Edmonton’s queer history highlighted through new website and walking tour

Sarah Komadina

On a snowy and cold day in Edmonton, Kristopher Wells and Michael Phair stood together holding maps they helped create. The maps are for the Edmonton Queer History Project's walking tour downtown, and the first stop is Michael Phair Park.

© Global News Kristopher Wells and Michael Phair look at the Edmonton Queer History Project walking tour map.

Wells commented to Phair just how important he is to the community, and how special it is the downtown park honours him. Phair is humble and said it was a group effort to get here today.

READ MORE: Edmonton park named after former city councillor and LGBTQ rights advocate

"We are an important part of the city. We're recognized in that, we're welcomed -- that's part of our history now," Phair said.

Phair remembers the S.S. Pisces gay bathhouse raid in 1981. Police arrested more than 60 gay and bisexual men. He remembers what the first Pride parades looked like, as well as the devastating time when the first detected Edmonton case of HIV/AIDS was confirmed in 1984.

READ MORE: 'Lives were ruined': 40 years after Edmonton's Pisces bathhouse raid

"When in '84 the first individual with HIV was identified in Edmonton, it was in fact members of the gay and lesbian community -- which I was a part of at that time -- who put together what became the AIDS network and it was a group from our community that really worked to assists folks," Phair said.

"The advent of HIV/AIDS was a horrible time personally, and for everyone else who was involved. Everyone that was impacted died within two years without exceptions."

The walking tour map has 27 spots. Among the stops are GATE, the first major LGBTQ2+ organization to help grow and support the community; the Roost, one of the longest-running queer spaces; and Centennial Plaza, where the Edmonton Pride Festival was first held. In the early days, it was small and people marched with bags over their heads -- not like how the event is held today.

The tour is meant to give people an idea of the adversity the queer community went through to gain acceptance -- but it's only one element of the Edmonton Queer History Project. A new website has been launched that lays out this history on a Pride timeline. There is also a podcast called From Here to Queer that dives into the issues.

"I think it's important for any city or any group to make sure that the history doesn't get lost," Phair said. "I think it's important for us who lived through this that we are able to tell our story and that other people can look at it and read our story and learn from it as well.



"It really is great quality work... I think it will speak to people for generations."

Phair stressed there is still work to be done for future generations.

"There's discrimination, but it's not supposed to happen now, and there's laws against it," he said.

"There's more work that needs to be done... we did it in the past and you need to do it in the future as well."

Wells was part of the team behind the walking tour and website. He is an associate professor at MacEwan University and a Canada research chair for the public understanding of gender minority youth. He said this project would have made a world of difference for him growing up.

"So much of this queer history is not taught in our schools," he said. "You go in your textbooks and you're not learning about these LGBTQ2+ pioneers -- you're not learning about the community that contributed so much to our city and our province and our country.

"When you're written out of history, when you're written out of your textbooks, what does that tell you about the worth and value of your identity? It tells you without a past, you have no future."

Wells said being gay in the 80s and 90s was a dangerous time.

"I remember in the mid-90s going to the Roost, the gay bar," he said. "I learned some powerful lessons: you parked your car far away from the front door, and then you raced to the front door before someone would grab you and beat you up. And you learned the lesson never to leave the club on your own -- you always travel in a pack.

"Despite that danger, and what was more important to you to be willing to take that risk was to be able to find community."

Wells said he wants young people to take pride in their identities and to learn about the generations that come before them.

"We want to inspire them to keep the work going moving forward."

Wells said the project is going to be constantly taking in people's stories.

"We hope this inspires others to come forward," Phair said. "Empty your closets -- we want your old photographs, your newspaper clippings, we want to hear your stories.


"We've just started with 27 locations in the downtown, but we know queer history happens everywhere."

There will be a public launch event at Michael Phair Park on March 8 at 10 a.m. After speeches, there will be a guided walking tour with Phair and Darrin Hagen.

Democritus and Epicurus : soul, thought, and theory of knowledge

Darcus, Shirley Muriel Louise

Abstract

This thesis seeks to present a clear account of the teachings of Democritus and Epicurus on the soul (mind), thought, and the source of knowledge through an examination of the extant remains of their works and the reports of their teachings made by other authors. Democritus believed that the soul was a substance like fire but not fire itself. He taught that the mind and the soul were identical. The soul (mind) was distributed throughout the whole body and was the seat of both thought and sensation. Thought was a "change" caused by idols entering the body and its nature was dependent upon the condition of the body itself. Democritus believed that all sensible qualities had no objective existence; they were empty "affections" (πάθη) of the senses — only the atoms and void existed in reality. Democritus postulated two forms of knowledge: "bastard" cognition which was equivalent to sensation; "genuine" cognition which could grasp the realities of the atoms and void. Although Democritus considered the evidence of the senses unreliable, he did use the senses as the starting point for gaining "genuine" knowledge. He also believed that the mind, by using sensible objects, could grasp the realities lying within the objects themselves but there is no clear evidence on how he thought this happened. Epicurus taught that the soul was composed of four very subtle elements; one like air, one like fire, one like wind and a fourth nameless element. The soul had two parts, the animus located in the breast and the anima distributed throughout the body. All four elements of the soul were present in both the animus and anima. The fourth element present in the anima caused sensation to take place in the sense-organs themselves. Epicurus believed that the mind was stirred in some way with each impression made upon the sense-organs. The mind was also struck directly by idols too fine to affect the senses. Epicurus taught that all sense-impressions were true; sensation was a criterion of truth. A second criterion of truth was the prolepsis. This was a general concept of a class of objects which was derived from sensation and stored within the mind. Epicurus believed that error arose not because the sense-impression was false, but because the mind formed an incorrect opinion of the nature of the sensible object. One had to pay attention to a "clear view" (ένάργημα) of the sensible object to determine the truth of any opinion formed by the mind. In the case of objects which could not be perceived close at hand, any opinion of their nature which was not contradicted by the senses could be accepted as true. Epicurus believed that all sense-impressions were true but the "clear" (έναργής) sensations were more valuable for determining the exact nature of the sensible object. Besides the forms of thought caused by sensation, Epicurus believed that the mind was capable of reasoning. This activity of the mind played an important role in determining the nature of imperceptible things. Epicurus taught that the mind used "signs" provided by sensible objects to form hypotheses about τά ӓϭηλα and that it checked these hypotheses with the evidence of the senses. If the hypothesis was confirmed or not contradicted by sensation, it could be accepted as true. Epicurus believed it was by this method that a knowledge of the atoms and the void could be obtained. The έπιβολή τής όιανοιας, which the later Epicureans added as a criterion of truth, appears to have been used by Epicurus to refer to the apprehension by the mind of idols too fine to affect the senses. There is also evidence that the έπιβολή of the mind signified the selection by the mind of concepts existing within it. The έπιβολή was important, not for any role in establishing the nature of τα άσηλα, but as a special form of sensation.

Democritus and Epicurus : soul, thought, and theory of knowledge - UBC Library Open Collections

Title
Democritus and Epicurus : soul, thought, and theory of knowledge
Creator
Darcus, Shirley Muriel Louise
Publisher
University of British Columbia
Date Issued
1968

Marx, Karl Doctoral Thesis

The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature

A student-debt forgiveness advocacy group wants you to strike when payments resume in May: 'The best way to pay $0 a month is to have all your debt canceled'


WASHINGTON, DC - FEB 16  Student debt borrowers demand President Biden cancel student loan debt during a demonstration outside The White House on February 16, 2022 in Washington, DC.

Paul Morigi/Getty Images for We The 45 Million

Ayelet Sheffey
Fri, March 4, 2022, 

The Debt Collective is launching a student-debt strike when payments resume on May 1.


This doesn't mean defaulting on debt. The group offers five ways to get to $0 monthly payments.


They say it's all about pushing the envelope on student-debt cancellation.

The nation's first debtor's union has an option for 43 million federal student-loan borrowers facing payments in under two months: a student-debt strike.

On Friday, the Debt Collective launched an initiative to help borrowers get to $0 monthly payments when the payment pause expires on May 1. The organization made clear that this student debt strike is not encouraging people to default on their loans, which can result from missed payments and lead to severe financial consequences, but rather, the strike is centered on helping borrowers get to $0 monthly payments "as safely as possible."

"I want to emphasize that not everyone can strike, and that's okay," Braxton Brewington, spokesperson for the Debt Collective, told Insider. "A strike is people politicizing that they're unwilling and unable to pay, and it's really something that pushes the envelope and aids the conversation of student-debt cancellation."

Student-loan payments have been on pause since the start of the pandemic, but with Biden planning to restart those payments on May 1, many borrowers have worried about their ability to foot another monthly bill while COVID-19 is still ongoing. As the $1.7 trillion student debt crisis continues to grow, some Democratic lawmakers have been urging the president to fulfill his campaign pledge to cancel student debt broadly, but he has yet to do so and has been largely silent on when, or if, broad loan relief is coming.

That's why a strike is necessary, Brewington said. "It's a way to stick it to Joe Biden and say, 'If you're going to turn payments on, we're going to try to find as many people as we can who can pay $0 a month so they can enjoy their lives in the way that hopefully they are right now.'"

But, as he noted, "the best way to pay $0 a month is to have all your debt canceled."
How to become a student debt striker

According to the Debt Collective, a student debt striker is anyone who is paying $0 a month "for a combination of economic and political reasons — because they can't pay and know they shouldn't have to pay" and who is committed to fighting for broad student-loan relief.

If a borrower fits that mold, they can fill out the organization's form to indicate which of these five options would best help them reach $0 payments:

Applying for "borrower defense to repayment," a type of loan forgiveness granted to borrowers defrauded by for-profit schools

Applying for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, which forgives student debt for public servants after ten years of qualifying payments

Using an income-driven repayment plan, which calculates monthly payments based on income, to help get monthly payments close to $0

Using the Education Department's safety net, which is a 90 day grace period that allows missed payments to go unreported on credit scores

Or staying in school, during which federal loans should be in an in-school deferment period.

Brewington also noted that borrowers currently in default are already on strike because they are unable to make payments on their debt.
Political momentum for student-debt cancellation continues to grow

Striking on student debt isn't about draining money from the Department of Education, Brewington said — it's an "overtly political" action.

As Insider has previously reported, left-leaning economists have said the economy has been doing just fine without student-loan payments made to the federal government during the pandemic. They say that will continue if the payment pause keeps getting extended, or if student debt is canceled altogether.

"In a student debt strike, the main target is the federal government," the Debt Collective said. "The federal government is a unique target because we don't actually hurt the government financially when we don't pay our federal student loans." That's because the government has already issued the debt and has continued to function without the payments.

While lawmakers advocating for broad student-loan relief, like Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, have not explicitly come out in support of a debt strike, Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib has, signaling the potential for further lawmakers supporting $0 payments come May 1.

"The road to student debt cancellation is long and hard, and a key aspect is building solidarity amongst students and graduates with debt," Tlaib told the Debt Collective, adding "we need to resist and abolish student debt, and there are so many ways to support it without putting yourself in financial jeopardy. I stand with Student Debt Strikers and encourage everyone – whether you have debt or not – to join us."

White House considering another pause in student loan payments

Fri, March 4, 2022


White House chief of staff Ron Klain on Thursday signaled that the White House would extend the freeze on student loan payments again, following no mention of student loans at the State of the Union earlier in the week.

"The president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or he'll extend the pause," Klain said on an episode of the podcast "Pod Save America" that aired on Thursday.

The payment pause, which first began through a moratorium enacted under then-President Trump in March 2020, has been extended five times. It is set to expire in on May 2 after Biden extended it in January.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the White House is reviewing an extension, when asked about Klain's comments.

"That is obviously something we will continue to access and review as we get closer to May. Typically, there's a period of time where you need to make a decision, or you at least need to convey to the leaners what they should prepare for, but I don't have anything to predict at this point in time," she told reporters.

Klain on the podcast said the White House will decide on whether to cancel student debt through executive action before the payments resume. He also noted that Biden is "only president in history where no one's paid on their student loans for the entirety of his presidency."

Biden in April requested a memo from the Department of Education to determine his authority to cancel student debt through executive action. Since then, the administration has not publicly announced if the memo is complete.

The White House has recently pointed to the president's extension in January when asked about the lack of action on student loan forgiveness, an issue the president has been under pressure by Democrats to address throughout his time in office.

The president did not talk about canceling student loan debt in his first State of the Union address after he campaigned in 2020 on forgiving at least $10,000 in federal student loans per person. Progressives have called on him to step that number up to $50,000 per borrower

Russian anger as Senator Lindsey Graham calls for Putin's assassination

The comments were dismissed as "hysterical Russophobia" 

by ambassador to US

REMOVE FOOT FROM MOUTH BEFORE SHOOTING IT 

A US senator has called on someone in Russian President Vladimir Putin's inner circle to assassinate him.

Lindsey Graham said the only way Russia's invasion of Ukraine ends is "for somebody in Russia to take this guy out".

In a statement on Twitter, the outspoken Republican asks if the Russian president has a "Brutus" who can take out Mr Putin and end the war.

His comments have outraged the Russian ambassador to the US.

Mr Graham, who represents South Carolina, tweeted: "You would be doing your country - and the world - a great service.

"Is there a Brutus in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military?"

Brutus was a Roman politician who assassinated Julius Caesar, while German army Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg is best-known for trying to kill Adolf Hitler in 1944.

Anatoly Antonov, Russia's ambassador to the US, described his statement as "unacceptable and outrageous".

He said the degree of "Russophobia and hatred in the US towards Russia was off the charts.

"It's unbelievable that a country's senator preaching his moral values as a 'guiding star' to all mankind could afford a call on terrorism as a way to achieve Washington's goals on the international arena."

US President Joe Biden has condemned the Russian invasion and imposed sanctions on politicians including Mr Putin himself. He says the US will defend Nato countries but has ruled out sending troops to Ukraine.

And on Friday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki insisted Mr Graham's stance was "not the position of the United States government and certainly not a statement you would hear come from the mouth of anybody working in this administration".

Senator Graham's comments also riled Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

"Of course, these days not everyone is managing to preserve a sober mind, I would even say a sound mind," he said, calling for national unity from Russians.

ZOONOSIS SPILLOVER POSSIBLE

USDA finds avian flu in Missouri commercial chicken flock

The USDA Friday said it confirmed avian flu in a flock of Missouri broiler chickens. 

File photo by format35/Shutterstock


March 4 (UPI) -- The United States Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service said Friday it has confirmed highly pathogenic avian influenza in a flock of Missouri chickens.

"State officials quarantined the affected premises, and birds on the properties will be depopulated to prevent the spread of the disease," APHIS said in a press statement, "Birds from the flock will not enter the food system."

APHIS said it tested a flock of commercial broiler chickens in Stoddard County that "confirmed the presence of highly pathogenic avian influenza."

Samples were tested at the University of Missouri Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory and confirmed at the APHIS National Veterinary Services Laboratories (NVSL) in Ames, Iowa.

APHIS said it is working closely with state animal health officials on a joint incident response.

Citing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, APHIS said the recent avian flu detections do not present an immediate public health concern.

Federal and state partners are jointly working on additional surveillance and testing in area around the flock that tested positive for avian flu.

The United States has the strongest avian flu surveillance program in the world, APHIS said, and USDA is working to actively look for the disease in U.S. commercial poultry operations.

Appeals court upholds Title 42 but says U.S. can't expel migrants to places of harm

Vehicles wait in line at the Mexico-United States border to leave Tijuana, Mexico, and enter the United States on March 21. A federal appeals court on Friday said the Biden administration can expel migrants under Title 42, but can't send them to places where they face harm.

 File Photo by Ariana Drehsler/UPI | License Photo

March 4 (UPI) -- A federal appeals court on Friday ruled that the Biden administration may expel migrants under a Trump-era policy to limit the spread of COVID-19, but blocked the U.S. government from sending them to locations where they face danger.

The District of Columbia U.S. Circuit Court, in part, upheld the government's use of Title 42, a policy put into effect in March 2020 to expel more than 1 million migrants without hearing their asylum cases since the start of the pandemic.

The panel, however, determined the families who challenged the use of Title 42 were likely to succeed on their claim that U.S. laws prevent the government from sending them back to countries where they could face harm.

Border authorities "cannot expel them [migrants] to places where they will be persecuted or tortured," the opinion said.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which represents the plaintiffs in the case, called the ruling "an enormous victory."

"Title 42 is illegal and inhumane. This brutal policy has resulted in serious harm to families seeking asylum -- it's past time for it to end entirely," the organization tweeted.

The Title 42 policy was enacted by former President Donald Trump in March 2020 with the stated purpose of preventing those who cross the border illegally from potentially spreading the novel coronavirus. Unaccompanied minors are not expelled under Title 42 after a change in policy in February 2021.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, under President Joe Biden, extended the policy with plans to review it ever 60 days.

SO QUIET NO ONE NOTICED
Biden Quietly Casts Trump As The New Face Of Putin In America

S.V. Date
Fri, March 4, 2022

(Photo: Scott Olson via Getty Images)

SUPERIOR, Wisc. – President Joe Biden failed to bring up the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol incited by his predecessor in his State of the Union speech, but less than a day later essentially made Donald Trump, without ever mentioning his name, the American face of Russia’s dictator.

“Vladimir Putin was counting on being able to split up the United States,” Biden said, and proceeded to describe the Trump-inspired mob that attacked the Capitol with the goal of overturning the 2020 election.

“Look, how would you feel if you saw crowds storm and break down the doors of the British Parliament, kill five cops, injure 145 ― or the German Bundestag or the Italian Parliament? I think you’d wonder,” he said. “Well, that’s what the rest of the world saw. It’s not who we are. And now, we’re proving, under pressure, that we are not that country. We’re united.”

The little-noticed remarks at the University of Wisconsin-Superior student union came just 18 hours after Biden did not mention the Jan. 6 attack at all in his hourlong State of the Union address to Congress and the nation.

Polls show that Americans are no longer as concerned about the attempt to forcibly keep Trump in power as they were immediately afterward. Indeed, Americans generally, and more so Republicans and independents, are also less inclined to believe that Trump was responsible for the attack than they were a year ago.

Republican pollster Neil Newhouse said that if Biden is hoping to stoke interest in Jan. 6, it is not likely to work.

“The Jan. 6 events are already baked into voters’ minds, and I have a hard time believing that any new revelations will impact attitudes one way or another,” he said. “That’s especially true when Americans are focused on other current event and issues, like Ukraine, inflation, crime and the economy.”

Perhaps appreciating where public sentiment is today, Biden actually drew an explicit link between Jan. 6 and Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. He said Putin assumed that his long efforts to sow division in the West, including the United States, would let him get away with seizing Russia’s neighbor.

“We were able to make sure we kept Europe united and the free world united,” Biden said. “In my view, he did what he did because he thought he could split NATO, split Europe, and split the United States. We’re going to demonstrate to the whole world no one can split this country.”

Deputy White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, when asked why Biden had not talked about Jan. 6 in his State of the Union, told reporters Wednesday that he has spoken about it many times, including a lengthy speech on the first anniversary of the attack earlier this year.

One White House official said on condition of anonymity that Biden would continue to discuss Jan. 6 as needed. And press secretary Jen Psaki on Thursday, responding to a question about the House Jan. 6 committee, repeated Biden’s previous statements that Jan. 6 was a uniquely dangerous event in the nation’s history caused by the sitting president at the time, and needed to be treated as such.

Trump, who now is under investigation in multiple jurisdictions for his post-election actions, was elected with the open help of Putin in 2016. The Russian leader’s intelligence agencies stole documents from the campaign of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and made them available. Trump used that material daily during the final month before Election Day, even though he knew it had been stolen for him by Putin’s spies.

Putin also mounted a propaganda campaign using social media to generate false stories about Clinton with the goal of depressing Democratic turnout, according to both Special Counsel Robert Mueller as well as the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Four years later, Russia was again working for Trump, and then after his loss helped amplify his lies that the election had been “stolen” from him ― lies that fomented the anger among Trump’s followers that culminated in the violent attack on Jan. 6.

Since then, Russian state media, “troll farms” and even Putin himself have been spreading Trump’s claims that the supporters who were arrested for their participation that day are “political prisoners” and are being unfairly persecuted.

Trump, despite losing the election by 7 million votes nationally and 306-232 in the Electoral College, became the first president in more than two centuries of elections to refuse to hand over power peacefully. His incitement of the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol ― his last-ditch attempt to remain in office ― led to the deaths of five people, including one police officer, injured another 140 officers and led to four police suicides.

That attempt to remain in power notwithstanding his loss has sparked both state and federal investigations.

The district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, has impaneled a special grand jury just to focus on Trump’s attempt to coerce state officials to “find” enough votes to overturn his loss of that state to Biden in 2020.

And the House Jan. 6 committee has been subpoenaing more and more former and current Trump aides to determine his precise role in that day’s events, while the Department of Justice has confirmed that it is investigating at least one element of Trump’s scheme to remain in power: the submission of fake Trump “electors” in states that Biden won.

This week, the Jan. 6 committee filed a lengthy brief in federal court in California in a lawsuit filed by a pro-Trump lawyer who wrote a memo arguing that Vice President Mike Pence had the unilateral ability to declare Trump the winner. That lawyer, John Eastman, is now trying to block the release of his emails on the topic. In the 221-page document, the committee told the judge that the lawyer cannot cite attorney-client privilege because of, among other reasons, the “crime-fraud” exception to that rule.

“The select committee ... has a good-faith basis for concluding that the president and members of his campaign engaged in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States,” the committee’s lawyers wrote.

In response, Trump has asked his followers to stage “the biggest protests we have ever had in Washington, D.C., in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere” if prosecutors come after him, “because our country and our elections are corrupt.”

Despite this, Trump remains the dominant figure in the Republican Party and is openly speaking about running for the presidency again in 2024.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

DEMONIZING PUTIN
Russia's former top diplomat says the West's previous appeasement of Putin has made him 'delusional'

Jake Epstein
Thu, March 3, 2022

Now former Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev speaks with

 journalists in the west driveway of the White House, Washington DC, September 29, 1993.

Photo by Mark Reinstein/Corbis via Getty Images


Russia's former top diplomat says the West's past appeasement of Putin has made him "delusional."

Andrei Kozyrev called for more sanctions and weapons deliveries to Ukraine during a CNN interview.

Last week, Kozyrev spoke out against current Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov

Russia's former foreign minister said the West's past appeasement of President Vladimir Putin has made him "delusional" amid his ongoing war against Ukraine.

"[Putin] is kind of delusional now, partly because of the long story of Western — including French — appeasement policy," Andrei Kozyrev said in an interview with CNN that aired on Thursday.

His comments came in response to a question about Putin's phone call with French President Emmanuel Macron earlier on Thursday, which left Macron thinking "the worst is yet to come" in Ukraine, according to a senior French official.

Kozyrev, who was Russia's first foreign minister under Boris Yeltsin during the early-to-mid 1990s after the Soviet Union collapsed, said there needs to be "more severe sanctions now and more weapons delivery to Ukraine now."

Kozyrev also called on Russian diplomats to resign from their posts. He said he thinks the message will resonate, but is unsure if it will have any impact.

Last week, Kozyrev spoke out against current Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov after the White House announced it would sanction Putin and Lavrov.

"Lavrov, rightfully sanctioned by the US and EU today, was my deputy in the 90s. Used to have my back," former Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev wrote on Twitter. "Today, I would watch my back if he was behind me."

With one week now having passed since Putin ordered Russian troops to attack Ukraine, Kozyrev on Thursday said people in Russia will begin asking questions about the war, especially younger children and teenagers.

"Hey father, mother, what is going on?" he said. "What are you actually representing — what are you defending, this kind of barbarity?"

Russia on Tuesday, however, said it planned to force schoolchildren to watch a broadcast about the government's justification for the Ukrainian invasion.

Putin, the oligarch and the Fabergé eggs on show in London


Viktor Vekselberg
Chris Harvey
Thu, March 3, 2022

The Alexander Palace Egg, by Fabergé (1908) - V&A

They’re the royal treasures of the former Russian empire, the magnificent imperial Easter eggs made for the Tsars Alexander III and Nicholas II by the St Petersburg jeweller Carl Fabergé. Only 50 were ever delivered, seven have been lost; of the 43 dazzlingly intricate creations still in existence, 15 of the most beautiful make up the climax of the V&A’s sold-out exhibition Fabergé: Romance to Revolution, which is scheduled to run until May 8.

The V&A say that of the 233 objects included in the entire show, 13 have been loaned from Russian institutions, and that to date there have been no requests to return the loans, which they expect to stay on display until the exhibition closes, “at which point we will work closely with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and the lenders to ensure [their] safe return.”

Yet the imperial eggs seem certain to become objects of fraught concern in a new and frightening Cold War that is extending even to the arts. It has already thrown into jeopardy the careers of such stars as Anna Netrebko, probably the most famous operatic soprano in the world, and Valery Gergiev, the great conductor. Russia has been disinvited from Eurovision. Meanwhile the eggs, these extraordinary symbols of Russian wealth and might, continue to draw crowds of visitors daily.

The CEO of Fabergé, Sean Gilbertson, describes them as “some of the most important culturally historic pieces of art ever made… The value that’s on display in those 15 imperial eggs is simply staggering. The Queen owns one called the Mosaic egg. If that was put up for auction today it would probably exceed $100 million.” Before the war in Ukraine, he says, “in our view, you’ve got half a billion dollars of eggs there.”

Among them is the Moscow Kremlin egg, a gift from Tsar Nicholas II to his wife, which consists of ornate towers of gold, silver and onyx around a white enamel cupola. It was crafted between 1904-6 and has been loaned by the Kremlin Armoury Museum. The museum has loaned two other imperial eggs: the Alexander Palace egg and the Romanov Tercentenary egg. Also present is the very first imperial Easter egg, the Hen egg, made in 1884-5 for Nicholas’s father, Alexander III, as a present for the Empress Maria Feodorovna.

The Moscow Kremlin Egg - Moscow Kremlin Museums/PA

It contains a small, golden bird, which fits in a golden yolk, inside a white enamel egg. This has been loaned by a foundation set up by the Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, who has had his assets frozen in the US since 2018 along with 23 other Russian nationals, in relation to Moscow’s perceived meddling in the 2016 American election and other alleged “malign activity”. His main relationship with Putin appears to be a business one connected to Russian infrastructure projects.

Vekselberg bought the Hen egg in 2004, as part of the collection of Fabergé works once owned by the late American media magnate Malcolm Forbes. He owns nine Fabergé imperial eggs, which are normally on display in the Fabergé Museum in the Shuvalov Palace in St Petersburg. The V&A say they “have received no direct support from Viktor Vekselberg either through funding or the donation of objects”. The museum explains, “Our loan agreement is with the Link of Times Foundation and was made in good faith between two cultural organisations”.

Yet Fabergé’s own publicity on their website refers to it as: “the celebrated Fabergé collection of the Link of Times Foundation owned by Russian entrepreneur Viktor Vekselberg”. The oligarch spent £30 million on renovating the neoclassical palace in which they’re housed and is reported as saying, “Any true collector makes a collection to put it on public display sooner or later and, ideally, create its own museum.” One source suggests that the purchase of the collection has been talked about as a bargaining chip that could be used to keep Vekselberg in favour with the Russian president, rather like a “get out of jail free” card.

In the past, the Ukrainian-born Vekselberg, who is based in Switzerland and has a fortune estimated to be around £12 billion, has donated freely to arts institutions, including the Tate, where he remains an Honorary Tate Foundation Member. This, Tate informed us, is in recognition of a donation made seven years ago.

Vekselberg considered returning the eggs to Russia as an act of “repatriation”. Yet as Toby Faber, the author of the book Fabergé’s Eggs, points out, for most of the 20th century, their exquisite craftsmanship was disregarded at home. “If you think back to the Soviet era, Carl Fabergé was absolutely a symbol of a discredited time, and they were not proud of his work. Pretty much all of his standard jewellery was melted down in the early Seventies, just for the precious stones it contained... the eggs themselves endured a series of raids by Stalin who wanted to sell them off to fund his five-year plan. The Kremlin was left at the end of that process with 10, and all the rest were scattered overseas.”

It was not until the late 1980s that accurate details about the provenance of the eggs emerged, he explains. "Perestroika and the opening of the Kremlin archives was the first time when people were getting real clarity about which egg was made for whom, and in what year; it had all been guesswork up to then, and a bit of hearsay.”

The Bolshoi Ballet performed at The Royal Opera House - Nigel Norrington

There is also the issue of another egg loaned to the exhibition, not an imperial one, but an item nevertheless of huge value. This is the Rothschild egg, bought by Alexander Ivanov, a Russian art dealer, in 2007 for £8.9 million, for his Fabergé Museum in Germany but latterly seemingly given to Putin, who would donate it in 2014 with much fanfare to the Hermitage museum in St Petersburg – which has now loaned it to the V&A.

Will the closeness of this egg’s connection to the man currently being accused of war crimes entail future problems?

We approached the V&A’s director Tristram Hunt for comment but were told he was not available. The chief executive of the Hermitage Foundation UK, Janice Sacher, was also unable to comment, and even declined to name any works on loan to the UK for fear that they might be targeted. The DCMS provided an almost identical statement to the V&A. There is clearly anxiety.

Meanwhile, the sense of the UK being drawn into a new culture war in the wake of the Russian invasion continues to expand. A planned season of the Bolshoi Ballet has been cancelled by the Royal Opera House, the Science Museum has called off an upcoming exhibition about the Trans-Siberian Railway (and even its director has handed back a Russian medal). The Royal Academy of Arts has severed ties with one of its trustees, the billionaire Russian banker Petr Aven, handing back a donation that he made to a Francis Bacon exhibition.

Semyon Bychkov conducts the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra at Carnegie Hall - Getty

One gallerist specialising in Russian artists told me she had been contacted by several collectors asking to be removed immediately from her mailing list. Meanwhile, a reader’s letter in the Telegraph complained about Classic FM continuing to play Russian music.

Navigating this new, bomb-scarred cultural landscape will be difficult for performers and institutions alike. Russian virtuoso musicians regularly play in Britain, principal dancers are integral parts of companies like the Royal Ballet, with Natalia Osipova and Vadim Muntagirov both performing in a current production of Swan Lake. “This will be a traumatic time for our Ukrainian and Russian staff and artists, particularly those with family and friends affected,” a spokesperson for the Royal Opera House told me. “Support has been offered to everyone who works with us, and our respect and solidarity is with Ukraine as it resists the invasion of its territory.”

The Barbican, which has not made any changes to its planned programme, says it is looking at it on a “case by case basis”. A spokesperson explained: “The Russian conductor Semyon Bychkov who conducts the Czech Philharmonic in March has made a public statement denouncing the invasion and the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s programme entitled Shostakovich in the Shadow of Stalin feels like an appropriate programme given the context behind Symphony No 5.” It seems that the words of Mikhail Piotrovsky, the director of the Hermitage Museum, that “culture is always above politics” have been overtaken by events.

Additional reporting by Alex Diggins

BRONZE AGE SWORDS

Ukraine is fighting the Russians 

with weapons from Troy, 

Alabama


Jemma Stephenson, Montgomery Advertiser
Wed, March 2, 2022

Javelin weapons made in Troy are seemingly being used by Ukrainian troops to fend off the Russian invasion.

Illia Ponomarenko, a defense reporter with The Kyiv Independent, posted photos Tuesday on Twitter that showed the weapons embossed with "Javelin Joint Venture Lockheed Martin Troy, AL."

In a 2017 article, Military + Aerospace Electronics reported that Raytheon and Lockheed Martin were building missiles for Ukraine, among other governments.

Lockheed Martin has a "manufacturing, final assembly, test and storage operation" facility based in Troy, per its website.

"Foreign military sales are government to government transactions, and we work closely with the U.S. government on any military sale to international allies," Lockheed Martin said in a statement Tuesday. "Discussions about sales to foreign governments are best addressed by the U.S. government."

PRO LIFE GOVERNOR
Gov. Kay Ivey tweeted that "we want the last thing Putin ever reads to be 'Made in Alabama.'"

Some social media users have shared their pride at Alabama-made weapons being used in Ukraine. One Twitter user with the handle @HunterPalmerPCB called it a "care package" from "sweet home Alabama."

Raytheon did not immediately return request for comment.

Jemma Stephenson is the children and education reporter for the Montgomery Advertiser. She can be reached at jstephenson@gannett.com or 334-261-1569.

This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Ukraine is fighting Russian troops with weapons from Troy, Alabama