Images tagged "romanesque"
Left side of the road
observations, reviews, comments
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Hi Michael I’m searching for a trail guide of Els tres mont. any idea where I can find one? Trail description directions to trailheads etc. thanks Maureen Connors
mcandbrowns@gmail.com
Hello Maureen
Sorry for the delay. The information I used when I did the walk was the guide and maps for the Cingles de Bertí. The guide I have scanned and placed at the bottom of the post Els Tres Monts – Stage 1 – the post to which you added your comment. It’s in Catalan but hopefully it will be of help. The two maps that accompany the guide I found (if my memory serves me right) quite good.
Please remember that I did this walk more than ten years ago and some of the information might be out of date. However, I don’t see why the maps shouldn’t still be available.
Hi
I found some interesting books here. Thank you very much. But what a pity that some books are in image format, not PDF. It would be great if all books are available in PDF. By the way, the link to
On Literature and Art, Progress, Moscow, 1973, 509 pages.
is broken.
Best regards
Naser
Hello Nasar
Good to read you found the Marx/Engels page interesting and useful.
Thanks for pointing out the broken link – don’t know how that happened. Should be OK now.
Don’t really understand your other point. All the documents on that page (and most of the documents on the rest of my site) are downloadable as pdf’s. Could you cite specific cases so I can investigate and understand what you mean?
Firstly I very much enjoy meandering through your wonderful website, especially the Albanian writings.
The tampering of this mosaic is certainly an interesting topic.
“The War of National Liberation against the invading fascists, first Italian then the German Nazis, was led by and principally carried out by Albanian Communists. ” I am not sure David Smiley would agree. I think the history Albanian resistance has not been fully understood and published. The communist regime most certainly exaggerated their effectiveness and of course set the narrative for the Ballists and Legalitit combatants.
Just as the ‘west’ tried to undermine the crucial/fundamental role of the Soviet Union in the defeat of the Nazis (all as part of their ‘Russophobe’ campaign (which began long before the Special Military Operation of February last year) so capitalism has constantly been attempting to undermine any role played by Communists in the Second World War.
But if it wasn’t the Communist who drove first the Italians and then the German fascists out of their country who did?
The ‘Nationalists?
The Communists disrupted ‘the plans of the German Nazis from establishing some element of legitimacy to their occupation of the country with the setting up of a ‘Quisling’ government. The date chosen for this sham was the 18th October 1943 and on that day the Albanian traitors met in the Victor Emmanuel III Palace on the outskirts of the city of Tirana.’
And who was it who brought the disparate groups fighting the invaders together?
‘Different nationalist groups, but especially those organised by the Communist Party of Albania (CPA) after its foundation on 8th November 1941, fought against the invaders but by the middle of 1942 it was recognised that the struggle for liberation needed co-ordination and with that in mind the Communists invited all nationalists to a conference to create a structure that would defeat the materially superior foreign forces.’
Perhaps it was the English ‘James Bonds’ who threw out the fascists, all by themselves?
But the Nazis knew who were their real enemy shown by their murder of Persefoni and Bule and the destruction of Borove.
And even the British knew who the real fighters were by finally ‘accepting’ that the Partisans were the only force that was serious in its fight for National Liberation.
But once the war was won the British did everything in its power to destroy the new Socialist Republic.
So what does a little ‘re-writing’ of history matter?
Grover Furr is not a Soviet Historian! He’s a despicable apologist for Joseph Stalin and denier of his atrocities! Furr has a degree in Medieval English not Russian History or any history! Conquest didn’t lie about anything Skunkwipe! He used legitimate sources and provided evidence of Stalin’s genocide! Furr ignored evidence and provided worthless sources! He’s the scum of the earth and so are you!
can I have wattapp number in order to communcate with someone to answer my questions regarding Spring 6 at Tskaltubo – Georgia
Just ask you questions through Comments on the Spring 6 post and I’ll try to answer them. I don’t use whatsapp.
Well, you may be right about that, for little appeared to be going on this week ((the one which ends up with oil being wiped over the British head of state. But the statutes of Lenin and Stalin, at least, have moved from the gallery’s back yard to the (impeccably kept) front garden of Mehmet Shehu’s house, now guarded by security men. Makes of that what you will….
Thanks for the update of the whereabouts of Lenin and Stalin. Does it mean both the Stalin statues have been moved there. And do you have the address of Mehmet Shehu’s house? I don’t think I’ve ever been there. If you give me the adress I’ll update the post in case anyone wants to go looking for them now that the art gallery may not return to what it was if any renovation actually takes place.
If you walk down rr Ismail Qemali from the Boulevard, into the former Blok, you walk along the north side of a little park. When you get to the end of the park, the house on your left is Mehmet Shehu’s house, so the address is probably the corner of Ismail Qemali and rr Ibrahim Rugova. The front or Enver Hoxha’s house is diagonally across the crossroads in front of you and at the back of the Shehu’s house, but whether there is a tunnel connecting them, as Kadare wrote, is not known. The house is used as a government guest house, and is under security guard, which prevents getting near. In the front garden you can see (the top parts of) Lenin and Stalin (and a jeep-like truck). I am afraid I cannot say whether there is any more, though someone suggested that some works from the gallery of Figurative Arts were being stored there on the inside.
Thanks for the update Adrian. I’ll try to work out how best to include the latest information in the other blogs where I’ve mentioned the statues of Lenin and Stalin. It will also be interesting to see how, or indeed if, they find a permenant home – accessible to the public – in the future of all the statues that were hidden away at the back of the National Art Gallery. I’m particularly concerned with the fate of the statue of Liri Gero
Michael, I wonder if we might have permission to use your photograph of Beggars Bridge to accompany a biographical entry for Thomas Ferres? He is to be included in a new book on people related to Hull over many centuries which is currently being compiled to mark 100 years of Lord Mayors in Hull.. All proceeds are to go to the Lord Mayor of Hull’s charities. I look forward to hearing from you. Dr Robb Robinson R.N.,Robinson@hull.ac.uk
Hello Robb,
No problem. I’ll send you direct higher definition copies which might be better for your purpose.
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Thanks for this write up. It was very helpful. Would you please tell me if they move all business class seats towards to forward movement direction of the train? Thanks!
I wouldn’t have thought so – but don’t know for sure. These are fixed trains. Seats will face front going one way and back the other. It all depends.
This is quite an old post, but the third artist would be Frederik Shuka.
I might have posted information and pictures of the mosaic some time ago But I’m still interested in updating/correcting if necessary anything I might have written. In that way I be able to, slowly, fill in the gaps in my information about Albanian lapidars in general.
Thanks for the name. Would he have been an artist or an architect? I know on other lapidars the two skills worked together.
Hello, Petro Sota was my grandfather’s brother. There is a book made about him. Also there is the technical university of Albania that was named after him.
I can give you more details on his life.
As per the sculpture in 2014. It was paid by my grandpa in honour of his brother. The original monument was destroyed when the city council gave the land to UAE mollahs to build a mosque without any consultation and through some generous bribes.
My grandpa collected a few favours here and there in order to get the statue there.
Side note, Raqi Sota (another brother also died during the occupation) him and Petro were exercising their aim when a bullet ricocheted and killed Raqi. He was later made hero of the people.
As per Petro, he was being followed based on information given by a local spy. He noticed that he was being spied and tried to get into a local “bar”. He tried escaping from the windows since he had in his possession a lot of over 40 something names of the resistance. He got shot, and tried eating the letter based on the local eye witnesses. The fascist broke his jaw while his was dying in order to get the letter. Apparently the letter was so damp with blood and chewed that it was unusable.
He got shot a total of 28 times total. And left in the the middle of what yes to be the market for 2 days. His father went to pick up his corpse on the 3rd day by night time.
After this incident, his/my family was sent to the goulag for 2 years.
They were able to come back when the Germans were defeated.
Hello Bessi,
Thanks for the information. It’s so difficult to get details about many of the lapidars and monuments from the socialist period in Albania and there are many gaps in my knowledge. Thanks you, again, for filling some of those gaps.
Michael
RESPEKTE PER TRIMIN, PATRIOTIN E KOMBIT.
Hello Michael,
Thank you very much for this very accurate and useful article. There is so much good content.
Glad you shared the coordinates as some points are really hard top find.
I’m currently in Albania and will take time to visit some of these fabulous places.
Keep up the good work.
Glad to hear you have found the information useful. Please get in touch if you find any errors or omissions. I will then update. Have a good time in Albania.
May have been moved recently…
https://balkaninsight.com/2022/08/30/albanian-governments-stalin-lenin-art-installation-stirs-anger/
The National Art Gallery was closed around the end of November 2021 following the most bizarrely curated exhibition I have ever seen. For a few months towards the end of 2021 it seemed that ALL the exhibits from the Gallery’s storerooms were brought into the exhibition space and put on ‘display’. No organisation, no information but an interesting exhibition, nonetheless, for anyone interested in Albanian Socialist Realist art. I wrote a blog post, together with hundred of pictures, here. When I saw the hoardings around the building I wondered about the fate of the statues from the ‘Statue Park’ at the back of the building.
When I first went to Tirana I had to play cat and mouse with security to get to the back of the building but in recent years it has been on the itinerary of the Tirana walking tours. So it seems Joe and Vladimir have a new, if only temporary, home. Some of the other larger bronze statues can be found in the internal courtyard of the Historical Museum in Skenderbeu Square – go through the doorway that is opposite the main visitor entrance and turn right.
I wasn’t able to find out anything about when the gallery would reopen or what had been the fate of all the exhibits that were placed on show last year.
The ‘anger’ mentioned in the short piece to which you provided a link just goes to show how stupid some people are. These statues, and more, had been on ‘public’ display for years. Ignorant people seem to have the perpetual desire to be outraged.
I’ll place a note at the end of my posts about the gallery to let readers know of the current situation with the ‘refurbishment’. Thanks for your comment, it has reminded me that I should have done that once I realised the gallery was closed.