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Object of the following study is the first solo piece for piano by the Bulgarian composer Julia Tsenova – “Keyboard Triptych” (1996). It is analyzed from an interpretative point of view, as an artistic and a pianistic challenge. The analytical approach is the core and also the keystone in the text, and it shows the integrant connection between the continuity of the form and the performer’s flair, to create an impact in Tsenova’s music. Composed in a period of different creative quests, “Keyboard Triptych” by Julia Tsenova is a work that combines three contrasting by character pieces, intertwined by different compositional techniques into one whole. Created in the second half of the 90s, this piece has different cultural influences and traditions, compositional-stylistic lines represented in the piece and are also extended to the next solo pieces written in the same period – “Musica Solitudinis” and “Four Prayers”. Strong expressiveness, lyricism, richness of emotional states, specific sensibility to metro-rhythmical organization and improvisation and, last, but not least – manifestation of the deep nature of the instrument – are all ingredients of Julia Tsenova’s original style, and they also deservedly display her individual importance in the Bulgarian contemporary music.
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This article deals with art functioning as a practice of localness and an identity activity. Discussing two examples – the town of Kovačica in Serbia, inhabited by the Slovak minority, and the Nikiszowiec housing estate located in Silesia, Poland – the author shows how the so-called naïve art today participates in the creation of a sense of belonging to a given place, its memory, the image of its past and the articulation of ethnic and cultural specificity, both on a micro and macro scale (region, national culture, state). In both cases, localness is treated as a task and as a project. Artistic activities undertaken by the individuals from the local communities serve to shape and display the iconographic codes and visual representations, as well as to stimulate the institutionalisation of activities related to the experience and identity of the place. Such instrumentalisation also connotes the reframing of art – a change in its communicative, civilizational or ideological-political context – and leads to the transformation of its semantics, social existence and its status in the field of artistic practices.
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Balázs Urbán writes about the premiere of a co-production between the Tamási Áron Theater in Sepsiszentgyörgy and the Szeged Outdoor Plays. It is the second time that László Bocsárdi directs Brecht, which is surprising, according to the critic, who believes that the author’s sharp-wittedness, stylized form, and expressive theatricality fit well into Bocsárdi’s world. The Beggar’s Opera, even though taking the world of the play further, leaves a sense of deficiency: mainly in respect of a bold directorial interpretation and the varying quality in the cast’s performances.
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In her review of the performance directed by Enikő Eszenyi at Cluj-Napoca, Katalin Ágnes Bartha concludes that while the tight-paced directorial approach featuring powerful and spectacular theatrical solutions made up for a compelling performance, the Lulu based on the ancient Lulu of Wedekind did not reinterpret the female issue from a contemporary perspective. Bartha’s sensible analysis elaborates on the dramaturgical interpretation, on the actor’s performances, and especially on the performance of Imre Éva playing the part of Lulu.
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Kinga Boros writes about Orestes in Mosul, the performance directed by Milo Rau in 2019 and still performed in different locations in Europe, going into the details of the ars poetica of NTGent, that is the National Theatre in Gent and placing the performance in this context at the same time: into a conception about theatre that turns away radically from art-theatre and defines its own role within its social connections. This is Rau’s first performance based on a classical text, being of course a free interpretation of the drama. Created in the Iranian city of Mosul, after its liberation from ISIS, with local actors and musicians, the performance intertwines the classic tragedy with personal stories of the creators and with the circumstances of the creative process.
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Gábor Viktor Kozma writes about two performing arts workshops. Vladimir Granov’s workshop held at the SÍN Culture Center in Budapest was not built on the classical etudes of Meyerhold’s biomechanics, but on the acquirement of the basic principles of the same technique through other exercises: simple and complex coordination exercises, individual, group and pair activities, acrobatics, stage fight, and work with one’s own and others’ bodies as well as with objects. The workshop in Belgrade, which was linked to a festival, targeted the assimilation of the Chekhov-technique through experience: instead of the personal experiences of the performers, it is based on the active participation of imagination.
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Dramaturge Beáta Adorján and actor Attila Lestyán have both participated at the workshop organized by Shoshin Theatre Association at Mera, conducted by Donald Kitt and Kai Bredholt actors of Odin Teatret. Adorján and Lestyán discuss the experience of the workshop including the theatrical event created in common with the locals from Méra.
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In her essay Emőke Péter is trying to find out whether there are similarities between theatrical and corporate culture from the point of view of professional ethics. She considers that, while creative work needs a certain amount of freedom, nevertheless, it would be useful for employees to observe more closely their individual and collective contracts, as well as for the leaders of a theatre to know systems of corporate management such as the international standards of quality management (ISO9001), the international standard that specifies requirements for an effective environmental management system (ISO14001), as well as health and safety management standards (ISO45001).
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In 2018 Katalin Deák conducted a series of interviews and focus-group discussions with active dramaturgs and actors in Transylvania. This time, the reader may get acquainted with the part of the research, which deals with the appreciation of the work of the dramaturg in Transylvania. The main questions of the essay are the following: How does the public discourse about dramaturg influence their working relationships with actors? How much is the profession appreciated by the community of theatre professionals? What is behind the distrust towards dramaturgs? Can the dramaturg become a creator with equal rights in the rehearsal process? – And finally: which are the connection between the self-esteem of the dramaturg and the financial appreciation/depreciation of his or her work?
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The author reviews a book edited by János Lázok and Ildikó Ungvári Zrínyi. The volume published in 2018 by the university’s own publishing house, UArtPress, deals with a period from the predecessor of the University of Arts in Tg-Mures. The title is: Hungarian University-Level Actor Training at Tirgu-Mures 1954–1991. Histories of the Szentgyörgyi István Theatre Institute. II. 1962–1976. The two editors and their co-authors, Mária Albert, András Balási, Zoltán Csép and Levente Kovács, as former or current teachers, try to give an impression of the period between 1962-1976.
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The relics of the warrior saint Theodor Tyron were brought to the Novo Hopovo Monastery in the mid-16th century at the latest. The first records of the relics were found in a panegyric dating from 1555. Three manuscripts of the Tale of Theodore Tyron record a legend referring to the events occurring prior to the transfer of the saint's relics to Hopovo, as well as to their fate in the Fruška Gora monastery. The relics were kept in a casket and displayed in the bema, bestowing it a memorial character. Such manner of displaying the relics had already been established in the Žiča Monastery and was practised in numerous monasteries of Fruška Gora.
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The correspondence between Hugo von Hofmannsthal and Richard Strauss, initiated in 1900 and conducted until 1929, is an extraordinary document of the work performed by the composer and his most acclaimed librettist. Among selected letters pertaining to the titular composition, created in ca. 1911-1917 initially on the margin of several others, including predominantly two versions of Ariadne auf Naxos and two ballets, Die Frau ohne Schatten still remains the peak achievement of this so-called hardworking friendship, which produced seven operas and a project of an eighth one (Die Liege der Danae), preserved in initial sketches on the libretto, interrupted by the poet’s death.
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This text – written for an anniversary book dedicated to Professor Lech Sokół – is a presentation of three “approaches” made by Tadeusz Łomnicki to Strindberg’s protagonist in three different dramas: Pariah and The Father by Strindberg and Dürrenmatt’s Play Strindberg, i.e. an adaptation of The Dance of Death. The first two texts were shown by television theatre, and the third – in a traditional theatre. Łomnicki prepared each role with the assistance of such means of artistic expression, which best rendered the very essence of the dramatis persona. We receive three – seemingly – realistic portrayals of the so-called strong man, together with his unchanging opinions about the world, who dominates the reality surrounding him. Their realism remains illusory since the assumption of the actor’s message consists of demonstrating a certain type of behaviour characteristic for man regardless of the time and environment in which he lives. Łomnicki was interested more in the visualisation of the idea or the phenomenon than in portraying an individual.
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The Polish version of the article was published in “Roczniki Humanistyczne,” vol. 64 (2016), issue 4. The article focuses on miniatures of an enthroned emperor. These are: the miniature showing Otto II from the Registrum Gregorii (Chantilly, Musée Condé, MS 14), two miniatures from the so-called Gospels of Otto III (Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm. 4453)—one showing Otto III and the other one showing the allegories of the provinces of the empire, two miniatures (Otto II and the provinces) contained in the Gospels bound in the code also containing works by Flavius Josephus (Bamberg, Staatsbibliothek, Class. 79) and the miniature with the figure of Otto III found in the Liuthar Gospels, also called the Aachener Evangeliars (Aachen, Domshatz). The pictures were studied by Percy Ernst Schramm, Piotr Skubiszewski, Henry Mayr-Harting, Wolfgang Christian Schneider, Ludger Körntgen, Hagen Keller and Eric Palazzo. Exaltation of the emperor has its precedents in the Carolingian art. Placing the royal space in the upper gallery of the Palatine Chapel in Aachen and the miniature showing the exalted Charles the Bald in the Count Vivian Bible witness to the Carolingian approach to the person of the ruler. The sources of the consecration of an exalted ruler over bishops and princes in miniatures should be looked for in the theological-political views of the epoch. Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims, Smaragdus, Alcuin and Thietmar of Merseburg define the ruler as one chosen and anointed by God for ruling the people. However, the exaltation of the ruler should be looked for in the liturgy of the consecration of the king that is documented in the Pontifical Romano-Germanique. The most important act of this liturgy is the anointing, unction, practiced during the consecration prayer. The image of the enthroned emperor mirrors the moment of the liturgy in which the consecrated one, after being anointed and handed the regalia, ascends the throne in the apse, led there by the metropolitans and princes. The anointing is derived from the Old Testament consecration of kings, prophets and judges. However, the consecration of a king is different from the consecration of a bishop, presbyter or deacon, so defining the anointed king as a sacerdos is unjustified. The image of the bishop consecrated and exalted on the pattern of a ruler also appears in the Ottonian art—in the Psalterium Egberti and the Codex Egberti. The analysed and interpreted pictures are put in the context of the set of Christological miniatures found in liturgical books where the mentioned miniatures appear. It follows from the above statements that the figure of the ruler as one who listens to God’s Word, and the figure of the ruler who is not a type of Christ, but should be shaped on the pattern of Christ, are the basic features of the contents of all the four miniatures.
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The Polish version of the article was published in “Roczniki Humanistyczne,” vol. 61 (2013), issue 4.Analysis of the mutual relations between the main intellectual and spiritual authority of the Plato Academy—Marsilio Ficino on the one hand, and Girolamo Savonarola, whose activity was a reaction to the secularization of de Medici times on the other, and a thorough study of their argument that turned into a ruthless struggle, are possible on the basis of selected sources and studies of the subject. The most significant are the following: Savonarola, Prediche e scritti; Guida Spirituale—Vita Christiana; Apologetico: indole e natura dell'arte poetica; De contempt mundi as well as Ficino’s letters and Apologia contra Savonarolam; and also Giovanni Pica della Mirandoli’s De hominis dignitate.The two adversaries’ mutual relations were both surprisingly similar and contradictory. They both came from families of court doctors, which gave them access to broad knowledge of man’s nature that was available to doctors at those times and let them grow up in the circles of sophisticated Renaissance elites. Ficino lived in de Medicis' residences in Florence, and Savonarola in the palace belonging to d’Este family in Ferrara. Ficino eagerly used the benefits of such a situation, whereas Savonarola became an implacable enemy of the oligarchy that limited the citizens’ freedom they had at that time, and a determined supporter of the republic, to whose revival in Florence he contributed a lot. This situated them in opposing political camps. They were similarly educated and had broad intellectual horizons. They left impressive works of literature concerned with the domain of spirituality, philosophy, religion, literature and arts, and their texts contain fewer contradictions than it could be supposed.Being priests, they aimed at defending the Christian religion. Ficino wanted to reconcile the religious doctrine with the world of ancient philosophy and in order to do this he did a formidable work to make a translation of Plato’s works. He wanted to fish souls in the intellectual net of Plato’s philosophy and to convert them. And it is here that they differed from each other. Savonarola’s attitude towards the antiquity was hostile; he struggled for the purity of the Christian doctrine and for the simplicity of its followers’ lives. He called upon people to repent and convert. He first of all noticed an urgent need to deeply reform the Church, which led him to an immediate conflict with Pope Alexander VI Borgia.In accordance with the spirit of the era, he was interested in astrology and prepared accurate horoscopes. Savonarola rejected astrology, and he believed that God, like in the past, sends prophets to the believers. His sermons, which had an immense impact on the listeners, were based on prophetic visions, especially ones concerning the future of Florence, Italy and the Church. His moral authority and his predictions that came true, were one of the reasons why his influence increased so much that after the fall of the House of Medici he could be considered an informal head of the Republic of Florence. It was then that he carried out the strict reforms, whose part were the famous “Bonfires of the Vanities.” Ficino only seemingly passively observed the preacher’s work. Nevertheless, over the years a conflict arose between the two great personalities. It had the character of political struggle. It was accompanied by a rivalry for intellectual and spiritual influence, as well as by a deepening mutual hostility. Ficino expressed it in Apologia contra Savonarolam written soon after Savonarola’s tragic death; the monk was executed according to Alexander VI Borgia’s judgment. The sensible neo-Platonist did not hesitate to thank the Pope for liberating Florence from Savonarola’s influence and he called his opponent a demon and the antichrist deceiving the believers.How deep must the conflict have been since it led Ficino to formulating his thoughts in this way, and how must it have divided Florence's community? The dispute between the leading moralizers of those times must have caused anxiety in their contemporaries. Both the antagonists died within a year, one after the other, and their ideas had impact even long after their deaths, finding their reflection in the next century’s thought and arts.
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The Polish version of the article was published in “Roczniki Humanistyczne,” vol. 64 (2016), issue 4.In Polish museum collections there are a few objects made of coral or decorated with it. They are, among others, altars, holy water fonts, crucifixes and other liturgical items. Most often they were bought during Poles’ travels to Italy in the Mannerism and Baroque epochs. St Mary’s Basilica’s treasury boasts of a portable coral altar dated to the middle of the 17th century, a gift from Maria Josepha, the wife of King Augustus III. It has a golden frame and is embellished with enamel and coral. Its centre features the figure of the Blessed Virgin Mary standing on a crescent, in a radiant coral glory, surrounded by Marian symbols. It is an apotheosis of the Blessed Virgin Mary based on a fragment of the Apocalypse of St John. The figure of Mary is presented with her cosmic attributes: twelve stars around her head; she is clothed with a radiant glory; and she has a crescent under her feet. Around her seven symbolic biblical signs are presented, ones connected in the exegetic tradition with her being the mother of the Messiah. The term Cedrus exaltata—is perceived as the symbol of majesty, sublimity, loftiness, paradisaical beauty, safety. Fons signatus is a sealed spring, an enclosed one, accessible only to the Mother of God’s Son, chosen by God. Hortus conclusus is the symbol of St Mary’s virginity. Oliva speciosa points to St Mary’s charity, her extraordinary fertility, inner peace, the gift of relieving sufferings. Rosa plantata is a metaphor of wisdom, love, medicine for sinners. Puteus aquarum viventium, a well of living waters, indicates St Mary’s mediation for people redeemed by Jesus. Turris eburnea—the ivory tower is another feature of the Virgin Mary’s beauty, of her immaculate body and fortitude.
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The Polish version of the article was published in Roczniki Humanistyczne vol. 60, issue 4 (2012). Ludomir Sleńdziński was the main representative of classicism in Polish art in the period between the two World Wars. The article discusses his two trips to Italy in 1922/24 and 1924/25. They have not been yet researched in the context of the origin and character of his work, albeit impulses coming from Italy were thought to have been an important catalyst for the birth of the so-called “return to order.”Sleńdziński was Dmitry Kardovsky’s student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Sankt Petersburg, and it was in his class that he acquired a worship of the old masters and a perfect command of his trade, first of all perfect drawing skills. Apart from the Sankt Petersburg school, classicist trends came to Polish art from Paris where they were first noticed in the circles connected with the Museion magazine (1911-1913) and among artists belonging to the Polish colony, such as Henryk Kuna, Edward Wittig and Eugeniusz Żak.In the article, I reconstruct Sleńdziński’s tour of Italy, and I remind about the exhibition of Polish modern art that he staged in 1925 as part of the 3rd Roman Biennale. His personal contact with old and modern Italian art became an important moment in his artistic formation, stimulating his departure from academic towards modern classicism, in which the artist starts playing a game with the present day and with tradition, consciously using stylistic elements that belong to different epochs.In conclusion it must be said that Ludomir’s trips inclined him to introduce many new solutions (sometimes surprisingly close to works by well-known Italian artists of similar outlook) and determined the final shape of his mature work.
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The Polish version of the article was published in Roczniki Humanistyczne vol. 65, issue 4 (2017). The article presents, apart from the well-known facts concerning Malczewski’s connections with Viennese institutions and art circles, unknown archive materials, including: 1. letters exchanged between the artist and Juliusz Twardowski (a ministerial official) regarding the lease of a workshop at the Prater district of Vienna (letters were written between 1900–1913 and in 1925); 2. photographic documentation (19 items from the years 1890–1911) of the XXXIX. Ausstellung der Vereinigung Bildender Künstler Österreichs Secession in Vienna that featured 40 paintings by Malczewski and the sculpture Procession to Wawel by Wacław Szymanowski. The manuscripts indicate that Malczewski kept a secret atelier abroad and he most definitely worked there (it was either during one prolonged period, or two periods each lasting a few years). It contradicts the naïve opinions that Malczewski, being a patriot, could not stand separation from his homeland.Photographs with dates and signatures complete the information from the catalogue; they allow for the matching of the ambiguous titles with photographs, and consequently help to identify the paintings shown at the exhibition. Some paintings presented in the photos are not known today, therefore the photographs constitute valuable iconographic material. The documents prove, for instance, that Spring. Landscape with Tobias (1904) was presented in Vienna. It is startling that the painting’s synthetic form was not acknowledged by the critics in Vienna. Just after the World War I, Malczewski wrote a letter to the President of the Wiener Secession in which he stated that the war had not been beneficial to any of the martyred and agitated nations and he had hoped for cooperation between the artists in the time of peace that would not be shaped by national interests or politics.
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