The Hermitage in St. Petersburg

Jun 16, 2013 16:08




Hermitage, a photo by Aino Maria V. on Flickr.
A month ago (how time flies!), I brought you dear readers some lovely photos by the Paris-based photographer Aino Maria V, a Finnish girl who travels widely as a human-rights lawyer.

This shot is in complete contrast with sunny Italy, the locale of the pair of shots I posted. It's the Hermitage Museum (the building on the right -- green paint being the giveaway) in St. Petersburg, Russia. Aino writes that she and her family are particularly fond of the city. It's only a short train-ride through gorgeous beech forests from Helsinki, as Joanne and I found when we visited both countries about four years ago -- proceeding on to Moscow by river. Back then, the Hermitage setting was completely different from this wintertime view -- we had wonderful late summer weather.

Just one further note on the Hermitage, which has a fabulous collection of Old Masters and more recent works of art: I was surprised to see how basic the heating/cooling is, with many of the windows thrown open for the breeze (but also city pollution, humidity, etc.) -- with billions of dollars' worth of fragile paintings hostage to the elements. Not that the Russians don't admirably maintain historic buildings -- indeed, just as one example, their restoration of the magnificent Peterhof Palace outside the city is amazing. But, somehow, modern climate-control seems an urgent need.

italian, artistic, inspirations, dream

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