His new book, ‘Man on Edge’, puts the reader at the centre of a geopolitical crisis in Moscow.
Humphrey Hawksley is an English journalist and author who has been a foreign correspondent for the BBC since the early 1980s.
Natural World Art: “Ten Artists Who Celebrated Nature” (Christie’s)
From Christie’s article (April 22, 2020):
From Switzerland to South America, from the South of England to the coast of Maine, they have been moved by mountains, oceans, deserts, plains, lakes and forests — we hope you will find their art every bit as stirring as we do
Russia’s pine forests
Siverskaya, located 70km south of St Petersburg, was a popular summer retreat for Russian city-dwellers in the 19th century. It was in Siverskaya and its neighbouring woods that Ivan Shishkin — one of Russia’s most famous landscape painters, dubbed ‘the patriarch of forests’ — created some of his best-known works.
Mount Emei, China
Mount Emei in Sichuan, southwest China, is the highest of China’s four sacred Buddhist mountains, reaching to 3,099 metres. The mountain is a place of pilgrimage, where dozens of temples and monasteries have been erected, and has been an inspiration for artists for centuries.
Wednesday 22 April, 2020 marks 50 years since the declaration of the first Earth Day in 1970 — an occasion on which to reflect on our natural world, and perhaps take action to help sustain it. In celebration of this anniversary, we look back on a selection of artists for whom nature — and our planet — has been an inspiration and guide.
Boomers Daily 