#imperial hall

[dijetemjeseca]

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Beatrix striving towards Fredrick II, 1751-1753., Imperial Hall, Residenz Würzburg, Germany

Kompozicija Apolon nosi Beatrice Barbarossi slikana je tako da stvarni štuko nalikuje na slikani u tolikoj mjeri da ih je doista teško razlikovati. Kompoziciju čine osvijetljeno plavo nebo, oblici i likovi. Posebno su impresivni konji gledani odozdo i prikazani u skraćenju, teški i mišićavi, a lebde s neviđenom lakoćom. Snažna boja i svjetlost, kao i glavno obilježje Tiepolove umjetnosti, u ovom djelu posebice dolaze do izražaja. (Zubek, Fulir, Ćus, Avmedoski; 2014., 98)

Posljednju i najrafiniraniju etapu talijanskog iluzionističkog oslikavanja svodova možemo vidjeti u djelima Giovannija Battiste Tiepola, koji je većinu života proveo u Veneciji u kojoj su njegova djela definirala stil rokokoa. Tiepolo je dvije godine boravio u Njemačkoj, a posljednje je godine svog života radio za Karla III u Španjolskoj. Tiepolo se proslavio i izvan granica domovine svojom majstorskom primjenom svjetla i boje, dražešću i lakoćom sllikanja te bujnošću invencije. Freske u Würzburgu naslikane su kad je bio na vrhuncu stvaralačke snage. Svod, koji svojom plošnošću nalikuje na slikarsko platno, često uključuje najrazličitije iluzionističke otvore i proboje, tako da ga ne doživljavamo kao prostornu prepreku. Međutim, u ovim otvorima u Tiepola ne nalazimo mnoštvo likova koje pokreću dramatični svjetlosni proplamsaji - kao što je to tako na baroknim svodovima - već modro nebo i suncem obasjane oblake, te tu i tamo poneko krilato biće koje uzlijeće prema neomeđenu prostranstvu. Čvršći grozdovi likova smješteni su jedino uz rubove stropa. (Davies, Denny, Hofrichter, Jacobs, Roberts, Simon; 2013., 778)

[gothhabiba]

As noted in post-colonial and gender studies, there has long been a pattern of homogenizing and victimizing discourses, particularly in international agencies and NGO’s, that highlight the need of Western nations to intervene on behalf of “third-world women” and “save” them (Spivak 1988; Wood 2001). Robinson-Pant [notes] that it is common for women’s literacy programs, in particular, to become the gateway for other development interventions such as family planning or child nutrition. Collins and Blot note that literacy projects are not power neutral and argue that,

the interconnectedness of literacy, power and identity formation are unavoidable in thinking about relationships between colonizers and colonized. Colonized discourses often emphasize the “inherent” goodness of bringing education, enlightenment and civilization to formerly savage peoples – literacy becomes a legitimizing narrative for other colonial projects (2003:21)

Such positions were evident in U.S. government discourses about literacy and development during the time the Passerelle program was being developed [in Morocco]. This can be seen for example, in a speech made in 2006 by Dr. Paula Dobriansky, the former U.S. Under Secretary for Democracy and Global Affairs, in which she advocated for better education for adult women in developing contexts. In her speech, Dobriansky argued that women and girls should be viewed as “untapped resources” and “vital sources of human capital” for future economic and social growth (Dobriansky 2006).

Thus, in addition to gender, of central importance to understanding the power structures and ideologies underpinning USAID’s Passerelle methodology[] is a consideration of how discourses about literacy often link it up to notions of social and economic development. Collins and Blot (2003) identify these discourses as forming the “Literacy Thesis” [...]. They explain that,

the central claims of the [literacy] thesis are that writing is a technology that transforms human thinking, relations to language, and representations of tradition, a technology that also enables a coordination of social action in unprecedented precision and scale, thus enabling the development of unique social and institutional complexity (Collins and Blot 2003:17)

Numerous critiques of the literacy thesis [...] have since questioned whether literacy can in fact be viewed as a universal, unitary skill that is determinate of social realities or if it is rather embedded in and shaped by the particular, historically contingent cultural contexts in which multiple literacies can occur. [...] Despite [...] challenges to the literacy thesis, its pervasiveness in academic literature, development agendas and the pedagogy of local literacy programs in Morocco is striking.

Given the 2004 Free Trade agreement between the U.S. and Morocco, the emphasis on relationships between literacy and economic forces by U.S. officials, such as [...] Dobriansky, is not unexpected. Prendergast (2003) for example, has argued that since literacy is usually acquired in relation to institutions, it is necessary to consider what other functions these institutions serve. A significant portion of American financial and pedagogical support for adult literacy education in Morocco is funneled through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), as illustrated by the Passerelle program. Among USAID’s “strategic objectives and goals” in 2006, was the goal of “Democracy and Economic Freedom in the Muslim World,” a plan, which “[confronts] the intersection of traditional and transnational challenges… [combining]… diplomatic skills and development assistance to act boldly to foster a more democratic and prosperous world integrated into the global economy.” Thus, any literacy promotion by USAID in Morocco should be considered in light of its broader mission statements and how increased literacy in Morocco is being imagined to align advantageously with them. USAID’s role and interest in promoting literacy in Morocco, can also viewed as a form of literacy sponsorship (Brandt 2001). Brandt explains that sponsors of literacy should be understood as “any agents, local or distant, concrete or abstract, who enable, support, teach, and model, as well as recruit, regulate, suppress, or withhold, literacy – and gain advantage by it in some way” (19). [...] Furthermore, Brant notes that, “in whatever form, sponsors deliver the ideological freight that must be borne for access to what they have” (20). In addition to transmitting ideological freight, perhaps indirectly, regarding language varieties and scripts, USAID also explicitly imposes ideological frameworks regarding notions of gender roles and human rights through the inclusion of Moudawana [Moroccan Family Legal Code] content in the Passerelle classroom.

— Jennifer Lee Hall, Debating Darija: Language Ideology and the Written Representation of Moroccan Arabic in Morocco (PhD dissertation), 2015, pp. 76-9.

[patchymoon]

homestuck month day 14: this is the brainrot i have experienced after working on a lyricstuck for a whole week

my brain automatically says that line is a homestuck reference every time even though im 99% sure 0 of the tally hall members (or associates) knew shit about homestuck

EDIT (that im making before i even have this shit posted publicly): andrew hussie made art for cojum dip in 2013-2014 so actually bora mightve known of homestuck in 2011 (when good & evil released). i do not know how to feel about this

EDIT EDIT: the "big bad betty of the pocalypse" line was in a demo version from may 2009, before the betty crocker plotpoint was introduced. crisis averted there is no actual homestuck in tally hall

also heres the full version of the condy meme i made in like 3 minutes

this pic goes unbelievably hard feel free to screenshot

[readingsquotes]

MACKLEMORE - HIND'S HALL 2 (feat. Anees, MC Abdul, Amer Zahr)

-YouTube age restricts videos about Palestine. it limits reach

[disneyprincessdxminatrix]

actually the sexiest trait a fictional character can have is being a little evil

[urca-stowaway]

the mountain goats’ new song fresh tattoo is soooo breq/seivarden coded like

very “picking up a half-dead soldier off the street and dragging her along on your quest for justice” core

[safirefire]

The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea has a she/he gnc lesbian pirate falling for a lesbian noblewoman she’s supposed to be double crossing and an anti imperialist message btw

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"ANTI-WAR LEADER HERE," Toronto Star. November 10, 1933. Page 1. ---- Tom Mann, editor of the Militant Trade Unionist of London, England, who sees an uprising of the workers of the world as the only hope for peace, is in Toronto, and will address a mass meeting on this subject to-morrow night in Massey Hall.

[hussyknee]

I'll be honest. I didn't expect Red, White and Royal Blue to be this good. I know it was always the number one rec in the gay romance rec lists but I kinda carried a grudge that Boyfriend Material was relegated to number two. I also thought it would be a typical romcom about "yay rich white cis gays" representing the most devastatingly colonizing nations on the planet. I didn't realise one of them would be the biracial grandson of Mexican immigrants. Or that it would be a legitimately beautifully written book with characters that didn't feel like token minorities.

It's an real queer story about identity and politics and tapestries of unacknowledged, suppressed loves reaching across time. Blended families and ambition and duty and authenticity. A moderate and rather thrilling dive into US politics, although a little bit more work into the institutional nature of Buckingham Palace would have been nice, instead of simply making the Queen a stock bigot. The royal family exists in a very precarious yet entrenched power balance with Westminster and the Church, and the queen is herself a sovereign entity managed by a rigid power matrix.

However, while the first half of the book was very funny and lively, I was pretty lukewarm about the pairing itself until the second half. I only felt invested in them after the stakes escalated into an emotional precipice and spiralled into angst and pining and yelling in the rain and "don't you tell me I don't love you bc I can't be with you" "then tell me to leave" and nearly being outed and having state-mandated beards and being miserable and desperate. And I only got gooey because Henry writes emails like the kind of anguished, repressed Victorian poet halfway to manic depression and a laudanum habit. I have to say, the second half of this book really delivers. The actual climax of the book being the 2020 election rather than a dramatic romantic denouement was somehow both unexpected and inevitable. Nothing could ever have come close to the historic experience that was Destiel Putin Total Landscaping 2020 (also it was pretty funny what happened to Nevada in the book vs real life), but the fictional election was still exhilarating. It makes the characters earn their stripes, no pun intended.

This book is first to last a political wish fulfillment fantasy, where the characters openly say, "aren't we glad we're not in some darkest timeline where the USAmerican people betrayed each other right after Obama's term was up?" (Apparently the idea for the book came to the author in mid-2016. Ouch.) Its primary conceit: What if Washington doesn't completely ruin or reject everyone who starts out with good intentions? What if a non-traditionalist union in the '80s turned out a couple of Royal kids who ended up decent people who interrogated their privileges? That most fantastical of premises – that at least a handful of people who attain power and privilege could hold onto their values and compassion. It is, achingly, sorrowingly, the ultimate wish of the disillusioned in the last few years: that just enough people had stepped up where it counted and turned the tide of history. And that they might continue to do so, more often than not.

Overall, a very good, solid, compelling read, far, far better than Love, Simon or whatever else the white cis het mainstream inexplicably latches onto. I won't say better than Boyfriend Material. Alexis Hall is still the better writer. But it's such a completely different book, speaking to a different demographic with different expectations, that it's a chalk and cheese comparison. The London Calling series (Boyfriend Material, Husband Material and the upcoming Father Material) is a quintessentially British romantic comedy with a deeply queer beating heart for an older Millennial audience, interrogating the UK's systemic class and colonial issues, delving into the universalism and diversity of the human condition with richness and complexity. Red, White & Royal Blue is an extremely USAmerican Zillennial fantasy, caught somewhere between YA and US West Wing intrigue with a dash of British glamour— pure escapist pop culture. I might be biased towards LC because I'm its target audience; but the exponentially greater popularity of RW&RB is definitely due to the power of the USAmerican cultural hegemony. I was complaining about fandom refusing to engage with actual queer art and literature before; all of Alexis Hall's work merits only a handful of pages on AO3. RW&RB alone has 154 pages on AO3 no I am not bitter that y'all are tasteless and disgraceful and if that doesn't speak to the power of having a USAmerican base then nothing does.

Edit: THERE'S A BONUS CHAPTER????

[dijetemjeseca]

M. von Welsch, J. L. von Hildebrandt, B. Neumann i dr., carska dvorana s freskama G. B. Tiepola, dovršena 1752., Rezidencija, Würzburg, Njemačka

U jedan od najimpresivnijih pothvata 18.st. spada uređenje biskupske rezidencije u Würzburgu, oko 1750. To je djelo arhitekta Balthasara Neumanna i suradnika, a slikarsku dekoraciju unutrašnjosti izveo je slikar Giambatista Tiepolo. Kaisersaal, carska dvorana, predstavlja raskošni gesamkunstwerk od mramora, štuka, pozlate, boje i svjetlosti. Na stropu je Tiepolo naslikao prizore iz života cara Friedricha Barbarosse. Tiepolova interpretacija smješta prikazane likove u 16.st., odjevene u venecijanske kostime. (Zubek, Fulir, Ćus, Avmedoski; 2014., 98)

[girlwiththearthistoryaccount]

Residenzschloss Wurzburg; Imperial Hall

Title: Residenzschloss Wurzburg; Imperial Hall

Artist: Giovanni Battista Tiepolo

Date: 1751

Movement: Germanic Rococo

Genre: Palace

This hall is peak Rococo.

From the marble, the paintings, the statues, the gold lining, and the crystal pieces, every part of this is traditional rococo and you can practically hear Allegro being played and bouncing off the ornate walls of the hall.

As far as I can tell how ever, Imperial Hall was not used as a concert hall. Instead, Residenzschloss Wurzburg was a palace, same as many of the other German and Austrian buildings we have looked at from this era.

As for the design, having walls and furniture white washed and gilded with gold was very popular. Whiteness for the Europeans is correlated with pureness in divinity. This is why marble statues in western academia are usually at the forefront visually, because scholars feel this is the best representation of the pureness of Europeans and American art and academia. 

So for something to be white was a sign of wealth and cleanliness for European designers, especially in the rococo era.

[the-drunken-huntsman]

Random bits of Metja lore that would be featured in the follower mod I'm never gonna make:

Metja and Alvigg were 30 minutes apart. Alvigg was born first and Metja had complications that caused her to be born so much later, nearly killing their mother, Linja.

During the difficult birth, she prayed to Kyne for strength. Because of this, she would adorn Alvigg with signs of Mara the Wolf, the tradition for Nord children, but she would adorn Metja with signs of Kyne the Hawk.

Her family's surname, Rarensen, was derived from their ancestor, Raren, who was one of Ysgramor's Five Hundred. The stories their father, Baldr, would tell of him were the inspiration for the twins to join the Companions.

That's not the only tie the family has to the Five Hundred, as Metja's paternal grandmother, Ysra, was of Clan Gray-Mane. In fact she was the eldest sister of Eorland and Vignar. That makes Thorald, Avulstein, and Olfina her second cousins.

Linja was a member of Ulfric's militia during the Markarth Incident, and was gravely injured in the fight, crippling her. Unable to continue life as a soldier, she married Baldr and became a seamstress on Rarensen Farm.

Linja also had a war dog with her when she served. The descendant of that dog, Helste, was Alvigg and Metja's childhood pet.

Obviously, most of the family are sided with the Stormcloaks, however Metja's paternal uncle, Hafnen, is a veteran of the legion and thus sides with the Imperials. Because of this Baldr kicked him off of the family farm and he now works as a farmhand for the Battle-Borns.

[vaguely-concerned]

...wolf hall!henry viii/cromwell version of the locked tomb pool scene, except that at the end of the book henry cheerfully eats cromwell's soul and chops his head off with all the whim and vigor of ianthe snacking down on babs

[redsamuraiii]

Itsukinomiya Hall in Mie Prefecture where you get to wear traditional kimono and experience Heian royalty.

You can take Heian Royalty themed wedding photos where you can imagine being the Emperor and Empress or members of the Imperial Court. 

You can play traditional games often done by the Imperial Court royalties like Kai awase, a game that involves finding 2 halves of the same shell.

Pics by itukinomiya_319

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[insidecroydon]

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