Revolutionary A listers visit Whitechapel.

The Brotherhood Church

In a recent edition of BBC’s Radio 4's Making History programme there was an illuminating piece about the 5^th Conference of the Russian Social Democratic Party that took place in London in 1907.   

What was by all accounts a bad tempered event was attended by a star studded cast of Russian Revolutionary luminaries, including Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Zinoviev, Dzerzhinsky, Gorky and the exotically named Rosa Luxembourg.  The event was held in the Brotherhood Church in Southgate Road, Hackney and many of the Russian participants bedded down in a block of flats in nearby Whitechapel which still stands today.  Apparently the door through which they entered is a now fire exit adjacent to a Bangladeshi Restaurant!  It is incredible to think that this event, attended by so many leading historical figures and at which the Bolshevik/Menshevik split deepened, took place largely unremarked.  The presenter of the BBC programme, Tom Holland, expressed the opinion that it might at least be appropriate to mark the spot with some sort of plaque.  An earlier congress held ironically at what is now the headquarters of Saatchi and Saatchi in Charlotte Street has also gone un-noted.

Of course England in the 19^th and early 20^th Century was a haven for radicals and revolutionaries.  Most people know that Karl Marx lived here and spent a good deal of time in the British Library.

In the course of putting together one of the talks I am giving at Gainsborough’s House in September, I have been reacquainting myself with a  possibly less well known, but equally influential, revolutionary figure, Alexander Herzen.  Unable to return to Russia on account of his subversive activities, Herzen spent many years in London in the middle of the 19th Century setting up the Free Russian Press which printed the radical journals The Polar Star and The Bell or 'Kolokol'.  He also entertained many contemporary revolutionary leaders from Europe and beyond, including the anarchist Michael Bakunin.   For over 10 years Kolokol, an early Private Eye equivalent, was smuggled into Russia, where it was widely read.  It is said that it even reached the office of the Tsar.

One of the sites of the Russian Free Press is recorded by a Blue Plaque in Judd Street.

If you want to find out more about Herzen and other opponents of Russia autocracy from the worlds of journalism and the arts,  come along to the Art of Resistance session at Gainsborough’s House on Wednesday 4^th October…only a month or so short* of the centenary of the Russian Revolution of 2017.

  

*The October Revolution took place in early November using the new style calendar.

Russia at Gainsborough's House in September

Solovetsky Monastery, White Sea, Russia

On four Wednesdays following 13th September, between 10. 30 a.m. and 12.30,  I will be hosting four sessions at Gainsborough's House during which I will present four different aspects of Russian cultural life.  The format will be two themed illustrated talks/discussions on each morning, with a break for coffee and pastry midway.

The four themes are based on the Russian Church, Russian Landscape, Russian Country Houses and Dachas, and Russian resistance to autocracy from the Decembrists (1825) to the Thaw (1956/7).

I have set up a tab above 'Late Summer Russian Talks' which gives more details.

Closer to the time I will be updating the tab with further details, including some suggested reading material.

You can book for whichever session or sessions interest you, and there is a slight price reduction if you book all four.

Bookings can be made by contacting Reception at Gainsborough's House.  All proceeds will go towards the work of the museum.

Naked truth?

Blessed Maxim, a 14th century holy fool

'Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away..

Teresa May’s comments about Jeremy Corbyn’s metaphorical state of undress in the face of Brexit negotiations means that there is a lot in the press and on the wires today about nakedness.  I am indebted to today’s tweet from Archbishop Cranmer for a reminder of the quotation from the Book of Job above.

Travellers over the years have been impressed by nakedness encountered on their travels.  Elizabeth the First’s envoy to Russia, Giles Fletcher, was moved to comment on the naked ‘holy fools’ that he encountered in Moscow.

Besides monks they have certain eremites (whom they call holy men).....They used to go stark naked save a clout about their middle with their hair hanging long and wildly about their shoulders, and many of them with an iron collar, or chain about their necks or middles, even in the very extremity of winter.  These they take as prophets, and men of great holiness, giving them a liberty to speak what they list, without any controlment, though it may be to the very highest himself…

Of this kind there are not many, because it is a very hard and cold profession to go naked in Russia, specially in winter.’

I will be expanding on the idea of holy fools. both naked and clothed, and, indeed, other picturesque Russian characters, in a talk at Gainsborough’s House this autumn.

St Basil, a bas relief from St Basil's Cathedral, Moscow

Munnings at LWHS, plus the next event.

Speaker, Marcia Whiting.

The lecture about Sir Alfred Munnings at Little Waldingfield History Society given by Marcia Whiting, was very informative entertaining.  It inspired many of us to plan to take the trip down to Dedham to visit Castle House Museum where the artist spent the last 40 years of his life.

In the absence of Andy Sheppard, who was indisposed, I have written a brief review of the evening which can be found under the ‘Munnings’ tab above.  It was interesting to hear about the artist’s involvement in the purchase of Gainsborough’s House in the 1950’s, and I have added a little research of my own on the subject to the review.  This comes from a piece I wrote about Gainsborough’s House in 2013 which was included in the Sudbury Museum Trust publication The Painter, the Princess and the Statue, edited by Valerie Herbert.  (Copies of this fascinating book are still available I believe.)

I hesitate to advertise the next LWHS event, since the Guest Speaker will be none other than me.  I feel very honoured to have been asked to give a lecture about Russian history to the Society and have chosen to speak about ‘The Bronze Horseman, A Tale of Petersburg’.   

Whether or not you have visited the ‘Venice of the North’ you should find this talk interesting.  Previous members of the audience have told me that they learned more about the history of the city and its landmarks from it than they did from the Russian tour guides on the spot.  I can’t really comment on this, but the talk is illustrated by a number of attractive slides and also a little bit of poetry, and people seem to like it on the whole.

The talk will be at the Parish Room, Little Waldingfield on Wednesday June 22^nd at 7.30 p.m.

Booking Secretary              
Diana Langford, Pitt Cottage                                          Phone: 01787 248298

A day in London, Part 1.

Portrait of Tolstoy(1884) by Nikolai Ge.

I spent an interesting day in London yesterday which split into three separate parts.

Much of the morning was occupied by two small but very worthwhile art exhibitions, one at the National Portrait Gallery and the other at the National Gallery.

Russia and the Arts, the Age of Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky offers a rare opportunity to see some wonderful portraits that normally hang in the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.  Almost everyone who was anyone in the arts in the pre-revolutionary era is on display in paintings of exceptionally high quality. 

The second half of the 19^th Century was a period of growing prosperity and also social complexity for Russia that saw a general flourishing of the arts, music and theatre. The pictures of the three great writers, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy and Turgenev, that are hung side by side in the show are particularly evocative.  It was amusing to read that Turgenev’s rather sour expression was due to the fact that he did not get on with the artist, Ilya Repin, who was sent specifically to paint his picture in Paris.

I then went on to the one room show at the National Gallery of around 25 Dutch flower paintings.  These were truly lovely as the picture below shows.  

Both exhibitions are worth catching if you are in the area.   The Russian Portraits Exhibition (small entrance charge)  runs until 26th June and the Dutch Flowers (free) until 29th August.

Flowers in a Glass Vase (1614) Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder

Russian reflections

Tsar Nicholas II 1900

 Time has now run out for anyone who, like me, would have liked to have caught the major exhibition marking the 150^th anniversary of the birth of the Russian artist, Valentin Serov (1865-1911) at the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.

The show finishes tomorrow and Russian newspapers have been reporting today that Muscovites have been queuing up in sub zero temperatures to see the show before it ends.

Serov, who combined the Russian realist tradition with elements of art nouveau, was one of the leading portraitists at the turn of the 20^th Century.  He also painted landscapes and scenes from Russian History, including a wonderful image of Peter the Great striding about in his unfinished city of St Petersburg (below).

How I would like to have gone to the exhibition!  However, it is much less easy to go to Russia these days.  Visa complications apart, relations with the UK have now plumbed further depths on account of yesterday’s shocking report about the death from polonium poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko in London.  Consequently, an English traveller may not enjoy the customary warm welcome, even from ‘ordinary Russians’ at present.

Given Russia's problems these days, some people find it strange that I still maintain my enthusiasm for all things Russian.  It is important to realise however that the country is not the Government, and also to hope that, against the tide of history, things may one day change in this most fascinating of places.

Meanwhile, keep watching War and Peace!

Peter the Great, 1907. Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow.