Cottontail on the Trail

Cottontail on the Trail (nicknamed the "Minnehaha Bunny") is a bronze sculpture in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The piece was commissioned as part of city's Art in Public Places program and was designed by Jeff Barber of Cannon Falls, Minnesota. The sculpture, which depicts an oddly proportioned cottontail rabbit, was permanently installed on Minnehaha Parkway in 2002. "Cottontail on the Trail" has been well-received by residents of the surrounding area, who often decorate it seasonally or in response to current events.
History.
In the late 1990s, the city of Minneapolis sought public input for several neighborhood "gateway art projects" to be installed throughout the city through its Art in Public Places program. City councilmember Scott Benson, who was at the time the Hale, Page and Diamond Lake Community Association's president, recalled that members of the community sought art "that would represent the beauty of the neighborhood [and] capture our appreciation for nature." Benson also stated that people desired art that was whimsical.
Proposals from artists were solicited. An artwork depicting Native Americans and an outdoor living room were among those not selected. Cannon Falls-based sculptor Jeff Barber won the selection process with his proposal for "Cottontail on the Trail", for which the city paid $50,000, a combination of public money and donations. Barber worked intermittently on the sculpture for two years before it was installed via crane in September 2002. The piece was dedicated on November 23 of that year.
Design.
"Cottontail on the Trail" is a bronze sculpture depicting an oddly proportioned cottontail rabbit. It measures long and high and weighs . It is displayed surrounded by red mulch along Minnehaha Parkway near its intersection with Portland Avenue South.
The piece is atypical of Barber's style, which typically tends to be more abstract than "Cottontail on the Trail". Barber said that "The general rule of thumb when it comes to the taste of the American public is that they want to recognize what they're looking at" and took inspiration for the piece from the whimsy sought by community members in the input process.
Reception.
Writer Andy Sturdevant described "Cottontail on the Trail" as "probably the best-known piece of art" along Minnehaha Creek between Lake Harriet and Minnehaha Falls. Local paper "City Pages" listed the sculpture as the best landmark in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area in 2019, writing that the piece "isn't glitzy or challenging—it's just a big-ass bunny that reliably brings smiles to passersby."
A 2014 survey by Minneapolis's Community Planning and Economic Development department found that 53% of the 58 respondents felt that the sculpture was connected to the community in which it was situated and over 80% said the piece contributed to the surrounding area. Of those surveyed, 40% identified it as a contributing factor in their decision to pass by that particular location on that day. Many respondents considered "Cottontail on the Trail" to be iconic and said the work served as a gathering space for the community.
The sculpture has garnered the nickname of the "Minnehaha Bunny" from residents. Children often climb on the sculpture and people who live nearby have frequently costumed and decorated it based on seasonal occasions or topical events such as leaving eggs by the sculpture during Easter or cladding the mouth of the sculpture with a large cloth face mask during the COVID-19 pandemic.


Perseus and Andromeda (Leighton)

Perseus and Andromeda is an oil painting by Lord Frederic Leighton. Completed in 1891, the year it was displayed at the Royal Academy of Arts, it depicts the Greek mythological story of Andromeda. In contrast to the basis of a classical tale, Leighton used a Gothic style for the artwork. The painting is in the collection of National Museums Liverpool at the Walker Art Gallery.
Legend.
In Greek mythology, the kingdom of Ethiopia was ruled by the beautiful but vain queen, Cassiopeia, who claimed that her beauty was superior to that of the sea nymphs. When the nymphs, who were the daughters of Poseidon, the god of the sea, became aware of her claims, they protested to their father. Poseidon retaliated by calling up a sea monster called Cetus to patrol and wreak havoc along the coastline of Ethiopia, placing Cassiope's kingdom at risk. Queen Cassiopeia, together with her husband Cepheus, decided to sacrifice their daughter, Princess Andromeda, to the monster.
Andromeda was chained to a rock at the edge of the sea as an offering to the monster. Perseus, who had just fought and defeated Medusa, was travelling back home on his winged horse, Pegasus. He rescued Andromeda by killing the monster. The couple fell in love, but the Princess was already betrothed to Phineus. Perseus and Phineus argued at the wedding, but Perseus held up the head of the defeated Medusa and Phineus was turned to stone.
Painting.
The mythological theme of Andromeda is depicted in a dramatic manner. The scene is a representation of the myth set on a rocky shore. Perseus is depicted flying above the head of Andromeda, on his winged horse Pegasus. He is shooting an arrow from the air, that hits the sea monster, who turns his head upwards, towards the hero. Andromeda's almost naked, twisted body is shaded by the wings of the dark creature, creating a visual sign of imminent danger. Andromeda's sinuous body is contrasted against the dark masses of the monster's irregular and jagged body. The white body of Andromeda is depicted in pure and untouched innocence, indicating an unfair sacrifice for a divine punishment that was not directed towards her, but her mother. Pegasus and Perseus are surrounded by a halo of light that connects them visually to the white body of the princess, chained to the rock.
Leighton cast a small bronze painted plaster sculpture of Andromeda as a study before commencing work on the painting. The statuette was naked but Leighton placed wet materials over it to achieve the effect he wanted to reproduce in his work. A later artwork, "Perseus on Pegasus Hastening to the Rescue of Andromeda", completed four years later, portrayed the same story.


Lost on the Grand Banks

Lost on the Grand Banks (1885) is one of several paintings by the American painter Winslow Homer (1836–1910) on marine subjects. Together with "The Herring Net" and "The Fog Warning", painted the same year, it depicts the hard lives of North Atlantic fishermen in Prouts Neck, Maine.
The painting was bought in 1998 by Bill Gates, the then chairman of Microsoft. Gates reportedly paid $30 million for the seascape, at the time a record price for an American painting.


Votive relief of Jupiter Dolichenus

The Votive relief of Jupiter Dolichenus was discovered in the ancient city of Perrhe in the kingdom of Commagene in the southeast of modern Turkey. It is now displayed in the Adıyaman Archaeological Museum.
Discovery.
The votive relief was discovered in the vast necropolis of the city of Perrhe - today the suburb of Pirin in the provincial capital of Adiyaman. During excavation and cleaning work by the Museum of Adiyaman in 2001 under the leadership of its Director, Fehmi Erarslan, the relief was revealed in secondary use as the covering for a late antique grave. Along with Samosata, Marasch and Doliche, Perrhe was one of the core cities of the Kingdom of Commagene. Thus, the relief of Jupiter Dolichenus is the only one thus far known, which has been found in the immiediate area of the god's original worship. While images of him spread throughout the whole Roman empire and numerous examples have been found in Western Europe, they are rare in Asia Minor and Syria. As part of a project of the Forstellungstelle Asia Minor of the University of Münster, the relief was discussed by Michael Blömer (relief) and Margherita Facella (inscription).
Depiction.
The stele is made of light yellow local limestone and measures 0.81 m high and 0.63 m wide. The base is 11 cm deep, the greatest projection of the relief is 12 cm. At left is the god and at right, under his arm is an eight-line inscription. A large part of the relief is lost, including the point of the god's hat and both hands, while of the legs only the upper thighs survive. This bottom break runs through the final line of the inscription. The relief is very deep, such that parts of the figure like the head and the arms are nearly in the round. The god is shown in a typical pose of Jupiter Dolichenus, with his right arm raised and his left arm bent. There was a thunderbolt held in his left hand, but only the lower part still survives. The labrys usually found in the right hand is completely lost. Jupiter is depicted with a beard and long hair, both of which are depicted in detail with individual spiral locks. Despite the serious damage to the face, the deep-set eyes with drilled pupils can still be made out. On top of his head, he wears a Phrygian cap. Otherwise he is dressed in a military outfit. On his upper body, he wears a Roman muscle cuirass over his tunic, which is held in place by flat leather straps over his shoulders and a Cingulum militare around his midriff. Over his hips he wears the Pteruges, with deep furrows in between them. Over his cuirass the god wears a paludamentum, which is gathered over his right shoulder and hangs down from his left shoulder such that it is visible in the background behind him. A small bandolier holds a sword on his right hand side. The god wears tights on his legs. Above the right shoulder of the figure, behind the raised arm, the remains of an eagle are visible. The end of the left wing and the tail feathers are relatively clear.
The relief may have been complete with the common, right-facing bull, on which the god would have stood, as is common in the iconography of images of Jupiter Dolichenus. The tights the god wears are remarkable, as is the head covering. Both were considered "oriental" attributes by the Romans and thus emphasised his supposed birthplace. In other images from northern Syria and Asia Minor, there are no other cases of the god depicted wearing tights, although they were subsequently an attribute of the god, especially in Roman depictions.
Inscription.
The dedicatory inscription is in the right, lower floor of the field, between the left leg and the left arm. It is eight lines long, with letters deeply carved into the stone. The letters get smaller lower down, which indicates that the stonemason had issues fitting the text in the available space. The inscription says:
Thus the inscription supplies the name of the dedicant, his position, and the reason for his dedication. The donor from Doliche was a soldier and his name indicates that he was a Roman citizen. Blömer and Facella suggest that one of his ancestors received citizenship and adopted the nomen Julius. This "nomen" was widespread in North Syria and Commagene and indicates either the emperor who was reigning at the time of the receipt of citizenship or the governor of the province who was responsible for the award.
It is not stated which legion of the army that Gaius Julius Paulus belonged to. It is known that towards the end of the 2nd century AD, soldiers of the Legio IV Scythica were carrying out construction work in Commagene and that, around the same time, the Legio XVI Flavia Firma was tasked with the construction of the Chabinas bridge. But whether Paulus came to Perrhe as a member of one of these legiones or belonged to another "vexillatio" stationed in the area, cannot be determined. This is particularly the case because the original location of the stele is unclear.
The letterforms indicate that the inscription dates to the period between the late 2nd century AD and the beginning of the 3rd century AD.


Shipping by a Breakwater (J.M.W. Turner)

Shipping by a Breakwater is a painting by J.M.W. Turner (23 April 1775 - 19 December 1851), painted c. 1798.


Public Sex (film)

Public Sex (Original title: Dogging: A Love Story) is a British romantic comedy film released in 2009 starring Luke Treadaway, Kate Heppell, Justine Glenton, and Richard Riddell, directed by Simon Ellis and written by Michael Groom and Brock Norman Brock. The film was originally titled "Dogging: A Love Story", but the title was changed to "Public Sex" when released in the United States.
Premise.
Dan (Luke Treadaway) is an aspiring journalist who drops his inhibitions to research the United Kingdom's underground subculture of dogging or public sex and along the way finds love and friendship.


Johnny Roventini

Johnny Roventini, also known as John Louis Roventini and popularly as Johnny Philip Morris, (August 15, 1910 – November 30, 1998) was an American actor.
Less than four feet tall as a fully developed adult, Roventini was working as a bellboy at the New Yorker Hotel in 1933 when he was discovered by an advertising mogul, who had him perform a page, issuing a "Call for Philip Morris". He reportedly could always vocalize a perfect B-flat tone as he repeated those words, literally over a million times during his career, according to his own estimate.
He soon became famous as a product spokesman for Philip Morris brand cigarettes in radio, television and print advertising media. He was described by Philip Morris personnel as a "living trademark", and represented the company for over forty years. He also played roles in the growth of broadcast media, most notably helping Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz with the initial success of their innovative "I Love Lucy" comedy series beginning in 1951.
Early life.
The child of Italian immigrants, he was born in Brooklyn, New York. Physically, Johnny Roventini was a dwarf. As an adult, he was only 47 inches tall and weighed 59 pounds. Employed as a bellman (or "bellboy") in the New Yorker Hotel in New York City, he was promoted by the hotel as the "smallest bellboy in the world".
Discovery.
The famous "Call for Philip Morris" advertising campaign predates Johnny Roventini's role and began during World War I. A drawing of a bellboy carrying a tray with a box of cigarettes on it was the original mascot. The campaign had been successful and was used for 15 years with artistic variations as the only significant changes.
In 1933, advertising executive Milton H. Biow, the principal of the Biow Agency in New York City, was managing the advertising account of Philip Morris cigarettes. Biow had an idea to bring new life (literally) to the mature "bellboy with tray of cigarettes" campaign. He had heard of the distinctive voice and appearance of Roventini. Biow and Philip Morris executive Alfred E. Lyons went to the hotel where Johnny worked. They sat in the lobby and observed him, noting both his diminutive size and distinctive voice.
In those days, hotel lobbies were typically elaborately furnished and used as meeting places, so situations with persons seeking each other were not uncommon. Biow and Lyons had apparently been unnoticed by the 22-year-old bellboy, when, according to the legend, Biow approached him and paid Johnny a dollar to page a "Mr. Philip Morris" throughout the lobby. The small bellboy repeatedly cried out "Call for Philip Morris" in his distinctive high-pitched voice, several times, not knowing that there was no such person. He did not realize that he had been essentially performing an audition. "I went around the lobby yelling my head off," Johnny recalled later, "but Philip Morris didn't answer my call." Roventini initially thought that his call had been both legitimate and unsuccessful. He was soon to learn that he had been wrong on both counts. He was later quoted in "Variety": "I had no idea that Philip Morris was a cigarette."
The page had, in fact, been a huge success, one that was to lead the young bellboy to a 40-year career. Biow and Lyons both visualized the performance of the small bellboy as ideal to bring life to their fictitious character. In April 1933, Roventini was hired to make a "Call for Phil-ip Mor-rees" on the different radio programs sponsored by the tobacco company. Roventini had been earning $15 a week at the hotel (about $ today) and received $100 (about $ today) for his very first radio commercial. He later recounted that he only accepted the new job after checking with his mother, with whom he lived much of his life. He was soon earning $50,000 annually, a substantial wage for such work in those years (as it was about $ in today's money), according to his biography.
Career.
It was obvious to his fans that Roventini enjoyed playing the smallness of his character, which Biow and others helped him capitalize upon. Philip Morris Tobacco Company provided a small chauffeur-driven American Austin convertible automobile to get Johnny to the live radio broadcasts on time. He became a friend to movie stars, sitting on popular actress Marlene Dietrich's lap in a publicity shot. During World War II, he patriotically tried joining the Coast Guard Auxiliary and, probably to no one's surprise, was rejected for being too short. He shared a dinner table with General and Mrs. Dwight D. Eisenhower, clowned around with Red Skelton, sat ringside with fighter Jack Dempsey, and participated in numerous parades and other public events. There were at least ten other Johnnys, known as "Johnny Juniors", including Albert Alteiri. This made it possible for Johnny to appear simultaneously in various sections of the country.
Roventini was heard on popular live radio programs and appeared in his short-jacketed bellboy outfit on some of the most-watched television shows of the 1950s and 1960s, including "I Love Lucy", "Candid Camera", "The Red Skelton Show" and "The Jackie Gleason Show".
"I Love Lucy".
He is possibly best remembered of all his Philip Morris related-work for the "I Love Lucy" show. In 1951, in the early days of commercial broadcast television in the United States, the new comedy show ran into difficulties when it first sought sponsorship. This was due to the Cuban character played by Desi Arnaz. Advertisers were fearful of unknown public acceptance of the show featuring a marriage of mixed ethnicity in that era. After failing to win financial backing from CBS executives, Arnaz traveled to New York to hawk the show, and struck a deal with advertising mogul Milton Biow, who bought the show for his client, Philip Morris cigarettes. The tobacco company sponsored "I Love Lucy" exclusively from its premiere on October 15, 1951, through Christmas of 1954 (it then shifted to an "alternate sponsorship" with Procter & Gamble until June 1955). Although Philip Morris had a rich return for its investment and risk-taking in backing "I Love Lucy", Arnaz also had the wisdom to retain ownership of the "I Love Lucy" shows, effectively inventing both the "rerun" and syndication procedures for the fledgling television industry.
The show was enormously popular with the viewing public, and with Lucy and Desi, and sidekicks William Frawley and Vivian Vance (as neighbors Fred and Ethel Mertz), Johnny and Philip Morris gained into unprecedented national television prominence. Johnny's voice and face was often the first thing one heard and saw respectively on Monday evenings on the CBS television network as the "I Love Lucy" opened. Johnny also did a number of commercial spots with stars of the hit show, Lucille Ball and Arnaz, who were expected to promote products sponsoring their shows in that era, when embedding ads straight into programs and in having the stars of shows do ads for the sponsors was common practice. In a particularly memorable episode, "Lucy Does a TV Commercial", the actress dresses up in the "Johnny the Bellhop" costume. Industry watchers reported that Lucy, Desi and Johnny had soon become fast friends while working together.
As "I Love Lucy" was enjoying its enormous popularity, the U.S. was in an early period of the Cold War. The politics of communism and the possibilities that subversive pro-communism activities were active within the United States became known as a Red Scare. In September 1953, allegations surfaced from columnist Walter Winchell that Lucille Ball was being investigated by the House Committee on Un-American Activities in the U.S. Congress for alleged communist ties. Johnny traveled from his home in New York to be with her at Desilu studios in Los Angeles, a gesture of support from both Roventini and her show's sponsor, Philip Morris, which she never forgot. Although with much difficulty, Lucy was able to disprove the charges.
Later years.
A Philip Morris representative once described Johnny Roventini as a "living trademark". In 1959, NBC Radio aired a special half-hour program to celebrate the 25th anniversary of his career, describing him (with an apparent double entendre) as "an advertising giant".
In April 1970, Congress passed the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act banning the advertising of cigarettes on radio and television starting on January 2, 1971. In the years after tobacco advertising was prohibited in broadcast communications regulated by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Roventini made personal appearances for Philip Morris until he retired in 1974.
Death in 1998.
In retirement, he enjoyed sailing. He never married and died in a hospital near White Plains, New York, in 1998, at the age of 88. The cause of death was listed as "natural causes".
"Johnny's fame as an advertising legend was enhanced by an ever-present smile and outstretched hand that won him friends wherever he went," Philip Morris eulogized.
Legacy.
Johnny Roventini's original uniform (red usher's jacket, piped trousers, black pillbox hat and white gloves) was donated to the American Advertising Museum, which was located in Portland, Oregon, before closing in 2004.
His catchphrase was the inspiration for Call Federal Credit Union, a credit union that initially served only Philip Morris employees.


Andrea Polli

Andrea Polli (born 1968) is an environmental artist and writer. Polli blends art and science to create widely varied media and technology artworks related to environmental issues. Her works are presented in various forms, she uses interactive websites, digital broadcasting, mobile applications, and performances, which allows her to reach a wider audience.
Her work has appeared widely in over one hundred exhibitions and performances both nationally and internationally including the Whitney Museum of American Art Artport and the Field Museum of Natural History. She has received numerous grants, residencies, including a residency at Eyebeam, and awards including the Fulbright Specialist Program (2011) and the UNESCO Digital Arts Award (2003). She is currently an Associate Professor of Art and Ecology at the University of New Mexico.
Education.
Polli has a Master of Fine Arts in time arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has a PhD in computing, communications and electronics from the University of Plymouth, UK.
As an educator, Polli has developed new media programs at Robert Morris College and Columbia College in Chicago. She was voted 2000/2001 Teacher of the Year at Columbia in recognition of her work connecting students to the wider community through collaborative projects.
From 2005 to 2008 she served as the director of the Integrated Media Arts Masters of Fine Arts Program at Hunter College in New York City. She later became an associate professor of Art and Ecology with appointments in the College of Fine Arts and School of Engineering at the University of New Mexico, where she directs the Social Media Workgroup, a lab at the University's Center for Advanced Research Computing.
Work.
Sonification.
Polli works with atmospheric scientists to develop systems for understanding storm and climate through sound. She began collaborating with atmospheric scientists on sound and data sonification projects in 1999, and has worked with NASA's Goddard Institute Climate Research Group in New York City and the National Center for Atmospheric Research. Her New York installation "Atmospherics/Weather Works" was a spatialized sonification that used highly detailed models to recreate the sound of two historic east coast storms: the presidents’ Day Snowstorm of 1979 and Hurricane Bob in 1991. In 2007/2008 she spent seven weeks in Antarctica on a National Science Foundation funded project, collaborating with artist Tia Kramer, who was working as a communications operator at McMurdo Station, and other scientists. The sounds she recorded there included water pouring off a glacier and wind whipping through the valleys. "Heat and the Heartbeat of the City" is a series of sonifications of actual and projected climate in Central Park. "N." (pronounced n-point), created in collaboration with Joe Gilmore, is a real-time multi-channel sonification and visualization of weather in the Arctic.
Light installation.
Polli has also experimented with the visualization of air. "Particle Falls" is a light installation that displayed air quality information in real time, using a nephelometer to sample particulate matter in air from a city street, and projecting changing light patterns every 15 seconds onto the wall of Philadelphia's Wilma Theater.
“Philadelphia has come a long way in improving the quality of the air we breathe, but our work isn't done. Particle Falls makes it possible to see—in real time and vivid color—the challenges we continue to face." Thomas Huynh, director, Air Management Services, City of Philadelphia.
Experimental architecture.
Polli's proposed "Queensbridge Wind Power Project" would incorporate wind turbines into a bridge's structure to recreate aspects of its original design as well as producing energy to light the bridge and neighboring areas.
Polli worked in collaboration with Rod Gdovic of WindStax, a Pittsburgh-based wind turbine manufacturer, on "Energy Flow", an installation with 27,000 multicolored LED lights positioned along the Rachel Carson Bridge in Pittsburgh, PA. The vertical cables of the bridge show a real-time visualization of wind speed and direction captured by a weather station located on the bridge. The electricity that powers "Energy Flow" is generated by sixteen wind turbines attached to the catenary arches of the bridge. "Energy Flow" uses data visualization to make people aware of changes in the environment.


Robert David Hall

Robert David Hall (born November 9, 1947) is an American actor, best known for his role as coroner Dr. Albert Robbins M.D. on the television show ".
Early life.
Born in East Orange, New Jersey, Hall attended Tustin High School in California and went on to graduate from UCLA in 1971 with a degree in English Literature. Hall is a former professional musician and accomplished guitarist, and is also proficient on piano, percussion and mandolin. For several years he was a high-profile radio DJ in Los Angeles. His musical talent has been alluded to in " several times, as his character Dr. Al Robbins would sometimes sing while performing the autopsy or with Gil Grissom when the latter came to the morgue to collect evidence. He has also done extensive voice work on television commercials and cartoons.
In 1978, Hall had to have both of his legs amputated as a result of an accident in which an 18-wheeler truck crushed his car. The accident also caused the gasoline tank of the car to explode, causing burns over 65% of his body. He now comfortably uses prosthetic limbs, allowing for personal mobility. Several of his characters, including his "CSI" character, have openly shared this disability. He is a prominent advocate for disabled Americans. Hall (as Dr. Robbins) mentioned once that he has prosthetic legs, but never alluded to the accident in reality.
Life and career.
In addition to starring on "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation", Robert has appeared in such films as "Starship Troopers" and "The Negotiator" and has made guest appearances in a number of TV programs including "The West Wing" and "L.A. Law". He also furnishes the narration on CourtTV's documentary series "North Mission Road". Currently, Hall is working on the short thriller "The Roymann Closure in the Netherlands", written by writer/director David Grifhorst and executive producer Jop Douma.
Hall was married to Susan Petroni from 1969 until their divorce in 1974, and Connie Cole from 1979 until their divorce in 1987. His son, Andrew, was born of his second marriage. Hall's third and current marriage is to Judy Sterns in 1999.


Jozef Janssens

Jozef Marie Aloys Janssens de Varebeke (29 May 1854, Sint-Niklaas - 29 June 1930, Antwerp) was a Belgian painter; known for his portraits and religious works.
Biography.
He was the eldest child of the industrialist and politician, , and his wife Marie-Angélique, née Beeckman (1834–1889). His father drew as a hobby, and numbered several artists among his friends, including Jan Swerts and Godfried Guffens. After graduating from the gymnasium in his hometown, he worked in his father's factory, then attended the Jesuit college in Bergen. During this time, he also took drawing lessons from Swerts.In 1872, when his father received a visit from Franz Ittenbach and , two painters from Düsseldorf, they saw Jozef's drawings and recommended that he undertake formal studies.
These were begun with Ittenbach, at his studio in Düsseldorf. He worked there until late 1874. He also took professional advice from the religious artist, Ernst Deger. Later, he worked with Guffens in Brussels. In 1876, he went to Rome where, thanks to a recommendation from Ittenbach, he was able to study with Ludovico Seitz. From Rome, he would often visit Monte Cassino, where Desiderius Lenz, founder of the Beuron Art School, was painting the church tower; together with his associates Gabriel Wüger and .
In 1880, he completed his studies there, and returned to Antwerp; establishing his own studio in 1884. He was married there, to Marie Lucie, née Hye-Hoys (1866–1950), and they had eight children.
In addition to his canvases, from 1890 to 1910 he provided decorative paintings for the Jesuit church in Leuven, the Beguine monastery in Ghent and the Maredsous Abbey in Namur, as well as the Cathedral of Our Lady in Antwerp. Many of his portraits were of clergymen; notably Popes Leo XIII and Pius X, the Archbishop of Mechelen, Désiré-Joseph Mercier, and the Bishop of Ghent, Antoon Stillemans. In 1904, Pius X presented him with the Order of St. Sylvester.
During World War I, he lived as a refugee in Manchester, where he made his living as a portrait painter. Among his subjects there were the physicist, Ernest Rutherford and his daughter Eileen.
Hs younger brother, Frans, was a Catholic priest and a scientist, involved in genetic research. He is credited with discovering chromosomal crossover.


Ponziano Loverini

Ponziano Loverini (July 6, 1845 – August 21, 1929) was an Italian painter, known primarily for his canvases and frescoes of sacred subjects.
Biography.
Born in Gandino to a humble but pious tailor, Ponziano was helped by his uncle to enroll (1858) at the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo. A stipend from the city of Gandino sponsored his art study. There, he was a pupil of the painter Enrico Scuri. In 1881, he exhibited at Milan: "St Bishop Philastrius"; in 1884 at Turin he exhibited the large canvas depicting "St Francis entering a monastic order". He exhibited at Milan a canvas depicting young nudes before a white background. In 1887 at Venice, he exhibited "Coeci vident". Among other works: "Studi dal vero"; "Il prediletto della nonna" were exhibited at Milan in 1886. In 1887, he painted a large canvas of "San Grata" in honor of the priestly jubilee of Pope Leo XIII, which was sent to the Vatican Pinacoteca.
He married in 1880, and had four children, but the deaths of two of them in infancy plunged him into a depression, which worsened when his wife died in 1895.
Loverini also painted some portraits, watercolors. and studies of various genres.
Among his fresco work, he painted the four biblical figures: "Job", "Ezekiel", "Jeremiah", and "Tobit", (1913) for the Chapel of Monuments in the Cimitero Unico of Bergamo. In 1887 he began a cycle of frescoes depicting the Story of St Peter for the parish church of Trescore Balneario. He also frescoed in the Basilica of San Pietro in Ciel d'Oro. From 1888 and in 1893, he completed five large canvases for the Sanctuary of the Madonna del Rosario of Pompei.
In 1893, he became an associate of the Atheneum of Bergamo. In 1895, he was one of the founders of the Bergamese Artists’ circle, and named a member of the "Commission to Conserve Monuments" for the Province of Bergamo. Finally in 1899, he was designated director of the School of Painting of the Accademia Carrara, replacing Cesare Tallone, a post he held till 1926, when he resigned due to ill health. He painted the "Il Cantico di frate Sole" for the Vatican, and in 1904, Pope Pius X sent it to the London Exposition. He died in 1929 in Gandino.


The Brass Teapot

The Brass Teapot is a 2012 American fantasy film directed by Ramaa Mosley. The movie's script was written by Tim Macy, who also wrote the short story on which the movie is based. The movie premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 8, 2012, and was released into theaters and video on demand on April 5, 2013.
Synopsis.
John (Michael Angarano) and Alice (Juno Temple) are a down-on-their-luck couple that comes across a magical brass teapot capable of providing them with money. The only catch is that they must experience pain in order for the teapot to provide. They must then decide what they are willing to do (and what they are willing to suffer through) in order to gain financial security.
Reception.
Critical reception for the film was poor. , "The Brass Teapot" holds a 32% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 31 reviews with an average rating of 4.88/10. Film.com review said "Despite the sometimes patchy moments The Brass Teapot by and large squeaks by as an enjoyable entertainment." The Playlist commented that "With the help of a talented cast, The Brass Teapot is able to coast on charm."
Hitflix writes "It is apparent that Ramaa Mosley has a voice, and that The Brass Teapot is a focused, controlled piece of storytelling that displays real control". Wall Street Journal reviews says "Alice and John are good company — especially Alice, thanks to Ms. Temple's buoyant humor and lovely poignancy. The problem comes when the couple gets greedy, the gods grow angry and the tone turns dark. It doesn't stay dark, but getting back to the brightness is a painful process."
The "New York Times" criticized the film, saying that while the two lead characters were interesting, the "movie’s best bits lose out to the requisite moral turnaround". The Film School Rejects commented that the darker points of the film's story line were "ill fitting" in contrast with the predominantly "comically light and slapsticky" tone of the overall movie. In contrast, "Variety" gave a more positive review for the film, saying that Mosely "makes her low-budget enterprise look as slick as most midrange studio comedies, demonstrating herself a director with both imagination and technical ingenuity".


George Claydon

George Claydon (4 September 1933 – 4 October 2001) was a British actor notable for his dwarfism. His television roles included that of Photographer George in The Beatles' "Magical Mystery Tour", a television film that initially aired on BBC1 on Boxing Day 1967, Ginaarbrik in the 1967 ITV adaptation of "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" (1967) (which he followed by playing Nikabrik many years later in the 1989 BBC adaptation of "Prince Caspian"), and the miniseries "The Last Days of Pompeii" (1984). His film appearances included the Joan Crawford horror film "Berserk!" (1967), as an Oompa Loompa in "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" (1971), and as Hercules in "I Don't Want to Be Born" (1975). He was "World Cup Willie", the official mascot of the England Football Team in 1966.
Death.
Claydon died on 4 October 2001 at the age of 68, at Charing Cross Hospital.


Coat of arms of Podgorica

The coat of arms of Podgorica is an official insignia of Podgorica, capital of Montenegro. It is a new coat of arms, adopted as a symbol of the city in 2006. It replaced the old coat of arms, which was thought outdated aesthetically. The author is Srdjan Marlović.


The Seaside at Palavas

The Seaside at Palavas is an 1854 painting of the beach at Palavas-les-Flots by Gustave Courbet. It was commissioned by Alfred Bruyas during Courbet's first stay at Montpellier. Courbet originated in Franche-Comté and so the landscapes of Languedoc and the Mediterranean were a revelation. The work was also partly inspired by "The Monk by the Sea" by Caspar David Friedrich. It is now in the Musée Fabre in Montpellier.


The Peasant Dance

The Peasant Dance is an oil-on-panel by the Netherlandish Renaissance artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder, painted in "circa" 1567. It was looted by Napoleon Bonaparte and brought to Paris in 1808, being returned in 1815. Today it is held by and exhibited at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.
Description.
The panel, neither signed nor dated, was painted "circa" 1567, at about the same time as "The Peasant Wedding". The paintings are the same size and may have been intended as a pair or as part of a series illustrating peasant life. They are the two most outstanding examples of Bruegel's late style, which is characterized by his use of monumental Italianate figures.
Details.
Like "The Peasant Wedding", it is likely that Bruegel intended this painting to have a moral sense rather than simply being an affectionate portrayal of peasant life. Gluttony, lust and anger can all be identified in the picture. The man seated next to the bagpipe player wears a peacock feather in his hat, a symbol of vanity and pride. The occasion for the peasants' revelry is a Saint's day, but dancers turn their backs on the church and pay no attention whatsoever to the image of the Virgin Mary which hangs on the tree. The prominence of the tavern makes it clear that they are preoccupied with material rather than spiritual matters.


Ultraman Orb The Movie

 is a Japanese superhero and Kaiju film, serving as the film adaptation of the 2016 Ultra Series television series "Ultraman Orb". It was released on March 11, 2017, in celebration to the 50th anniversary of "Ultra Seven" where the titular character himself and his son Ultraman Zero is set to appear. Both Blu-Ray and the DVD is set to be released on 28 July 2017.
The catchphrase for the movie is .
Story.
One day, a strange object appeared at the SSP's office, which was revealed to be the X Devizer, a transformation device which inhabited by Ultraman X. Having separated from his host, the Xio personnel Daichi Ozora due to an enemy attack, X sought the help of SSP and Gai (who returned from his wandering activities) in search for his human host but this however brings the threat of a new enemy.
The main villain approached herself as the space witch Murnau with the possession of a Dark Ring that empowers her own strength. With a desire to transform whatever pretty thing she fancies into her personal jewelry collection, she had already captured the Ultra Warriors Ginga and Victory and set her sight on Earth as the main target. Worse enough is the return of Jugglus Juggler who continued his scheming ways from behind the scenes again. With the help of Murnau's alien army, X had finally been captured and added to her jewellery collection.
Now Orb must rescue the new generation Ultra Warriors and master the power of bonds as the battle for Earth has begun.
Production.
This movie was previously glimpsed following the conclusion of 2016 Ultraman Festival. It was properly announced on November 23, 2016 in a special event in Ario Hashimoto shopping mall in Sagamihara, Japan. Hideo Ishiguro, the actor of Gai Kurenai highlighted that the movie will introduce Daichi, Ultraman X and Murnau as strong involvements to the plot while having a comedic scene on Shibukawa's part.
On December 9, Tsuburaya further revealed that voice actor Kōichi Yamadera and members of Jungle Pocket, a Japanese comedian trio will participate in the movie as voice casts. They as well revealed that Ultraman Zero, Ginga, Victory and X will be reprised by their original voice actors respectively while the movie's ending theme, TWO AS ONE will be performed by Da-ice and sold as part of their album, NEXT PHASE. Kudo and Hanamura of Da-ice became the guest voice actors of the movie as well, becoming their major debut in voice acting. The director also encouraged the voice actors to perform more ad-libs to their respective roles. Also in commemoration to the movie, preorder for Gai's leather jacket in Bandai Fashion was released and the product is set to shipment in March 2017. Early pre-order of said jacket comes with a pair of free movie tickets for parent-child pair. During the day of the film premier, viewers will be given the chance to shake hands with Ultraman Orb in all of his forms. During the premier of "Ultraman Orb the Movie", director Kiyotaka Taguchi reveals that he summed up the entire "Ultraman Orb" series and spin offs into 10 chapters:
Due to this, he also mentioned that there will be another future project for the series, with chapters 2-5 taking place in-between "The Origin Saga" and the original series, while chapters 8-10 will be after the premiere movie.
Reception.
According to the Japanese theatre website Eiga.com, "Ultraman Orb The Movie" ranks seventh in the box office during its premier date.


Margo Consuela Bors

Margo Consuela Bors (born in 1942) is a painter, muralist, photographer, illustrator and enthusiast of nature and native plants mainly focused around the Bay area. She is an activist for protecting native plants and animals is supported by big organizations like the California Native Plant Society.
Early life and education.
Bors completed her Bachelor's of Art in 1963, at the University of Rochester, New York. In 1992, she attained her foreign studies degree at the University of Mexico, Mexico City. Later she received her docent training in Asian Art and the Asian Art Museum and in the Native Arts of Africa, Oceana and at the de Young Museum, San Francisco, California. ("1966-1973") In 1976, Bors started her independent studies in fine arts at San Francisco City College. ("1976-1976")
Career.
Bors is an artist who currently is located in Portero Hill, San Francisco, California. Bors is a muralist, painter and photographer. Bors has created murals with Precita Eyes Muralists. Bors used her painting skills to create murals and notable artists that she has collaborated with are Luis and Susan Cervantes and Tony Parrinello. She has focused her artwork on Native plants in California. She uses her knowledge on native plants to share with her community in San Francisco. Her aesthetic is based on native plants and animals, she focuses on embracing the beauty of nature and the environment. Bors has used her knowledge about native plants and flowers to give a presentation at the San Francisco Botanical Gardens. She has studied and showcased her photography. Bors' intense investment in nature and native plants and animals has allowed her to give tours for Bayview Hill as well as other national parks and organizations. Her photography consists of mostly botanical and native plants and animals primarily from the Bay Area. Bors has illustrated lino prints in the portfolio, Gardening Out Loud, by Judith S. Offer. Bors has contributed 700 Native plant photos to Calphotos, which is the UC digital library.
Artwork.
Murals.
Bors has created murals all over the San Francisco area. Murals often consists of different artists and not one person is given credit for the whole piece. Bors has helped paint many murals like the murals for the Cesar Chavez School (1995), The San Francisco State University, The Bryant School, 1989 and The Herrick Hospital in Berkeley, California, 1981. In 1982, she painted a mural that depicted Potrero Hill and its history. This mural was created at the entrance of the Potrero Branch Library. The mural shows hills, trees and houses to show what is around this area.
Photography.
Most of Bors' photographs are private and only available for Calphotos. Bors' photographs consist of botanical life and likes to include in her photos images of insects like spiders, butterflies, Damselflies, and bees. Her photos are used by groups like the Sierra Club who is an organization who tries to help persevere the environment. The intentions of her photographs is to embrace the beauty of nature and express the importance of native plants and animals.
Exhibitions.
Solo Exhibitions
 Group Exhibitions
Collections.
Bor's linocut print, California Poppies, is acquired by Library of Congress.
Awards.
The California Native Plant Society has awarded Bors with the Certificate of Excellence in botanical art
Publications.
Bors has illustrated and collaborated with Judith S. Offer to create the 1996 book, "Gardening Out Loud." The book includes various poems written by Offer along with images created by Bors. In this book you will find Bors linoprints that include abstract images of flowers and plants. Bors has had a long term interest in preserving habitat and native plant species in California. Some of the poems in Gardening Out Loud are "Purple Iris, Stumped?" and "ARGIOPE TRIFASIATA." These poems are based on Judith S. Offer's experience in gardening and volunteer work with the National Native Plant Society.


Waiting (Degas)

Waiting is a pastel on paper by the French Impressionist Edgar Degas, completed between 1880–1882. It is an early example of the more than 200 pastels, paintings, mixed media drawings and sculptures of ballerinas depicted by Degas from the early 1880s. This work is regarded for its vibrant colouring and steep perspective.
The ballerina series follows his earlier studies of both lower and middle class women, where he looked at the moment when they let their public face drop, and pretense gave way to an awareness of the reality of both themselves and their surrounding. With ballerinas he was primarily interested in the contrast between their beauty and grace on stage and the reality of the physical and physiological toil such artifice took on the performers. Of the more than 200 works, only 50 show the dancers performing on stage, the rest are set in rehearsals or capture fleeting, private moments like this. "Waiting" is an empathetic example, depicting a ballerina accompanied by her chaperone, bent over ostensibly to massage her foot but whose body language indicates a person racked with anticipation before she takes stage.
The background is formed from a wide variety of oranges, browns and blacks, while the younger woman is portrayed in pink, blue, and creamy tones which highlight her softness compared to the severity of the older woman. The work is executed with an innovative mixture of subtle (the woman's feet), slashed (the bench) and hatched (the younger woman's dress) strokes.
Degas was taken by the peripheral world of the dancers, the rehearsals and backstage moments, a world to which he did not have access to until 1885; he only became interested in the ballet in 1870, and backstage was strictly limited to long term patrons. His removal from the moment reflected in the image is highlighted by the unusually steep perspective; the viewer seems to be positioned far above the two women; looking down as if seated in a box above the auditorium.
Degas was aware from an early point in his studies of the exhaustion of the girls, and the extent to which they pushed the limits of their bodies for fleeting moments of elegance. He was further conscious of the brevity of a ballerina's career, and the positioning of the older chaperone–more than likely an ex-dancer herself–in this work adds to its poignancy; the younger woman representing what her forlorn looking companion once was. Degas, mindful of this, presents an interesting irony - while the young woman waits to make her entrance the older woman waits for her to leave. The tip of the chaperone's umbrella points in the direction the dancer must take; towards the stage and away from her guardian.
Describing the dichotomy of the series, Rilke wrote in 1898 of Degas' pictures of "ballerinas full of sequined rubbish and stage lighting. They surprise us with their ugliness, these girls, whose whole life gradually descends into their legs, so that on their low, twilight brows nothing remains except a dull memory of things never known, and that will soon be lost in the acquired smile..."
The work is jointly owned by the Norton Simon Art Foundation, Pasadena and the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.


The Sun (Tarot card)

The Sun (XIX) is a trump card in the tarot deck. Tarot trumps are often called Major Arcana by tarot card readers.
Description.
An infant rides a white horse under the anthropomorphized Sun, with sunflowers in the background.
Rider-Waite symbolism.
A. E. Waite suggested that this card is associated with attained knowledge. An infant rides a white horse under the anthropomorphized Sun, with sunflowers in the background. The child of life holds a red flag, representing the blood of renewal while a smiling sun shines down on him, representing accomplishment. The conscious mind prevails over the fears and illusions of the unconscious. Innocence is renewed through discovery, bringing hope for the future.
Interpretation.
This card is generally considered positive. It is said to reflect happiness and contentment, vitality, self-confidence and success. Sometimes referred to as the best card in Tarot, it represents good things and positive outcomes to current struggles.
The Sun card is associated with the planet Sun in astrology.


Michel Dumas (painter)

Michel Dumas (19 June 1812, Lyon - 26 June 1885, Lyon) was a French painter; primarily of religious subjects.
Life and work.
He was a student of Claude Bonnefond and Jean-Michel Grobon at the École des Beaux-Arts de Lyon, a school where he would be a teacher himself, many years later. In 1834, he moved to Paris, where he worked in the studios of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts. After Ingres moved to Rome, he became an assistant to Victor Orsel and at the church of Notre-Dame-de-Lorette.
He then joined Ingres in Italy, spending sixteen years in Rome before returning to Paris, where he specialized in religious art. Later, he went back to Lyon, to take the position of Director at his old alma mater. He was named a Knight in the Legion of Honor in 1884. et meurt en cette ville l'année suivante.
His best known students include and François Guiguet. His works may be seen at the , the Musée des beaux-arts de Lyon, and the Louvre, among several others.


Enid Chadwick

Enid Mary Chadwick (1902–1987) was a British artist known for religious art and children's religious material.
Enid Chadwick lived in Walsingham for more than fifty years. She came to Walsingham from Brighton in 1934. She was the daughter of a priest and attended a convent school in Oxford run by the sisters of the Society of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, whose house is now St Antony's College.
Chadwick trained at the Brighton School of Art prior to coming to Walsingham in 1934. Chadwick's painting and her personal style appear in the Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham.
Notes and references.
Citations
Bibliography


B. Kliban

Bernard "Hap" Kliban (January 1, 1935 – August 12, 1990)
 was an American cartoonist.
Early life and education.
Born in Norwalk, Connecticut, Kliban studied at the Pratt Institute and Cooper Union but "flunked out". He spent time painting and traveling in Europe before moving to California, where he lived in the North Beach section of San Francisco. He did freelance advertising illustration, drawing ads, logos and annual reports. His first wife, Mary Kathleen Brown, was a noted cartoonist in her own right as M. K. Brown and chose many of the cartoons that appeared in his publications. It was while living in North Beach that "Hap" (for his birthday, "Happy New Year") began to draw cartoons for "Playboy" magazine. The income from "Playboy" provided financial security that enabled him in 1967 to move Brown and his daughter Kalia to the suburb of Fairfax, Marin County.
Career.
In 1962, Kliban became a "Playboy" cartoonist, contributing cartoons until his death. Michelle Urry, Playboy’s cartoon editor, visiting his studio, reviewed his drawings, mostly cats. She thought they should be compiled into a book, introduced him to an agent, who found a publisher, resulting in the 1975 book "Cat". This led to several other books of cartoons ending with "Advanced Cartooning" in 1993. Since "Cat", his cartoons have adorned many products including stickers, calendars, mugs, and t-shirts.
The books that followed "Cat" consisted mostly of extremely bizarre cartoons that find their humor in their utter strangeness and unlikeliness. Many of these are cartoons that Kliban drew for "Playboy". They often contained dysmorphic drawings of nude figures in extremely unlikely environments. Another frequent subject of satire were the type of wordless, step-by-step visual instruction manuals typically found with such things as office furniture. Kliban also had a recurring series of drawings called "Sheer Poetry", in which the page would be split into six panels, containing images of objects whose names, when spoken in the order presented, would form a rhyming, nonsensical verse.
Death and legacy.
Bernard Kliban died at UCSF Medical Center aged 55 of a pulmonary embolism; he had undergone heart surgery there two weeks previously. He was survived by his second wife, Judith Kamman Kliban (who later married actor Bill Bixby shortly before Bixby's death in 1993); brother, Ken, of New York City; and two daughters: Kalia, from his first marriage; and Sarah, from another relationship.
Gary Larson cartoonist of The Far Side comic strip, named Kliban as one of the inspirations for his work.


An Athlete Wrestling with a Python

An Athlete Wrestling with a Python was the first of three bronze sculptures produced by the British artist Frederic Leighton. Completed in 1877, the sculpture was a departure for Leighton, and heralded the advent of a new movement, New Sculpture, taking realistic approach to classical models. It has been described as a "sculptural masterpiece" and as "possibly Leighton's greatest contribution to British art". Despite its indebtedness to the Classical tradition, it can be understood as one of the first stirrings of modern sculpture in Britain as well as in Europe. The Athlete was arguably the most influential piece of English sculpture of the 19th century.
The sculpture was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1877 under the title "An Athlete Wrestling with a Python" but it is sometimes also known as "An Athlete Strangling a Python" or "An Athlete Struggling with a Python". The original full-size bronze was acquired for the nation using funds from the Chantrey Bequest, and is displayed at Tate Britain in London.
Description.
The sculpture depicts a dramatic scene of life and death, with a classically proportioned male nude wrestling with a large snake. Leighton conceived the composition while working on sculptural modellos for the figures in his 1873-76 processional painting of the "Daphnephoria". It may have been inspired by the story of Apollo slaying the Python of Delphi. There are obvious parallels with the classical sculpture of "Laocoön and His Sons", and the work also owes a debt to works of Michelangelo.
The male, a muscular athlete crowned with a wreath, is standing with his legs apart, holding the python's head away with his right hand, while grasping its body with his left hand behind his back. The python has thrown two coils around the athlete's left thigh and its body curves around the athlete's back, but its mouth gapes wide in the throes of death as it is being throttled. The work depicts the musculature of the figures and the scales of the serpent realistically, with contrasting textures. The work was designed in a spiral, so it must be viewed in the round from a variety of angles. The exaggerated spiral composition confounds any singular view of the statue, and its form exceeds that of its predecessors' use of the figura serpentinata. With it, Leighton developed the Athlete as a statement about the properties of sculpture as distinct from those of painting, and the composition encourages a temporal and circumambulatory experience of the work as a means of highlighting sculpture's physicality and three-dimensionality.
The model for the athlete was an Italian professional, Angelo Colorossi (father of the Angelo Colarossi who was the model for Alfred Gilbert's 1891 sculpture of "Anteros"). The work was originally modelled a small-scale clay figure, a plaster cast of which was later given to George Frederic Watts. Jules Dalou, a French sculptor who was in exile in London after the Paris Commune, encouraged Leighton to scale it up and to have it cast as a life-size bronze.
Leighton was assisted by Thomas Brock, and comparisons can be made to Brock's 1869 work of "Hercules Strangling Antaeus", and a similar sculpture of 1814 by François Joseph Bosio, "Hercule combattant Achéloüs métamorphosé en serpent" (not cast in bronze until 1824; in the Louvre). There is a similar wrestling figure in Leighton's painting of "Hercules wrestling with Death for the Body of Alcestis" (at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut).
The work was scaled up and modelled in plaster at Brock's studio in Boscobel Place, Westminster, and then cast in bronze by Cox & Son, whose foundry in Thames Ditton was later taken over by A.B. Burton. The original life-size bronze measures and weighs . It was the first full-size nude adult male sculpture with no fig leaf to conceal its genitals to be made in Britain in decades. It is also one of the first modern life-size statues in Europe to eschew a clearly identifiable mythological, religious or classical source. In this, it is comparable to the contemporary sculpture by Auguste Rodin, The Age of Bronze (1876), and the slightly later 'Standing Man' (1884) by Adolf von Hildebrand. Leighton's Athlete, along with these contemporary statues, pushed the Classical tradition to its limits and helped to open the discourse of modernity in sculpture in Europe.
Reception.
Leighton had the work cast in bronze without a prior commission, a mark of his artistic confidence and his wealth. At the time, the purity of white marble was preferred for new imaginative works, but Leighton's work created renewed interest in the darker material.
The sculpture was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1877. Joseph Edgar Boehm, Queen Victoria's Sculptor in Ordinary, wrote to Leighton in 1877 that it was "superb. I think it the best statue of modern days." The art critic Edmund Gosse saw it was "something wholly new, propounded by a painter to the professional sculptors and displaying a juster and livelier sense of what their art should be than they themselves had ever dreamed of". The Athenaeum praised the work, saying Leighton had "selected a subject full of passion, and dealt with it in correspondingly energetic manner, and in a style that suited the subject, adopting a vigorous, and, to some extent, massive style".
It won the gold medal for sculpture at the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1878. It was purchased for £2,000 by the Chantrey Bequest on behalf of the British nation, making it the first sculpture acquired for the national art collection in that manner. It is still held by Tate Britain.
Leighton was elected the President of the Royal Academy in 1878 and was knighted in the same year. He donated the original plaster model for the full-size sculpture to the Royal Academy in 1886, the year he was created a baronet. A plaster cast of the clay study, , is held by Tate Britain, made c.1877 and presented by Alphonse Legros 1897, and a further version in bronze is in the Ashmolean Museum, in Oxford.
A marble replica was carved by Frederick Pomeroy for Carl Jacobsen's Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in Copenhagen. Leighton counselled against the reproduction, as the marble is less able to hold its own weight, but eventually acquiesced and adapted the composition, adding supports for the legs. It was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1891 before being transported to Denmark. The marble sculpture was de-accessioned by the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in 1974. After passing through several private collections, it was sold at Christie's in 2003 for £446,650. In 2017, John Schaeffer donated the marble replica to the Art Gallery of New South Wales, in Sydney, Australia.
Smaller reproductions of the bronze were cast in two sizes by Ernest Brown and Phillips at the Leicester Galleries between 1903 and 1910. A bronze was acquired by the Leighton House Museum in 2005, part funded with a grant from the Art Fund. The museum also has a plaster model of the python which Leighton presented to George Frederic Watts around 1900. An example of the 52 cm bronze was sold at Bonhams in 2017 for £106,250.
Later works.
Leighton made only two other bronzes sculptures, both exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1886.
Brock assisted Leighton with a second full-size male nude sculpture, his "The Sluggard" (1885), sometimes titled "An Athlete Awakening from Sleep". The inspiration for the piece came from his life drawing of model Giuseppe Valona. The original bronze measures . It was donated to the nascent Tate Gallery by Henry Tate in 1894. Smaller casts are in several other museum collections.
Leighton's third and last bronze sculpture was a much smaller statuette of a female nude, "Needless Alarms" (1886), depicting a girl frightened by a toad. It measures . A cast was acquired by John Everett Millais, and another cast was presented to the Tate Gallery in 1940 by Lady Aberconway (the wife of Henry McLaren, 2nd Baron Aberconway).


Saint Jerome Writing (Caravaggio, Valletta)

Saint Jerome Writing is a painting by the Italian master Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio in 1607 or 1608, housed in the Oratory of St John's Co-Cathedral, Valletta, Malta. It can be compared with Caravaggio's earlier version of the same subject in the Borghese Gallery in Rome.
Caravaggio arrived in Malta on 12 July 1607. He had spent the previous months in Naples, where he had sought refuge with his powerful protectors the Colonna family after killing a man in a brawl in Rome the previous year. In Naples he had been an instant success, achieving ten commissions, including a number or large and very prestigious altarpieces, in less than a year, and inspiring a following of Caravaggisti among the city's artists. In short, in Naples he had found professional success, the esteem of fellow-artists, and the support of important patrons. Why then leave all this for a speck of rock inhabited by warrior-monks noted more for their fighting (Peter Robb compares them to the French Foreign Legion) than for their support of the arts? The following summarises the speculation of recent biographers such as Robb and Helen Langdon: In 1607 Caravaggio was still an outlaw, at risk of being tracked down by his enemies - the family of the man he had killed - and Naples, close to Rome, may have seemed comparatively exposed. His patrons and protectors - the Colonna, the Giustiniani, the banker Ottavio Costa, - had strong links with Malta and the Knights, and it may have been felt that joining the Order would give Carvaggio immediate protection and aid in procuring a Papal pardon for his eventual return to Rome. The Grand Master of the Knights, Alof de Wignacourt, was keen to enhance the prestige of his Order and his capital, and the prospect of having one of the leading artists in Rome and Naples as "de facto" court painter must have been an appealing one. And so Caravaggio went to Malta.
The coat of arms in the bottom right corner of the painting is that of Ippolito Malaspina, Prior of the Order of the Knights of Saint John (the Knights of Malta) in Naples. Malaspina was a relative by marriage of Caravaggio's patron Ottavio Costa, a friend of his other patrons the Giustiniani brothers, and a cousin of Giovanni Andrea Doria, Prince of Genoa, who two years before had sheltered the artist after an earlier flight from Rome. It's possible that he may have had himself represented as the saint. "Saint Jerome" was thus a very important painting for the artist.
The subject seems oddly unmartial for a commission by a man whose "raison d'etre" was to fight the Turks - St Jerome was venerated as the translator of the Bible, which he is seen doing here. But Malaspina was not only a famous warrior, he was also a commissioner for the poor, orphans and widows, and the painting may have been intended to emphasise both this aspect of his work and also the asceticism of the Order.
Ippolito Malaspina arrived in Malta at the end of the Great Siege of 1565. He landed with the 'Grande Soccorso' and was present in the final onslought on the invading Ottoman forces. Therefore, this knight indeed witnessed the final stages of the Great Siege. He was also a relative, if not the brother or cousin, of Vespasianus Malaspina who died a martyr's death whilst courageously fighting the Ottoman soldiery in Fort Saint Elmo. A depiction of Vespasianus Malaspina is found within the Co-Cathedral of Saint John on the right hand side of a window just above the chapel dedicated to the Langue of Italy. Therefore, Ippolito must have reached the Island to aid his brethren however his relative, amongst others, died a Catholic martyrs death. Previously to his Maltese residence, Ippolito Malaspina was Admiral of the Papal Fleet. The Catholic martyrs are unfortunately not much remembered by the Maltese, however a collective remembrance day referred to as Victory Day is celebrated on September 8, Feast dedicated to the Nativity of Our Lady, also known as Our Lady of Victory on the Islands.
In 1984 the painting was stolen from the St. John's Co-Cathedral. The canvas was cut out of the frame. Two years later the painting was recovered when a ransom had been asked. The masterpiece was damaged and needed restoration before it was put on display again.


Nancy Rourke

Nancy Rourke is an internationally-known Deaf artist and ARTivist, with a focus in oil painting. Her pieces carry the themes of resistance, affirmation, and liberation, with stylings falling under 'Rourkeism' and 'Surdism'.
Life.
Rourke grew up in San Diego with both her parents. Her mother was from Michigan, and her father belonged to the Mesa Grande Band of Mission Indians in the Kumeyaay Nation. The family only learned she was deaf at six years old, and she credits her main form of expression before and then after this discovery was art. Her schooling focused on oralism, and Rourke was not educated in ASL until college at the Rochester Institute of Technology. She received a BFA in Graphic Design and Painting (1982) and a MFA in Computer Graphics and Painting (1986). Two of her greatest inspirations were Jean Michel Basquiat and Jacob Lawrence and their work in the civil rights movement.
Career.
Rourke's career began with a variety of graphic design jobs, at companies such as Xerox, 20th Century Fox, and Microsoft. After 2009 she became a full time artist with a focus on Deaf View/Image Art after she began to explore deaf culture. She additionally works to bring Deaf View curriculum into schools for deaf children. She hosts retreats, galleries, and works through several artist-in-residencies in schools nation wide. Some of her experience also pertains to assisting deaf inmates who did not have access to interpreters or video phones in prison, and creating programs to expand their artistic abilities.
In 2014 she published “Nancy Rourke: Deaf Artist Series”.
In 2019 she has been awarded the Laurent Clerc Award by Gallaudet University's Alumni Association to recognize a deaf person for "his or her outstanding contributions to society,"


Sharon Lutheran Church and Cemetery

Sharon Lutheran Church and Cemetery is a historic Lutheran church and cemetery located near Ceres, Bland County, Virginia. The church was built in 1883, and is a one-story, frame church, four bays long, with round-arched, stained-glass windows and a gable roof. It features a projecting square tower with a bell-cast pyramidal roof and cross finial on the entrance facade. The adjacent cemetery was established in 1817, and includes a collection of rare Germanic gravestones which are stylistically related to those found in the outlying churches of the Wythe County German settlements.
It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.


Dancing Through Life (sculpture)

Dancing Through Life is a public art work by artist Schomer Lichtner. It is installed on the Riverwalk in Pere Marquette Park in downtown Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Description.
The steel sculpture depicts a ballerina "poised prettily" on a cow. The cow is painted green, purple, blue and yellow, with a black face, white triangular nose and red horns. The ballerina bends one knee to rest on the back of the cow and kicks her other leg overhead. She wears a red and white polka-dotted leotard, white tutu and red ballet slippers. Both arms extend aloft, and she holds a blue fan above her head in one hand. The entire composition incorporates folds and assemblage to create a sense of angularity and dynamism.
Location.
"Dancing Through Life" occupies a prominent location at the southern entrance to Pere Marquette Park. Lichtner collaborated with the Riverwalk District BID to contribute to its RiverSculpture! program by placing the sculpture at this location.


Mausolea and Monuments Trust

The Mausolea and Monuments Trust is a charity for the "protection and preservation of mausolea and funerary monuments situated in Great Britain and Ireland." The trust was founded in 1997 by the architectural historian Jill Allibone (1932–1998). Tim Knox, then the director of the Soane Museum and the trust's first chairman, described it as “the dottiest conservation cause in the land”.
The trust has responsibility for six mausolea:
The trust publishes a regular journal titled "Mausolus", and researches and maintains a gazetteer of mausolea in Great Britain and Ireland.


The Immaculate Conception of El Escorial

The Immaculate Conception of El Escorial is a circa 1660–1665 oil religious painting by the Spanish Baroque artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, now in the Museo del Prado in Madrid. Murillo's many artistic depictions of the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary were enormously influential on later art. This painting is regarded as one of his best. It was earlier identified as the "Immaculate Conception of the Granja" due to a mistaken understanding of its history.
Background.
Although the doctrine that Mary was conceived without sin was not dogmatically defined in the Catholic Church until 1854, that she was sinless was declared in 1661 by Pope Alexander VII, a declaration for which the Spanish church and the Franciscan order had long been strong proponents. To the Spanish Marian cult, not just Mary's purity but the concept that she had been conceived without sin was essential. This was the belief held by Spain and the Franciscans; by contrast, the Dominican order argued that she had been conceived in sin but purified while unborn in her mother's womb.
Even though the immaculate conception doctrine would not be embraced for several centuries, the Spanish rejoiced at the declaration of purity, and many Spanish artists were commissioned to depict the theme. Murillo himself produced 20 such paintings.
Composition.
Painted in oil, the work is displayed on a canvas by . It depicts Mary as a young woman in a white dress and blue cloak, hands clasped in prayer and eyes upraised, ascending on a crescent moon born by cherubs. These carry roses, lilies, a palm frond, and a mirror, all references to her purity and martyrdom. The crescent moon is a reference to the description of the woman of the Apocalypse, clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet, although in this version Mary (as the woman is often identified) is not crowned or pregnant. The near disappearance of the cherubs at the top of the image have been attributed with an overall sense of weightlessness of the piece.
The work is simplified from some of Murillo's earlier efforts, a result of Murillo's ongoing efforts to distill the depiction to its most iconographic form. It is, accordingly, described as "perhaps the most perfectly resolved" of Murillo's Immaculate Conception images in 2005's "Seventeenth-century Art and Architecture".
Several influences on Murillo are found in the painting. His depiction of the age of Mary reflects the guidance of artist Francisco Pacheco, official censor of Seville's Inquisition, that the Virgin Mary should be shown always as a beautiful girl of 12 or 13 years old. Additionally, Murillo had been introduced to the works of Van Dyck and Rubens by Francisco Herrera the Younger, who was sub-director of the Seville Academy under Murillo. The influence of these painters is visible in the delicate and airy coloration of the piece.
The work is dated between 1660 and 1665. Because no contract for a commission for the piece has been located, the exact date is undetermined, but the range is presumed because of the style of the piece compared to his other works of the period and because of a drawing by Murillo from 1664 of the Immaculate Conception which, though it features Mary in different pose, uses the same two cherubs from the right of this work.
Legacy.
It is unknown whether or not the painting was produced on commission or when and why it was produced, but the image is believed to have found its way to the royals collections after purchase by Charles III in Seville. It was then part of the collection of Charles IV, following which it was registered among his collections in the Casita del Príncipe in the Escorial. It is from this registration that the title derives. Previously believed to have been in the Granja palace, it was for some time titled the "Immaculate Conception of the Granja".
Murillo's formulation of the Immaculate Conception theme became a major influence on many subsequent artists. He has been described as "the quintessential painter of the theme of the Immaculate Conception" - this is one of four in the collection of the Prado.
Failed restoration of another version.
In June 2020, it was reported that a copy of "the Immaculate Conception" of uncertain origin had been handed to a furniture restorer for restoration, at a cost of €1,200 ($1,355; £1,087). The restoration was botched, with the face of Mary left unrecognisable after two attempts. Spain's Professional Association of Restorers and Conservators (Acre) called the attempted restoration vandalism. Comparisons were made to the 2012 'Monkey Christ' incident, a similarly botched restoration of "Ecce Homo".


The Stone Bridge

The Stone Bridge is a 1637 landscape painting by the Dutch Golden Age painter Rembrandt in the collection of the Rijksmuseum.
Painting.
This painting was documented by Hofstede de Groot in 1915, who wrote:
The picture is currently documented as being in the collection of Augustin Lapeyrière, based presumably on the Hofstede de Groot catalog. Before him, Smith wrote:
Probably M. Perrier refers to Augustin Lapeyrière, because it was sold on 14 April 1817, lot nr. 46, in Paris. The auction catalogue of May 12, 1900 stated that it was in the collection of James Gray of Versailles in 1863, which Hofstede de Groot repeated. Since Waagen had seen the painting in the collection of the Marquess of Landsdowne in 1850, this was however impossible.


Mark Northover

Mark Northover (27 March 1950 – 6 June 2004) was a British actor with dwarfism, whose best-known screen character was Burglekutt in the 1988 film "Willow". Another memorable role was that of Alvy in "Hardware". Outside cinema, he made an appearance in the music video for Depeche Mode's "Walking in My Shoes".
Mark Northover died at 54 of a heart attack in Upton, Dorset. He was survived by wife Patsy and namesake son Mark.


Osip Sorokhtei

Osip-Roman Iyosafatovych Sorokhtei (Ukrainian: Осип-Роман Йосафатович Сорохтей; 28 February 1890, near Baranyvtsy, Sambir Raion – 28 November 1941, in Ivano-Frankivsk) was a Ukrainian painter, graphic artist, caricaturist and art teacher.
Biography.
His father was a Czech laborer who came to Galicia working on the railway. His mother was Polish. Shortly after his birth, his family moved to Stanislaus (now Ivano-Frankivsk). His father was killed in an accident shortly after and his mother had to raise the family on a railway pension.
He soon developed an interest in drawing and often snuck away from the Jesuit school, which he loathed, to take lessons from a local, unsuccessful, painter. Eventually, unable to tolerate the school, he ran away from home. When he returned, he was enrolled at the Teacher's Seminary instead, and graduated from there in 1910, although he had no intention of becoming a teacher.
Instead, from 1911 to 1914, he studied at the Kraków Academy of Fine Arts, where he enrolled as a Ukrainian. While there, he was awarded several medals.
During World War I, he was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian Army and was assigned to the press corps of the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen. When he was mustered out of service in 1918, he participated in the Ukrainian War of Independence, but became disillusioned, so he returned home.
In 1919, he resumed his studies at the Academy with Yulian Pankevych, among others. After graduating, he worked as a drawing teacher; initially at the (1920-1926). After 1925, he was a regular contributor to the satirical magazine "Zyz" (Squint), published in Lviv. One of his contributions was an unflattering caricature of the school's Director, which resulted in his dismissal. He then went to teach in Sniatyn (1926-1928). While there, he met and married Maria Karpyuk (1900-1978), a pupil of Oleksa Novakivskyi. They returned to Ivano-Frankivsk, where he had been offered a job at the gymnasium.
In 1925, he had begun a series of drawings and paintings called "Golgotha" , which displeased Bishop Hryhoriy Khomyshyn. Despite this, in 1935, he received a commission from the theological seminary and produced a depiction of Christ's descent from the cross. It was considered too unconventional, however and, ironically, ended up being placed in a Jesuit church.
He died of a heart attack in 1941. Major retrospectives of his work were held in Ivano-Frankivsk (1942) and Lviv (1970).
More than 1,000 works in a variety of media are known. Most are held at the Ivano-Frankivsk Regional Art Museum and the Lviv National Art Gallery. Streets are named after him in both cities.


Salmon Run Bell Tower

The Salmon Run Bell Tower is a bell tower and glockenspiel in Vancouver, Washington's Esther Short Park, in the United States.
Description.
The tower is in Propstra Square, the southeast corner of Esther Short Park, near the intersection of 6th and Columbia Street. The tower was designed by architect Cindy Sterry, and features a clock by the Verdin Bells & Clock Company and glockenspiel diorama which tells a story about the Chinookan peoples. The tower also features the art installation "Spiraling Salmon" by Jim Demetro, who also designed the nearby statue of George Vancouver (2000). The installation features bronze sculptures of salmon.
History.
Funded by philanthropist George Propstra and donations by other local businessmen, the tower was dedicated in 2002. Propstra contributed $3 million.


Carolina Caycedo

Carolina Caycedo (born 1978, London, United Kingdom) is a multimedia artist based in Los Angeles.
Born to Colombian parents, Caycedo's art practice is based on environmental research focusing on the future of shared resources, environmental justice, energy transition and cultural biodiversity. Through contributing to community-based construction of environmental and historical memory, Caycedo seeks the ways of preventing violence against humans and nature.
Her works have been shown in museums around the world, including in a number of international biennales, such as the 2019 Chicago Architecture Biennial, 2018 “Made in L.A.” biennial, 2016 São Paulo Art Biennial, 2010 Pontevedra Biennial, 2009 Havana Biennial, 2009 San Juan Poligraphic Triennial, 2006 Whitney Biennial, and 2003 Venice Biennale.
Education.
Caycedo received a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) from the University of Southern California in 2012, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) from the University of Los Andes in Bogotá, Colombia in 1999.
Selected awards.
Caycedo was awarded the “Fine Initiative” from the Vincent Price Museum, in Monterey Park, California, and The Huntington Library, in San Marino, California, United States. This award focuses on the expansion of Huntington Library's art collections, with the aim that awarded artists create new works around the theme of identity. Caycedo also won the 2015 Creative Capital Visual Arts Award.
Selected works.
Caycedo's work is included in several collections at major art museums, including Whitney Museum of American Art and Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
To Drive Away Whiteness/Para alejar la blancura.
"To Drive Away Whiteness/Para alejar la blancura" (2017) was a multi-media sculpture shown at Hammer Museum, Los Angeles as a part of 2018 “Made in L.A.” biennial.
Be Dammed.
Caycedo's project "Be Dammed" (since 2012) is a body of video, artist book, and installation works that focus on Colombian communities residing around the Magdalena River in Colombia that are being affected by extractivist industries such as the construction of dams and the privatization of the river.
By 2014, 200,000 Colombian residents had been displaced under of the resource extraction projects along with the river, and privatization of the land, and Caycedo has been researched on the aftermath of the relocation to create this artwork. In 2019, she showed a performance piece, Beyond Control at the Museo de Arte Moderno de Medellín, Colombia. The performance, choreographed in collaboration with Rebeca Hernandez, sought to visualize the relations between dams and how humans manage bodies of water.
How to obtain a British passport.
"How to obtain a British passport" (2003) is a video work based on the both real and fiction-based acting of Caycedo and her Colombian friend, performing a civil marriage ceremony.
Daytoday.
"Daytoday" (2002–09) was Caycedo's individual project, in which she stayed metropolitan cities such as New York, London, and Vienna without having any money or no essential goods. She lived day-to-day by offering people basic skills, such as haircuts or Spanish lessons, as an exchange for food or a place to stay for a night.
Apariciones/Apparitions.
"Apariciones/Apparitions" is a video work that debuted at The Huntington Library as part of the institution's contemporary arts initiative called "/five." The nine-and-a-half-minute video features ghost-like dancers inhabiting The Huntington's collection.
The Collapse of a Model.
"The Collapse of a Model" consists of two massive photomontages made of composite satellite imagery of three major dam sites. The piece suggests a hopeful not toward the end of the capitalist model of resource extraction.
Exhibitions.
Her work has been exhibited at the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) in Boston, Massachusetts (2020); the Orange County Museum of Art in Santa Ana, California (2019); the Muzeum Sztuki in Lodz, Poland (2019); the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) in Astana, Kazakhstan (2018); the New Museum of Contemporary Art (NUMU) in Guatemala (2017); Clockshop in Los Angeles, California (2015); the Instituto de Visión in Bogotá, Colombia (2014); daadgalerie in Berlin, Germany (2013); and the Galerie du Jour in Paris, France (2013).
Caycedo has participated in group exhibitions at the Ulrich Museum of Art, Wichita, Kansas (In the Wake, 2019); Chicago Architecture Biennial in Chicago, Illinois (2019); the Museo de Arte São Paulo in Brazil (2019); the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin, Germany (2018); the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, California (2018); the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, New York (2018); the Seoul Museum of Art in Seoul, Korea (2017); the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) in Los Angeles, California (2017); Les Recontres d'Arles in Arles, France (2017); and the KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin, Germany (2014).
Fall of


Johann Heinrich Suhrlandt

Johann Heinrich Suhrlandt (30 March 1742, Schwerin - 1 January 1827, Ludwigslust) was a court painter for Duke Frederick II, and Grand Duke Frederick Francis I, of Mecklenburg-Schwerin.
Life and work.
His father, Johann Friedrich Suhrlandt, was the court mechanic. His first art lessons were with, Johann Wilhelm Lehmann, a court painter who recognized his talent. He was, however, unable to obtain a formal academic education, as there were no art schools in Mecklenburg and Duke Frederick would not provide a scholarship. Eventually, he turned to sculpture and took lessons from , the court sculptor. Another court painter, , helped him study painting until his death in 1772. Yet a third court painter, Georg David Matthieu, became his mentor until he also died, in 1778,
In 1777, he married Christina Luisa Schmidt (1753-1793), daughter of the organ builder, . They had six children, one of which, Rudolph, would become a well known history and portrait painter. Following her death from "consumption", he married the widow, Elisabeth Marie Kramel (1748-1827), who brought her own child into the marriage.
Suhrlandt mainly painted landscapes, animals, still-lifes and Biblical scenes; creating decorative art for the in Ribnitz, the in Crivitz, and the in Stavenhagen. In 1791, he was commissioned to create the interior designs for the "", which was being built for Princess Louise. He completed a number of wall paintings, including a depiction of a military victory, won by Prince Josias of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. After completing the commission, the Princess refused to pay him his promised wages; a recurring situation at the court during that period.
His best-known work was a monumental altarpiece, depicting the Annunciation, at the in Ludwigslust, which had been left unfinished by his teacher, Findorff, and allowed to remain that way until 1788. He was occupied with that project until 1803, due to his many other duties as court painter, which included the design of decorations for the court festivals, the painting of fabrics and wallpaper and the design of silk flags for the military. In addition, he was responsible for maintaining the ducal art holdings, and therefore often had to restore old pictures.
In 1818, he received his last commission; decorations for the new "" (Appeals Court) in Parchim. It proved to be a very labor-intensive assignment, so he had to excuse himself due to poor health. He nevertheless remained productive into his last years, devoting his time to still lifes.


Winged Lion Memorial

The Winged Lion Memorial (in Czech: Památník Okřídleného lva) was unveiled on 17 June 2014 at Klárov in Prague by the British Member of Parliament, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas Soames MP, grandson of Sir Winston Churchill. It is dedicated to the Czechoslovak airmen who served in the Royal Air Force (RAF) during World War II and who achieved acclaim for their contribution to the Battle of Britain.
Description.
The two metre high Winged Lion is the work of the contemporary British sculptor Colin Spofforth. The Lion was cast in bronze at the artistic foundry in Horní Kalná, Hradec Králové Region. The Lion is placed on a concrete plinth covered by Czech granite. When viewed from above, the circular pedestal resembles the insignia of the Czech Air Force. The plinth riveted side coverings replicate the fuselage surface of aircraft of the day and since 2018 bear the names of all the Czechoslovakians who served with the Royal Air Force during the second world war. In 2019 the site was extended with benches, information panels and paving around the plinth.
Inscribed on the monument in both Czech and English is: "This monument is an expression of the British Community’s lasting gratitude to the 2,500 Czechoslovak airmen who served with the Royal Air Force between 1940 and 1945 for the freedom of Europe."
Also there is a quotation from British poet William Kean Seymour (1887-1975): "He fights for freedom, one of freedom's sons, lone in his aery sphere of blue and bronze."
It was unveiled by the right honourable Sir Nicholas Soames MP on 17th June 2014 as a gift to the Czech and Slovak peoples from the British community living and working in the Czech and Slovak Republic"s".
History.
During World War II, some 2507 Czech and Slovak men and women served in the British Royal Air Force. About a fifth of them did not survive the war. Not all of them were pilots. In addition to the well-known men in blue, there was the ground crew. Other men worked in administrative positions such as liaison officers in the Royal Air Force or in the training units. Among the RAF pilots there were also airmen from many other countries. Czechoslovaks, like their Polish comrades, earned a great reputation in the RAF.
After February 1948, the Czechoslovaks who had served in the RAF and had repatriated to Czechoslovakia after 15 August 1945, often with wives and children, were subsequently persecuted by the communist regime.
The installation of the monument met with the criticism of Prague's conservationists, who protested against its location. The protest was not upheld.
Funding and unveiling.
About 99% of the funds raised (about three million Czech crowns) was donated by the British community in the Czech and Slovak Republics. Donations from Czech citizens, businesses and individuals were also received. The origins of the monument are credited to Mr. Euan Edworthy, who has lived in the Czech Republic for many years and whose father served in the Royal Air Force and Colonel Andrew Shepherd, UK Defence Attache.
The unveiling ceremony at Klárov was accompanied by music performed by the Royal Air Force College band and by the Pipes and Drums of the Queen’s Royal Hussars. The event was attended by nine former Czechoslovak RAF members. Before the unveiling, Sir Nicholas Soames (the grandson of Sir Winston Churchill) gave a speech; he referred to the memorial as a symbol of the courage of the 2,500 Czechoslovak airmen and reminded the famous phrase of his grandfather, Churchill, who, speaking of the pilots who took part in the Battle of Britain, proclaimed that"Never was so much owed by so many to so few." Immediately following the unveiling of the memorial a legendary aircraft Spitfire, in the livery of Squadron Leader DFC, made a flypast over Prague.


Night Lodgers

Night Lodgers is a 2007 documentary directed by Licínio Azevedo about squatters living in the former Grande Hotel Beira in Mozambique.


Sal Meijer

Salomon "Sal" Meijer (Amsterdam, December 6, 1877 - Blaricum, February 1, 1965) was a Dutch painter, primarily known for his paintings of cats and Amsterdam city views. Works by Meijer are on view at the Jewish Historical Museum and the Kattenkabinet cat museum in Amsterdam, among others.
Sal or "Sally" Meijer was born at Zwanenburgwal 10 as the son of Jewish diamond-cutters. In his youth, he worked in the diamond industry while studying art. He devoted himself full-time to painting in 1914. His first one-man exhibition was in 1926.
Meijer's work was included in the 1939 exhibition and sale "Onze Kunst van Heden" (Our Art of Today) at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
His marriage to the non-Jewish Liesje Giehl in 1930 caused so much friction with his parents that he moved out of his parents' home and moved the following year to the village of Blaricum, which had a vibrant artists' community. Following the German occupation of the Netherlands during World War II, Meijer was banned from exhibiting his paintings; however, his mixed marriage enabled him to survive the war.
In 1957, he was honored at a ceremony by the Blaricum artists' society to mark his 80th birthday. At this occasion, the Dutch state purchased one of his paintings, depicting the Raamgracht canal in Amsterdam. In 1958, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam presented an overview of his work. After his death in 1965, a memorial exhibition was held at Zeist palace. Meijer was buried at the Jewish cemetery in Muiderberg.
Due to the simplicity of Meijer's paintings and his modest attitude - he did not regard his paintings as works of art but as craftmanship - his work was often labeled as "naive" and "primitive". However, a re-evaluation of his work began in 1957 with the article "Onze grootste moderne primitief - Schilder van betekenis" ("Our greatest modern primitive - Painter of importance") by Kasper Niehuis. The book "Sal Meijer, zo naïef nog niet" ("Sal Meijer, not that naive") by Agnes Grondman followed in 1986. In 1990, a small book about his paintings of cats was published, "Sal Meijer: Raphaël der katten" ("Sal Meijer: Raphael of cats") by Nicole Ex. (The title Raphael of Cats had previously been given to Swiss artist Gottfried Mind (1768–1814)). And in 2007, an exhibition of never before-shown drawings and oil paintings by Meijer and Melle Oldeboerrigter was held at the Amsterdam artists' society Arti et Amicitiae.


Seal of Seattle

The official Corporate Seal of the City of Seattle consists of a portrait of Chief Seattle under which appears the date 1869, the year of the city's incorporation. It is surrounded by two circles. The words "Corporate Seal Of The" are at the top within the outer circle, and the words "City of Seattle" are at the top within the inner circle.
The original seal was designed by James A. and cast by Richard Fuller and was adopted by the Seattle City Council in 1937. Previous to its adoption in 1937, the city had used a notary type seal.
Over time the seal has gone through many updates and re-design efforts. The original seal was re-designed and replaced in 1974 with a more simplified design as part of Seattle's larger branding effort. The seal was again re-designed in the 1980s and then in the 1990s to match the adoption of the Seattle City logo. The current official design features two cones from an evergreen tree and what appear to be two salmon beneath the portrait. The Corporate Seal of the City of Seattle is distinct from the official Seattle City Logo.


Andreas Untersberger

Andreas Untersberger (1874–1944) was an Austrian painter who worked under the pseudonym A. Juenger. He created hundreds of illustrations for Catholic children's books and holy cards.
Family tree.
Andreas Untersberger was the eighth son of a wood carver from Upper Austria, who made altars and other religious and liturgical objects. He was the brother of Josef August Untersberger (1864–1933), who had gained some fame in the 1920s as a sculptor and painter of religious images under the pseudonym "Giovanni."
Career.
Andreas Untersberger first worked under his father. At the age of 16 he was assisting him in the building of an altar in Knittelfeld; Josef Untersberger worked in the Neo-Romanic style. He distinguished himself in a local art exhibit in Austria; began work in Munich, Germany, in various workshops; and was noted as having painted three paintings in Odrovice, modern day Czech. By the turn of the century, Jugendstil became all the rage, and the church no longer gave out big assignments. Josef Untersberger gave up the family business, and his son Andreas moved to Vienna.
From 1895 to 1899 Untersberger studied at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, where he presumably became schooled in the style of the Jugendstil. From 1901 to 1905 he traveled back and forth between Munich and Vienna, until he settled for good in Munich in 1905. He joined artists' societies, locally in Munich and nationally in Berlin, and garnered good reviews of his work, including some non-religious paintings which were on exhibition in the "Glasspalast". In 1932, his work was part of the exhibition in the "Deutsches Museum".
Religious art.
In the first two decades of the twentieth century Untersberger illustrated many children's books, many of them religious, including books used in Catholic education.
In the last decades of his life he worked almost exclusively for Ars Sacra, a German publishing company, where he illustrated children's books and religious material according to very strict guidelines. He made more than 400 illustrations for holy cards, which, until the press was secularized in 1980, were reprinted again and again. Presumably it was Liane Müller, the director of the press, who suggested Untersberger use the pseudonym "A. Juenger," in order to avoid confusion between Andreas and his older brother, who had a reputation of producing "kitsch." It appears that in the last years of his life his work went exclusively to Ars Sacra in the last years of his life, since after the Gleichschaltung religious art became more and more suppressed.


Dance in the Country

Dance in the Country (French: "Danse à la campagne") is an 1883 oil painting by French artist Pierre-Auguste Renoir. It is currently kept at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.
Background.
This painting was commissioned in 1882 by the merchant Paul Durand-Ruel who wanted works on the theme of the ball. He bought it in 1886, exhibited it for the first time in April 1883, and kept it until Renoir's death in 1919. Two complementary painting on the same theme, named "Dance in the City" and "Dance at Bougival", were also painted by Renoir the same year.
The painting, influenced by the artist's trip in Italy in 1881 where he found inspiration from Raphael, marked an evolution of the painter who tried then to break away from Impressionism.
Description.
The painting depicts a couple dancing under a chestnut tree: the man is Paul Lhôte, a friend of the painter, and the woman is Aline Charigot, who later became the wife of the painter. Both figures are painted life-size and occupy almost the entire painting. However, a table in the background on the right, and a hat on the ground, and a pair of faces below the level of the dance floor, can be seen. The woman who holds a fan in her right hand, displays a smiling face and looks towards the viewer. The scene is bathed in a bright and cheerful atmosphere, and the women's clothes use warm colors (yellow gloves, red hat).
Companion pieces.
The paintings two companion pieces, "Dance in the City" and "Dance at Bougival", also show a couple dancing.