Русская Венера

Whenever I post pictures of women on this blog Mrs Kartoshka becomes agitated. Why? It's not jealousy - not one of them can hold a candle to her. It's because they are usually brunettes. Mrs Kartoshka is a blonde. The contempt with which blondes regard brunettes is monumental.

So- I have selected this picture for two reasons: because like Mrs Kartoshka she is a blonde, and because like Mrs Kartoshka she is a Russian Venus. I should point out however that Mrs Kartoshka is about 50kg with her hat and coat and boots on, whereas this lady is more generously built.


The painting is Русская Венера (Russian Venus) by Boris Mikhaylovich Kustodiev (Борис Михайлович Кустодиев:1878– 1927).
Kustodiev, who was known for illustration, stage and graphic design as well as his paintings, provides the link between traditional Russian realism and the classically influenced realism of the Soviet era. He studied under the great Russian painter Repin, who wrote I have great hopes for Kustodiev- praise indeed.
Kustodiev's political awareness was awakened by the 1905 Revolution, and he produced satirical works in response to those troubled times.
Themes of traditional Russian life filled his work, indeed the times that Kustodiev spent away from Russia (he studied in France and Spain and later went to Switzerland for medical treatment) strengthened his love of his homeland.
From 1916 onwards Kustodiev was paralyzed from the waist down by spinal tuberculosis.

Dave Pike plays Joao Donato-Bossa Nova Carnival-1962

Dave Pike is a Detroit born vibraphonist.

He started out as a drummer, but taught himself to play vibes and marimba. He has made a number of albums influenced by Brazilian and Latin music.

Joao Donato is a Brazilian pianist/composer who has been active in the Bossa Nova genre from its earliest years.

As you can see the record also features trumpet legend Clark Terry and guitarist Kenny Burrell, both of whom were prominent practitioners of bebop .

Link: http://rapidshare.com/files/372829381/Dave_Pike.rar

Italy 1990...

Probably the worst, most tedious, bad-tempered Final in the history of the World Cup… Brian Glanville The Story of the World Cup.

The 1990 tournament had the lowest goals-per-match average of all World Cups. There were 115 goals, an average of 1 goal every 42.7 minutes.There was only one match where both teams scored more than one goal.
Defensive play dominated- The Republic of Ireland, for example, reached the quarter-finals despite scoring only 2 goals. They also did not win a single match outright. Both semi finals were decided on penalties.

Other features of the tournament were the high number of sendings off- 16, and a record number of penalty awards. Even the opener in which Cameroon defeated the holders Argentina was most memorable for the brutal play of the Cameroonians who were reduced to 9 men by the end.

The rules of the game were changed largely in response to this cynical, unpalletable fare- back passes to the goalkeeper were outlawed (ROI's game against Egypt, possibly one of the least interesting ever, saw goalkeeper Packy Bonner keeping the ball for 5 minutes),as was the tackle from behind.
The final was truly dreadful- Argentina didn't seem to want to play and the Germans, playing their third successive final, reacted theatrically to physical challenges. The crowd were hostile towards the Argentinians,who had defeated Italy in the semi final, and as the national anthem was jeered Maradonna could be seen muttering 'sons of bitches' in response. In the 65th minute, Argentina's Pedro Monzon was sent off for a foul on Klinsmann (who threw himself around like a fish in the bottom of a boat). Team-mate Gustavo Dezotti received the second red card of the game with four minutes left, by which time Brehme had scored the only goal of the game from the spot after the referee had awarded a soft penalty when Rudi Völler went down.

Away from football the early nineties were times of great change, and this tournament saw the last appearances of West Germany, USSR, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia.
Italy discovered a hero in Salvatore ‘Totò’ Schillaci – the Juventus striker made his debut as substitute in the opening game against Austria and finished the tournament as top scorer with six goals- he only scored one further goal in his international career.

Cowboys #6 - The Bills

In the colonial era when DR Congo was known as Zaire , Kinhasa as Leopoldville, a surprising youth culture emerged. There was racial segregation in the city, and most of the Africans were denied a decent education or any opportunity of improving their lot. In the late 1950's cinemas became very popular in the African quarter. Youths were inspired by Westerns, Buffalo Bill in particular because of his similarity to hunter heroes of Congolese tradition, and Charlton Heston especially for his portrayal of Bill in Pony Express.
The Bills, as they came to be known, were gangs of youths who adopted Western style dress and gave their patches names with a Western flavour, such as Santa Fe or Texas.
The photographs are by Jean Depara(1928-1997), an Angolan who cronichled many aspects of life in Zaire.

The Hallmarks of Sophistication...

Back in the late 1960s I had some relations whose home was far more like the homes that you saw on TV or in the movies than our house was.
They had a colour TV, a 'studio couch' (without arms- coarse brown plaid fabric), dynamic looking lightshades, a 'hi-fi' with seperate loudspeakers (we had a radiogram), an aquarium, a shaggy rug, ice cubes...
I took all of these things to be the hallmarks of sophistication, signs that these people had somehow escaped from the austerity in which my branch of the family seemed terminally stuck.
But of these trappings the one that I have the strongest memory is the soda siphon.

Theirs was dark green (the model above dates from 1965). Funnily though, I don't think that anybody in the household drank. My cousin and I would play with it, shooting fizzing jets of disapointingly bland and dusty water into sturdy green pimpled tumblers. Other than that I don't think it ever got used.

We collected the empty gas capsules though, and employed them in our Airfix armageddons as weapons of mass destruction, which we ominously called Doom Bombs or Blockbusters.

Caetano Veloso (1968)

During the course of his 43 year 30 plus studio album career Caetano Veloso has released 4 eponymous LPs (and one entitled Caetano). This 1968 record is an early example of Tropicália ,of which Caetano was one of the main originators. The music is an eclectic blend of bossa nova, Bahian music and more psychedelic influences such as Indian music.
Link:http://rapidshare.com/files/371471819/Caetano_Veloso.rar

Mexico 1986...

I was waiting for my teammates to embrace me, and no one came... I told them, Come hug me, or the referee isn't going to allow it… Diego Maradona.

Who remembers the sinister star shaped shadow that haunted the centre circle of The Azteca stadium during June 1986?
In June 1974 FIFA chose Colombia to host the 1986 World Cup. However, in November 1982 Colombian authorities declared that they could not afford to stage the tournament, and Mexico was selected on 20 May 1983 as replacement , becoming the first nation to host two World Cups. In September 1985 A severe earthquake struck Mexico, but the World Cup went ahead as planned.
The final between Argentina and West Germany was the last World Cup game to be watched by a crowd of 100,000 plus.
As 1986 had been declared the International Year of Peace by the United Nations, the advertising boards of all the stadia displayed the FIFA and United Nations logos along with the legend "Football for Peace - Peace Year".
Three of the quarter finals were decided on penalties (shootouts having being introduced in 1982).
The fourth produced the remarkable sight of 1.65 m Maradona out jumping 1.85 m England goalkeeper Peter Shilton to punch the ball into the net. A few minutes later Maradona scored a goal that is often cited as the best ever. At the time I was convinced that the final touch had actually come from an England defender.
Manuel Negrete of Mexico scored an equally memorable goal:



Appearing in his second tournament Zidane scored his first World Cup goal…not Zinadine but his uncle, Djamel Zidane, who netted for Algeria against Northern Ireland.

On the world stage it was goodbye to Socrates and Zico, two players who will always rank amongst the greats.

Muriel?

Fans of Tretchikoff might want to check out these stunning murals. Here's the Surface View blog. That's Wayne Hemingway there...Wayne is an English designer, founder of Red or Dead and author of Just Above The Mantelpiece: Mass-Market Masterpieces.

Cowboys #5

Westerns, of course, were not only made in the USA. So, what comes next, a feature on Spaghetti Westerns? Later perhaps, but here is a strange Soviet/ Cuban collaboration from 1972.
Всадник без головы (The Headless Horseman)was based on a novel by the Irish-American adventure writer"Captain"Thomas Mayne Reid (1818 – 1883). The novel was an adaptation of a South Texas folk tale.

The movie was filmed in Cuba- local actors (dubbed from Spanish) playing the Hispanic carachters and the black slaves. The Caucasians and Native Americans are played by Soviet actors. Leading man (and Soviet heartthrob) Oleg Borisovich Vidov was born in Moscow in 1943. In 1985, he defected to the U.S. You'd have to go a long way to find a more handsome cowboy.

The past is a foreign country...

The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there
This is the opening line of The Go-Between ,a novel by L.P. Hartley (1895 – 1972), published in 1953.
I've decided to drop the Bossa Nova reference from the title of the blog because it was becoming misleading. There will still be Bossa Nova posts on here, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to source music that is not widely available on other sites (Loronix for example). This is not to suggest that Joao Kartoshka's love of Bossa Nova genre was insincere or fleeting, but rather that it was the tip of an iceberg in terms of his fascination for popular culture of the recent past.
I would hesitate to call this a nostalgia site, as we must remember
the development of new ideas and the quest for change is a positive force in life.

Time out...

Spring is coming.

I'm off to see Mrs Kartoshka.

Sadly I don't think the weather will allow me to wear holiday threads like those modelled here by The Duke.

Spain 1982...

If 1978 was about Mennoti and his cigarettes 1982 was, thanks to Enzo Bearzot, the year of the pipe.

Italy triumphed in the final against a lacklustre West German side despite missing a first half penalty. The Italians had overcome dire treatment from their press (accusations included players being involved in gay love affairs) and emerged from what is considered to be the original 'Group of Death' (second round group C saw them matched with Brazil and Argentina).

Most neutrals would have favoured Italy over a West Germany team who had introduced kung fu to the tournament in the shape of Schumaker's assault on Battison, and who in the opening phase had been involved in the darkest episode in World Cup history. In a match known as The Shame of Gijón West Germany and Austria colluded in providing a result that ensured they both progressed at the expense of Algeria.
Algeria had beaten West Germany 2–1 on the opening day, becoming the first African team to defeat European opponents at the World Cup. Now, when West Germany took a 1-0 lead against Austria, both teams gave up playing and spent 80 minutes aimlessly punting the ball to and fro.

El Salvador had a desperate time. The country was ravaged by civil war, and they arrived in Spain just 72 hours before their opener with Hungary. They had to borrow footballs from the Hungarian camp in order to train. Their manager advised them to take the game to Hungary. On this occasion attack was not the best form of defence, and they got on the end of a 10-1 defeat When Luis Ramírez Zapata (nicknamed El Pelé) had pulled it back to 5-1 his teammates were annoyed with his joyful celebrations, worried that the Hungarians would , in their anger, step up a gear. Their fears were realised to some degree when substitute Laszlo Kiss netted a seven minute hat trick.

Zico and Socrates featured for Brazil, two of the greatest players never to win the World Cup.

Stowaway...

The blue-and-silver Walkman TPS-L2 (the first commercially available Walkman) went on sale in Japan on July 1, 1979.

This magazine ad comes from June 1980 (in the UK the Walkman was known as The Stowaway).It was not cheap (around £100, with a second set of headphones costing around £15 extra- the average weekly wage in the UK in 1980 was £110)

007...

Nostalgia... cars, women, exotic locations, adventure, guns, smart clothes, wit...

Pa Kartoshka used to take me to the cinema to see the James Bond movies (the Sean Connery ones) and I've always retained a fondness for them. Back home my mother had a musty and already dog-eared selection of the Ian Fleming novels. They became the first 'grown up' books that I read. Just thinking about them now reminds me of my bed on a winter's night, under the heavy covers, understanding about 50% of what I was reading.