The Volunteers Bronze Statue Guest Blog

Thank you Joanne who sent the article and photographs from Halifax

The Volunteers Bronze Statue in Halifax, at the Waterfront, Nova Scotia (click link for article written when the monument was unveiled in 2017)

The bronze sculpture, called “The Volunteers,” features three life-sized figures from three generations: A young girl pulling a wagon full of salvaged metal, an African-Nova Scotian woman holding a tray of coffee and sandwiches, and an older woman seated with a Mi’kmaq basket and knitting.

The sculptor is Marlene Hilton Moore

Bronze Sculpture of Woman Knitting for the WWII Effort

Happy Flag Day Birthday David

The history of Flag Day on the History Channel

Ruth from Jack( blog follower and good friend)

Father of Flag Day” honors have been given to William T. Kerr, who was credited with founding the American Flag Day Association in 1888 while still a schoolboy in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Blue Bottle Tree

Keeping evil spirits out of the garden and home- bottle trees were created to catch those evil spirits. Here’s an article about the American Bottle Tree on Smithsonian Gardens blog.

I photographed this blue bottle tree in Lenox CT as we went for early morning coffee in November. The bottle tree has African origins and has now spread across the country but was primarily evident in the South. Now you can order a bottle trees online from you know where.

Blue Bottle Tree

Stumbling Stones/Stoplersteine Memorials

To remember. Read their names.

As I was photographing one of these brass Stolpersteine, an elderly man came up to us and said in German “it’s important to remember the bad things that happen.”

Artist Gunter Demnig creates the Stoplersteines  and personally places them in the sidewalks, using a small trowel, in front of the residences where individuals and families were taken by the Nazis. They all say “here lived_______” , their name and their dates and the location where they were murdered.

Writer Megan King says in her article https://theculturetrip.com/europe/germany/articles/the-deeper-meaning-behind-berlins-brass-cobblestones/ “These cobblestone plaques that bear a tragic chapter of German history are the open-ended project first initiated in 1996 by the German artist Gunter Demnig. Not only is their message one of remembrance and of personalising the victims by honouring their names, but their purpose is also thought-provoking, aiming to initiate discussion and stimulate thought.”

(Link to another post about the Stolpersteine remembrance project)


The last photo taken at night illustrating how the light catches the brass plaques. Here are a few of the thousands of stolpersteines placed in Berlin but the project has expanded to other countries as well.

Please Don’t Touch the Magnificent Costumes (All Made of Paper)

The title of today’s post comes from a conversation I had with one of the guards in the gallery.  He has seen two women lie down on the museum floor to look up the dresses ( he thought they had fainted), two men blow on the hanging costumes to get them to move (saliva included) and a 5 or 6 year old ran into the Queen Elizabeth gown the other day.  Today I saw a woman reach to touch the gossamer lace on a collar.  It’s hard to fathom that the gorgeous costumes/sculptures are made entirely of paper but they are.   

Today at the Frick Art Museum we viewed the exhibition of Isabelle de Borchgrave : Fashioning Art from Paper

My sister Mary reads about the Isabelle de Borchgrave paper sculpture commissioned by the Frick after the Peter Paul Rubens’ Portrait of Princess of Condé, Charlotte-Marguerite de Montmorency (1594-1650) 




You can touch the paper on this table in the rotunda.

Pittsburgh Streetcar #1724 at the Heinz History Center

In a week’s time I hosted Charlie and Laura and then Michael,Jack and Maura.

The streetcar parked in the Heinz History Center lobby was a big hit with all the grandchildren

Charlie driving the streetcar

Jack at the controls.

Pittsburgh Streetcars on Northside Routes

YouTube video

https://www.heinzhistorycenter.org/blog

Millvale Murals are Masterpieces

Right in Millvale PA, across the Allegheny River from Pittsburgh.

” Croatian artist Maxo Vanka painted a one-of-a-kind masterpiece on the interior walls of St. Nicholas Croatian Catholic Church in Millvale, PA. The 25 murals—created in two intense periods in 1937 and 1941—are unique, evocative and larger-than-life representations of faith and family; the immigrant experience in America; social justice and injustice and the horrors of war”        from the website   Vanka Murals 

When I parked on Grant Avenue, I noticed the banner sign on the lamppost and remembered seeing these dramatic and stunning murals at St. Nicholas Church. Information on the website link about how to get a tour and how to support the preservation of these significant and historic artworks.