The Engine

ANDREA PALLADIO at the ROYAL ACADEMY  The new exhibition at the Royal Academy is a modern look at the work of Andrea Palladio (1508-1580).  I had heard that Palladio’s architectural concepts were musical in inspiration, but I didn't see much of that beyond his understanding of proportion, the rule of thirds, incredible symmetry, his understanding of the rules of classical perspective and the perspective used in Renaissance Italy, his contemporary world. Many of his drawings are haphazard sketches clearly made on the job, while some drawings are incredibly sophisticated, many drawn by his son, who clearly had a big hand in the advertising campaigns for new designs. Palladian buildings can be found in the UK, where they influenced the dramatist and architect Vanbrugh amongst many others.  There are also examples in Russia, in America.  In fact they have been imitated everywhere and are an important single basis for modern architecture.  The emphasis of the ...

MAGNIFENCE OF THE TSARS, VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM, SOUTH KENSINGTON, LONDON The new exhibition at the V & A is 'Magnificence of the Tsars', an exhibition that glories in the opulence and decadence of the Tsars, with little mention of the rest. By 'the rest' I mean the rest of society including nobles, aristocrats, boyars, civil servants, merchants, lawyers, doctors, lecturers, teachers. None of them are mentioned in the exhibition, apart from exhibitions of the cloths of servants such as Heralds and Postillions. The Russian ruling elite was very narrow indeed compared to those in Western Europe, sharing few of their extensive luxuries and comforts, who would ultimately enact a chilling revenge but firstly replacing then deposing the Tsars in their year of destiny, 1917.  Most of the garments on show here were gathered from France and other Western European countries. Essentially Russia had a scarcity of nascent culture and cultural traditions, the Tsars we...

In history as in nature, decay is the laboratory of life. - Karl Marx