Category: Architecture

A single snapshot of a madding crowd moving through a bustling capital city can only tell us so much. Any conclusions we might draw from such an image can only be made on a surface level — from clothing, facial expressions and body language. All we can do is make vague inferences.  But if one…

General Mikhail Skobelev was a hero of the Russian-Turkish war (1877-78) and liberator of Bulgaria. But in addition to his military exploits, he left his mark on our cuisine. That was quite a feat considering that he was not a gourmand and, in fact, never ever guessed that he’d go down in history for his…

Пишущая машинка: typewriter Here’s an easy word that everyone knows: писать. To write, right? Right. For the most part. There are always what one of my friends calls нюансики — from the word нюанс (nuance), нюансики are small details, almost inconsequential differences, minor distinctions that of course in the end turn out to be major.…

For the last year, Igor Gusev has fought his own war against Russian imperialism. Gusev’s combat employs unusual tactics. His conflict is waged from home, and his weapon of choice is  an Instagram series called “World War 3.” Gusev, who was born in 1970 and has lived his entire life in the Ukrainian city of…

Moscow’s Tretyakov Gallery has refused to hand over a renowned Orthodox icon to the Russian Orthodox Church in defiance of President Vladimir Putin’s orders, the Fontanka.ru news website reported Tuesday. According to Fontanka, a May 15 Tretyakov Gallery expert meeting with Church members concluded that Andrei Rublev’s “Trinity” cannot be taken out of the art museum due…

Thousands of schoolchildren gathered on Red Square wearing red hats and neckerchiefs Sunday as Russia’s Communist Party inducted new members of the Pioneers, the party’s youth organization during the U.S.S.R. In an opening address, Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov thanked parents and teachers for their loyalty to the “glorious traditions of the great Soviet era.”…

Over a year into Russia’s grotesque full-scale invasion of Ukraine, disinformation and misconceptions of the conflict — fuelled both by the Kremlin and by political actors abroad — continue to permeate public debate. “The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History” by Serhii Plokhy takes aim at many of these myths, demonstrating how Russia’s centuries-long imperial obsession…

Trout is a delicate and yet contrary fish. The slightest slip in the kitchen will ruin the it. The old rule of cooking fish is still true: the simpler, the better. That is, keep the fish and haute cuisine separate. But in that separation is where real culinary artistry might be found. A couple of…

Vasily Voronin was working as a bartender at the Blue Oyster bar on St. Petersburg’s Lomonosova Street one Friday night last month when security officers arrived to shut down all the bars and clubs in this nightlife hotspot.  “It wasn’t just the police,” Voronin, 26, told The Moscow Times.   “The Investigative Committee turned up as…

Russian authorities have suspended the release of an award-winning film about a serial killer who targets sex workers in Iran, a distributor said on Tuesday. “Holy Spider,” directed by Danish-Iranian Ali Abbasi, was inspired by a true story about a veteran of the Iran-Iraq war who killed 16 sex workers in the early 2000s in…

Since Feb. 24, 2022, the Russian book market has faced many problems: rising prices for paper, logistics, new laws against so-called LGBT propaganda and foreign influence, and the refusal of foreign authors and publishers to work with Russia. A writer’s anti-war position may also be a make it difficult to find a publisher. Officially, Russian…

Russian President Vladimir Putin has handed over the country’s most acclaimed Russian icon — Andrei Rublev’s Trinity — to the Church, the Moscow Patriarchate said on Monday. The handover of Rublev’s most famous work to the Russian Orthodox Church comes after its hugely powerful head Patriarch Kirill threw his support behind Putin’s decision to send…

In 1999, then Prime Minister Vladimir Putin emerged as a force to be reckoned with in Russian politics after a decisive victory in Chechnya. His confidence grew with successes in Georgia in 2008 and the audacious annexation of Crimea in 2014. Yet it was in the early hours of Feb. 24, 2022, that Vladimir Putin…

Dishes made of wild greens  — not herbs and lettuces grown in the garden  — are not necessarily sign of hard times. Nettle, sorrel, ground elder and wild garlic have all been used in our kitchens since time immemorial. Even today one of the most popular May soups is “green” vegetable soup. In Ukraine and…

Измена: replacement (sometimes); betrayal (sometimes) If there is one bit of Russian that continues to confuse me, it’s prefixed verbs. You know — when you take a basic verb and then add при-, от-, из-, пере-, об-, за-, or по-, at the beginning of the verb to get seven new verbs with 27 meanings, except…

Type “Is Russia fascist?” into a search engine and you will find no shortage of op-eds and articles seeking to enlighten you. RFE/RL, Al Jazeera, Politico, and The New York Times are just some of the major outlets that have published articles weighing up divided expert opinion on the issue.  The title of “Z Generation:…

Support for Yevgenia (Zhenya) Berkovich and Svetlana Petriychuk has flooded Russian media abroad and social media inside and outside Russia. The director and author of the play “Finist the Brave Falcon” were taken into custody on May 5 for two months of pre-trial detention under the charge of “justifying terrorism.” The charge is punishable by…

In 1993 Natasha Lance, a television producer with excellent Russian who had made documentaries in the Soviet Union and the newly formed Russian Federation, was hired to be the executive producer of a Russian Sesame Street. This was not as crazy as it perhaps sounds today: the Children’s Television Workshop behind Sesame Street were working…

Dan Andreevich, a Russian who grew up in Italy, bicycled 5,000 km from Italy to the Russian-Estonian border to spread the message that not all Russians support Russia’s war against Ukraine. But by the end of his trip, the 18-year-old Andreevich no longer called himself Russian. “I have Russian blood — but I don’t have…

Borodinsky has been one of the most popular types of bread in Russia for many decades. When foreigners visit they are given a taste of Borodinsky to show them what Russian cuisine is all about. And when Russians go abroad they bring loaves for their friends who long for the flavors they left behind in…

Задубеть: to be frozen stiff In the part of the world where I’m now living, oaks are protected. They have little green oak leaf badges on their trunks to remind everyone that they may not be cut down or harmed in any way. And so there are some truly mighty oaks around, including one that…

Updates with Berkovich’s arrest.  Russian authorities have opened a criminal “justifying terrorism” case over theatre director Yevgeniya (Zhenya) Berkovich’s award-winning play about Russian Islamic State brides, her mother said Thursday.   Berkovich’s mother, activist Yelena Efros, said the case was opened in connection with the play, “Tiercel the Brave Falcon,” which tells the stories of real…

Updates with Berkovich being remanded in custody. A Moscow court ordered the director of an award-winning play about Russian Islamic State brides to be remanded in custody for two months on Friday, a day after she was arrested for allegedly “justifying terrorism,” Interfax reported. Lawyers representing Yevgeniya (Zhenya) Berkovich had requested the court place their client…

Russia’s fashion industry lost two of its most renowned fashion designers, Valentin Yudashkin and Vyacheslav Zaitsev, this week. Yudashkin died at the age of 59 in Moscow on Tuesday after a long battle with cancer. He came to fame in the late 1980s when he dressed the first lady of the Soviet Union, Raisa Gorbacheva,…

Fashion designer Valentin Yudashkin, whose elegant dresses gave Russian fashion a star in the constellation of international haute couture, died Tuesday in Moscow at the age of 59. The cause of death was oncology, which he had been battling since 2016. Yudashkin was born in a small town outside Moscow. He graduated from the Moscow Industrial…

Vladimir Kuznetsov is an artist who protests in his work in Russia today. A former journalist and activist in Penza, a city about 600 km (325 miles) to the southwest of Moscow, he is now working on a storytelling project called “1,000 Faces — 1,000 Words.” “I had different motivations for starting the project, and one…

Russian fashion designer Viacheslav “Slava” Zaitsev, dubbed the “Soviet Christian Dior,” has died at the age of 85, his fashion house told AFP Sunday. Confirming Russian media reports, a spokeswoman added that when Zaitsev had celebrated his birthday in March with friends, “we could already see he was very, very, weak.” “The couturier Viacheslav Zaitsev…

Rhubarb is a plant with many virtues. Although it is sometimes overlooked today, a hundred or more years ago it was used in many ways in many different dishes. From ancient times it has been used in pies, salads, fruit drinks and as an accompaniment to meat. For example, in the “Chef’s Calendar” published in…

Мурзик: Murzik (popular cat name) We interrupt our usually scheduled serious topics for a public service column about the care of and conversation with a Russian-speaking cat. What should you name your кот (tom) or кошка (dam, molly or queen)? How should you address him or her? And how can you entertain your питомец (pet)…

The Pushkin House Book Prize is celebrating its 11th awards year with six shortlisted books that represent a wide range of scholarship — and memories —about Russia, past and present. Every year a panel of distinguished judges considers dozens of books about or from Russia in every field imaginable, from art to war, from politics…

Would you sell your soul for a cookie? Russians like cookies so much that the authorities believed a person would sell out his homeland for a cookie. In 1933, the Soviet writer Arkady Gaidar wrote about a heroic Pioneer and a bad boy who committed treason in return for payment of a jar of jam…

Уклонист: draft dodger When it comes to anything military, I am an absolute профан — an imbecile, an ignoramus, a dunderhead, a know-nothing (and not, as English speakers might think, a person who uses profanities — though, let’s be honest, I do that, too). What I mean to say is that I know very little…

The first feature film ever shot in space premiered in Russian cinemas on Thursday, which was celebrated in Moscow as a victory over a rival Hollywood project. In “The Challenge” a surgeon played by the actress Yulia Peresild is sent to the International Space Station (ISS) to save a cosmonaut injured during a spacewalk.  Along…

Russia’s Bolshoi Theater has permanently dropped a ballet about Russian dance legend Rudolf Nureyev following the toughening of “gay propaganda” legislation, its director said on Wednesday.  The ballet was staged by Kirill Serebrennikov, one of Russia’s most innovative and successful directors, who left the country after President Vladimir Putin sent troops to Ukraine in February…

Russia’s Bolshoi Theater has permanently dropped a ballet about Russian dance legend Rudolf Nureyev following the toughening of “gay propaganda” legislation, its director said on Wednesday.  The ballet was staged by Kirill Serebrennikov, one of Russia’s most innovative and successful directors, who left the country after President Vladimir Putin sent troops to Ukraine in February…

Since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, a tsunami of protest poems has swept over many countries. Absurd, nightmarish, horrifyingly humorous, they bear testament and evoke empathy in readers and listeners. In Russia they are written, but almost never recited publicly. The danger is too great. People get fined and arrested for antiwar statements in cafés or…

At Easter in Russia eggs are dyed different colors and blessed in church on Saturday. Then on Easter morning the hard-boiled eggs are eaten for breakfast. But first everyone at the table picks up and egg and challenges their neighbor to a duel: they smash the eggs together. No one understands the meaning of this…

А то!: Sure! Absolutely! Like I’d say no! It’s a rainy Friday in my part of the world, and there is nothing like a good pop quiz to get the blood flowing. So put your books down, turn off your phones, take out a pen or pencil, really turn off your phones this time, and…

Sometime in the early thirteenth century, a great king divided his vast kingdom among his four sons. That king’s name was Temüjin, but he went down in history is Chinggis (“Mighty”) Khan. Anyone who has seen or read “King Lear” might think this an inauspicious start to the story of a ruling house. But in…

On Tuesday the State Prosecutor’s Office in Russia received a petition to declare actress Liya Akhezhakova a foreign agent and charge her with several crimes, including treason, Current Time and other media announced. Vitaly Borodin, the head of a non-governmental organization called The Federal Security and Anti-Corruption Foundation sent a missive to Igor Krasnov, denouncing…

There was a quiet sensation at the recent Berlin Film Festival. “The Cage Is Looking for a Bird” directed by Malika Musaeva was shown — the first film in the Chechen language that has ever been presented at the international film festivals. It was also the only film from Russia at this year’s Berlinale. Musaeva…

LONDON — Arguments in the United Kingdom over the role of Russian studies and the promotion of Russian culture sparked by the invasion of Ukraine continue to rage even as the fighting enters its 14th month.  The U.K.’s leading independent Russian cultural center, Pushkin House, last month even faced calls to change its name and…

Orthodox Easter, which is celebrated next Sunday, is impossible to imagine without kulich — tall and airy cakes iced with sweet fondant. The cakes the people bring to church on Holy Saturday to be blessed look like this. But have they always been this way? Today’s delicate cake is not an ancient recipe. Russian baked…

Околесица: blather, nonsense Now here’s a word I’d never heard before: куролесица. It isn’t used much — less than 15,000 hits on Google — and apparently means nonsense, confusion, something unintelligible. It comes with a verb, куролесить, which means to behave oddly, to act silly, to play pranks. Он дурачился на счет “таганской куролесицы” ―…

An ongoing dispute over the historic Kyiv Pechersk Lavra monastery came to a head last week as demonstrators rallied against a group of Orthodox monks who Ukrainian authorities accuse of having links to Russia. Last month, the state body that oversees the Lavra terminated its contract with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, telling its members to…

After the Russian invasion of Ukraine last year, hundreds of thousands — perhaps more than a million — people left Russia. Although there is no data on how many of those people were foreigners, certainly many foreign citizens left Russia either at the insistence of their employers or on their own initiative. Many Western embassies…

Tobin Auber is an English writer who lived in St. Petersburg for 29 years. During that time he worked in many jobs, including as editor of The St. Petersburg Times and as a film producer. He has published ten chapters of his memoir, “30 Days in the Hole,” an extract of which is published here.…

How serious is cooking? Certainly many people think that the kitchen is no place for jokes and pranks. But today, on April Fool’s Day, we simply must take a closer look at the humor and fun that we find even in such an important matter as culinary history. Foreigners’ acquaintance with Russian cuisine has always…

Проходимец: rogue Двор (courtyard) is a deceptive word in Russian. You think it’s easy to understand and translate. It means a court — as in royal — or a courtyard — as in the space belonging to a house. But in cities some of the дворы are tricky to translate. The big issue is whether…

Celebrated Soviet and Russian actress Liya Akhedzhakova has resigned from the Moscow theater where she has worked for 46 years following her outspoken criticism of the war in Ukraine, Novaya Gazeta reported on Thursday.  Moscow’s Sovremennik Theater effectively ended the actress’s decades-long career at the theater in February when it canceled a production of “The Gin Game”…

A major Russian film distributor said it had developed an alternative to the high-resolution, large-format cinematic experience IMAX, the Vedomosti business daily reported Thursday. The IMAX Corporation, a Canadian company that produces entertainment technology, left Russia in June as part of the backlash against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine by Western firms. The company has since banned screenings…

Russia’s Interior Ministry has placed Nadya Tolokonnikova, co-founder of Russian feminist protest and performance art group Pussy Riot, on its wanted list, independent news outlet Mediazona reported Wednesday.  Though the ministry didn’t specify which criminal offense prompted the move, the Russian authorities opened an investigation into Tolokonnikova for “insulting the religious feelings of believers” earlier…

Foreign films have always been the backbone of the film distribution industry in modern Russia. According to the Russian Cinema Fund, foreign films made up almost 75 percent of all ticket sales in 2021. In March 2022, the situation changed dramatically, especially after Hollywood studios left the Russian market. But the latest edition of the…

A court in Russia’s Far East has overturned feminist and LGBT activist Yulia Tsvetkova’s acquittal for charges of “pornography,” her lawyer and mother said on Tuesday. A judge in the remote city of Komsomolsk-on-Amur in July 2022 cleared Tsvetkova of all charges brought against her after she was detained in late 2019 and placed under house…

It’s not just vodka that must be ice-cold. Let’s be honest. One of the main achievements of Russian culture that Russians’ ancestors generously shared with the peoples of Siberia and the Far East was vodka. Yes, yes, of course: literacy, rifles, collective farms and radio — all that was fine, but they came later.  …

Патрики: Patriki, slang for the Patriarch Ponds neighborhood in Moscow I’ve gotten way behind in my youth slang. In my recent reading, I was stumped by the word падик. The phrase was about some people в падике (in the [mysterious] padik) so I knew it was a place or a structure. For a while, I…

The longtime head of Moscow’s Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts has been replaced by a former policewoman and one-time member of a pro-Kremlin youth movement. “Marina Loshak voluntarily resigned from her post as director of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, which she had held since 2013, on March 20,” Russia’s Culture Ministry was…

Almost from the moment Vladimir Putin announced the start of Russia’s “special military operation” against Ukraine, it was perceived to be Putin’s war — a war conceived and guided by one man’s obsessions, personal grudges, and idiosyncratic reading — or invention — of history. While that is true, it could not be fought without the…

A nylon fabric heart is embroidered with the word “pain” in languages of the nationalities of Russia. This is the third work of the project “I hear the voices of Russia” by Alisa Gorshenina, who is also known as Alice Hualice. She lives in the Urals town of Nizhny Tagil, which has a population of…

In the U.S.S.R., salted herring with onions was every woman’s way to arrange a feast in a hurry. But, of course, this fish was also used for more elegant and complex dishes. Herring went into vinaigrettes, forshmak, and a layered vegetable salad called “under a fur coat.” Herring was a favorite treat everywhere — in…