Museum of the History of Riga and Navigation / Rīgas vēstures un kuģniecības muzejs (permanent exhibition

Unknown artist: Port of Riga. Second half of the 17th century. At the time Riga was under the rule of the king of Sweden. Museum of the History of Riga and Navigation / Rīgas vēstures un kuģniecības muzejs. 

Museum of the History of Riga and Navigation / Rīgas vēstures un kuģniecības muzejs

Palasta iela 4 - Riga - Latvija

Visited on 13 July 2024

Based on a private collection by Nikolaus von Himsel and launched in 1773, Museum of the History of Riga and Navigation is one of the oldest museums in Europe. What is now called Riga has been an important hub for millennia, thanks to the sheltered harbour by the river Daugava which during the Viking era was instrumental in the trade with the Byzantium, via the Dvina-Dnieper route.

The artefacts date back to around 9000 BC, the end of the last glacial period. There are tools from the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages. We witness the times of the resistance to Christianisation, the Livonian Crusade, the founding of Riga in 1201, and the reign of the Hanseatic League. Because of its strategic location, Riga was a focus of combats between the Teutonic Order and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In the Great Northern War, the Swedish Empire crumbled and the Russian Empire was born under Peter the Great. In 1710 Riga became a Russian city. The first independence started in 1918 after the Russian Revolution and the First World War, until 1940. This ends the period covered by the fascinating and beautiful displays of the Riga history museum.

Scale model of a frigate. Museum of the History of Riga and Navigation / Rīgas vēstures un kuģniecības muzejs.

Among the special exhibitions there is a fabulous Silver Cabinet and an impressive Navigation Exhibition - including beautifully crafted scale models from Viking ships till modern vessels. There are some 400 exhibits on display. Also the development of the Latvian ports of Riga, Ventspils and Liepaja is documented. This section is a joy to behold for admirers of arts and crafts.

The Kumu Art Museum in Tallinn: permanent and topical exhibitions

    Friedrich Hartmann Barisien, Christian Gottlieb Welté: Põltsamaa lossi talvine vaade / Põltsamaa Palace at Winter (1783). Oil on canvas. 210,5 x 160. Eesti Kunstimuuseum EKM j 9257 M 3700.

Eesti Kunstimuuseum Kumu. The Kumu Art Museum is situated on the limestone cliff between Kadriorg Park and the Lasnamäe district. Weizenbergi 34 / Valge 1, 10127 Tallinn. The building opened its doors to the public on 18 February 2006. Architect: Pekka Vapaavuori.

Eesti Kunstimuuseum Kumu. The Kumu Art Museum 

Weizenbergi 34 / Valge 1, 10127 Tallinn

Visited on 12 July 2024

I have visited Kumu before and admired it as a building of inspiration, a space for rich associations with plenty of room to breathe. Today I visited the permanent exhibitions of the Art Museum of Estonia for the first time. They are on display on the third and the fourth floors. It was a fabulous day.

The Third Floor houses "Landscapes of Identity: Estonian Art 1700-1945". We are welcomed by distinguished busts of Estonian cultural figures such as Lydia Koidula sculpted by August Weizenberg. Over the centuries, Estonian visual arts reflect the general outlines of continental trends, but peculiar landscapes, seascapes, faces, costumes, buildings, climates, seasons and qualities of light and air give it all an original distinction. From the Great Northern War to the end of the Second World War we experience the persistence of the Estonian spirit against the Swedish Empire of King Charles XII, the rise of Russia since Peter the Great, the German landlords, the Nazi Occupation and the Soviet Occupation. There is much to discover. Innovative solutions of hanging break the routine. There is an excursion in the depiction of sex work. There is a portrait room where the quantity of the portraits transforms into quality - and into an act of installation art / conceptual art. Similarly, and even more so, in a bust room developed by Villu Jaanisoo around Tamara Ditman's bust The Seagull, with dozens of important figures ranging from Peter the Great to V. I. Lenin. I am also impressed by the Black Room where selected paintings glow with rare illumination - paintings such as Ernst Hermann Schlihting's Toolse varemed / Toolse Castle Ruins (n.d.). 

Aili Vint: Mees merd kuulamas / Man Listening to the Sea (1972). Oil on canvas. 160 x 98 cm. Eesti Kunstimuuseum EKM j 15105 M 4599.

The Fourth Floor exhibition is called "Conflicts and Adaptations: Estonian Art of the Soviet Era (1940-1991)". The curator is Anu Allas working with an inspired team, and they have also written an excellent guidebook, which is a true keepsake. Estonian art reflected the same periods as Soviet art in general: Stalin - Thaw - Stagnation - and Glasnost. But because Estonia was the most Western outpost of the USSR, liberty was reflected more openly. I learn about the image of power and the power of the image. I learn about inner exile. I learn about trauma in secret art such as Olga Terri's Prisoner (1949) and Fear (1952). I learn about Stalinist Impressionism - a paradox, because Stalinist art was tendency art, and impressionism, whose 150th anniversary we celebrate this year, was against tendency and even against big subjects in general, art for art's sake. After 1956, modernism was tolerated within limits, and even abstraction, when it was understood in a context of architecture and design. Surrealism, whose centenary we celebrate this year, flourished in the underground circle of Ulo Sooster in Tartu. A work like Ilmar Malin's Fading Sun (1968) was possible to register as surrealist art, abstract art, figurative art or symbolic art. It is striking to notice how the international trends of 1960s modern art found expressions in Estonia. Pop Art was an ambiguous reaction to consumer society - a phenomenont absent from Estonia. But here we have Estonian Pop Art - an original and different reflection. We have also psychedelia, collages, assemblages, records of performances, media art, happenings, self-referential art, found photographs and environment art. The individual spirit was highlighted against the collectivist agenda. Socialist realism was never abandoned, but artists transcended it via hyperrealism.

Jevgeni Zolotko: an installation of gravestones with names erased in the exhibition The Secret of Adam (2024).

The Fifth Floor is dedicated to a monograph exhibition of Jevgeni Zolotko (born 1983) called The Secret of Adam.

Kumu: "Jevgeni Zolotko’s large solo exhibition in the Kumu Art Museum displays some of the earlier chapters of his creative legacy and creates new ones. The Secret of Adam is an exhibition that consists of various works, and constitutes his most massive work thus far, synthesising recurrent subjects and images in his oeuvre. Zolotko, who entered the art scene in the late 2000s, is one of the most idiosyncratic contemporary artists in Estonia. Instead of dealing with the topical and political, the context of his art is Western cultural history in the broadest sense, embracing antiquity, the Bible, belles-lettres, philosophy and folklore. His works deal with human existence: life, death, loneliness, silence and decay, as well as hope."

Curator Triin Tulgiste-Toss (1987–2024) about the exhibition: 

"While it is often possible to point out shifts in artists’ choices of subject matter or emphasis over time, Zolotko’s art can be compared to a tower: every new work of art grows out of the previous one, specifying and elaborating on what has been said. The Secret of Adam combines previously used elements and those that have been developed further with completely new ones, returning to the central issue in Zolotko’s art: the question of the relationship between things and language."

"It seems like the artist is finally providing us with a clear answer. Words are as old as the first human being and inseparable from his nature, serving in addition to the physical body as a way of communicating with the world and understanding it. The realisation that we need both the physical and language to cope in society becomes evident."

"According to Zolotko, his works are not autobiographical, and his main interest in art is to deal with universal topics. Considering the emotional effects of his works and their perceptiveness, one gets the sense, however, that only a person whose works emanate from personal experience and acknowledgement, not theoretical ideas, can say something like that."

"The purpose of Zolotko’s works has never been to generate intellectual reflection but to induce recognition. You may approach them like a detective trying to find the clues hidden in the installations, but by doing so you will miss something intrinsic. Zolotko’s works are meant to be inside of, like being in nature, and it seems that the sole purpose of the artist is to make sure that the viewer does not feel alone during these moments." (Kumu)

This exhibition is not only monumental but possesses true magnificence and gravity. I am thinking about Anselm Kiefer, now topical also because of Wim Wenders's remarkable movie. The Jevgeni Zolotko exhibition consists of sculptures, images, photographs, paintings, assemblages, objects and videos. It is a one-man adventure in the multitude of contemporary art. The most impressive entry for me is a vast room full of gravestones with names erased. An original and haunting image about the evanescence of memory.

Elisàr von Kupffer (1872-1942): Uus liit / The New Covenant (1916). The central figure is an auto-portrait of the artist himself. Elisarioni keskus, Minusio omavalitsus.

In the nooks and crannies of the Third Floor we can discover a very special exhibition: “Elisarion. Elisàr von Kupffer and Jaanus Samma”. "Come if you dare", we would have said in the 1980s about these flamboyant displays of queer pride created a hundred years ago. They are also idyllic celebrations of gay happiness. Irresistible.

Kumu: "This exhibition brings together the works of the Baltic-German artist Elisàr von Kupffer (1872–1942) and the Estonian artist Jaanus Samma (b. 1982). Elisàr von Kupffer, also known as Elisarion, was a colourful personality, versatile creator and something of a visionary. He was passionate about painting, literature, art history and philosophy. He was also one of the founders of the neo-religious movement Clarism (German klar “clear”).Today, Kupffer is recognised as a pioneer who promoted tolerance for people of different sexual orientations."

"In the exhibition, Elisàr von Kupffer’s homoerotic paintings, influenced by ancient and Renaissance art, are in dialogue with contemporary works by Jaanus Samma, who explores the sexuality of Estonian peasants and queer folk art. His works highlight the relationship between Estonian peasants and the German-speaking elite: a fusion of fear, hostility and desire, and a juxtaposition of the high and the low."

"Jaanus Samma has created a new video work for the exhibition, The Clear World of the Blissful. Also on display is Karl Joonas Alamaa’s installation Limited Fun."

Richard Wagner: Lohengrin (2024 Savonlinna Opera Festival)

Richard Wagner: Lohengrin, Savonlinna Opera Festival, 3 July 2024. Photo: Jussi Silvennoinen.

Richard Wagner: Lohengrin, Savonlinna Opera Festival, 3 July 2024. Sinéad Campbell Wallace, Karita Mattila, Timo Riihonen, Lucio Gallo & Choir. Photo: Jussi Silvennoinen.

Olavinlinna, 2 October 2023. Photo: Savonlinna Opera Festival.

THE OPERA

    Lohengrin : Romantische Oper in drei Aufzügen

    DE 1850 [Weimar, Thüringen, Königreich Preussen]. Musik und Libretto: Richard Wagner. Durchkomponiert. Originalsprache: Deutsch. Literarische Vorlage: Wolfram von Eschenbach: Parzival (1200-1210). Uraufführung: 28 August 1850 - Grossherzogliches Hoftheater - in Weimar - unter der Leitung von Franz Liszt.

    Figuren: Heinrich der Vogler, deutscher König - Lohengrin - Elsa von Brabant - Friedrich von Telramund, brabantischer Graf - Ortrud, seine Gemäldin - Der Heerrufer des Königs - Vier brabantische Edle - Vier Edelknaben - Vier Kammerfrauen - Sächsische und thüringische Grafen und Edle, brabantische Grafen und Edle, Edelfrauen, Edelknaben, Mannen, Frauen, Knechte.

    Die Handlung spielt in Antwerpen in der 1. Hälfte des 10. Jahrhunderts

SAVONLINNA OPERA FESTIVAL TEAM

Conductor / Stephan Zilias

Director / Roman Hovenbitzer

Set designer / Hermann Feuchter

Costume designer / Hank Irwin Kittel

Lighting designer / Wolfgang Göbbel 

Video designer / Andreas J. Etter 

Choreographer / Janne Geest

Chorus master / Jan Schweiger

Savonlinna Opera Festival Choir

Savonlinna Opera Festival Orchestra

Language / German

Surtitles / Finnish and English

Duration : approx. 4 hrs 30 min, 2 intervals

CAST

TUOMAS KATAJALA / LOHENGRIN

KARITA MATTILA / ORTRUD

SINÉAD CAMPBELL WALLACE / ELSA

LUCIO GALLO / FRIEDRICH VON TELRAMUND

TIMO RIIHONEN / HEINRICH DER VOGLER

KRISTIAN LINDROOS / THE KING’S HERALD

PERFORMANCES AT OLAVINLINNA CASTLE

Olavinkatu 27 ; 57130 Savonlinna ; Finland

Capacity: 2.264 seats

5.7.2024 - 9.7.2024 - 12.7.2024 - 15.7.2024 - 18.7.2024

Visited on Friday, 5 July 2024

Savonlinna Opera Festival introduction: " Finally – here is Karita Mattila’s debut at the Savonlinna Opera Festival. She is a cunning sorceress and deep-voiced plotter in Wagner’s opulent Lohengrin. And what a Finnish celebration the evening will be, with Tuomas Katajala, the most internationally successful Finnish tenor of today, singing the title role. "

‘ Only one Finnish star can fill Olavinlinna alone. ’

Helsingin Sanomat about Karita Mattila’s concert, 15 July 2012 

" Wagner’s mythical work of art is a fairy tale about the relationship between utopia and reality. ‘It is a child’s dream of an intact, reconciled world. The world has dreamed of this hundreds of times and keeps dreaming of it again and again. The work is about this human longing – and the painful realization that it can never come true’, says director Roman Hovenbitzer. "

" Right from the intense prelude, Lohengrin grips the listener. There’s a rumble of thunder in the castle walls. The music is highly charged, even hypnotic. With Wagner, time loses its meaning. When the secrets are revealed and the performance ends, you walk out of Olavinlinna into the summer night and ask yourself what really happened. "

‘ There is an empire on the verge of collapse, a people waiting for its saviour, and Lohengrin, the saviour. There is love, loyalty and Wagner’s medieval world of myths. ’ – Director Roman Hovenbitzer 

AA: The setting, Olavinlinna castle, provides a magnificent context. The building was launched around 1475 by the Kalmar Union (1397-1523), in what proved to be the last stage of this union of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, with Copenhagen as its de facto capital. The monarch then was the Danish King Christian I, followed by his son Hans. The construction was launched by Erik Axelsson Tott, the regent of Sweden.

The Kalmar Union had been established as a counterforce to the Hanseatic League, but by now new powers were gaining prominence. Lithuania had grown into the greatest state of Europe. Ivan III, Grand Prince of Moscow, pushed Lithuania back from the East. The Byzantine Empire (330-1453) ended in the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire. Ivan III wed Sophia Palaiologina, niece of the last Byzantine emperor. Moscow finally liberated itself from the Mongol / Turkish rule of the Golden Horde (1242-1502). It also annexed the mighty Novgorod Republic (1136-1478).

Against this new formidable power of Ivan III the Kalmar Union fortified itself by strengthening the Castle of Vyborg (est. 1293) and building Olavinlinna.

Visiting Savonlinna Opera Festival today we cannot help meditating the power of history and the history of power. The troubles of history and the history of troubles. "The past is never dead. It's not even past" (William Faulkner: Requiem for a Nun).

Richard Wagner's Lohengrin is set in a precise moment of history 500 years before Olavinlinna, but it is not a historical play. It is a dream play, a fairy-tale and a mythological quest inspired by Arthurian legends. The formidable walls of the real castle provide a rock solid sounding board to the ethereal fabula.

As a music lover I am an amateur and armchair listener who hardly ever ventures to a live event. Knowing Lohengrin as a radio listener only I am moved and stunned by the subtle power and refined perfection of detail in a first class live performance. Live music is a superior physical experience, shared by a spellbound audience in a castle with a capacity of over 2000.

I realize that Richard Wagner started to discuss "unendliche Melodie" ("endless melody") only ten years after the premiere of Lohengrin and that this work is the last which he called an opera, meaning that it still obeys the conventions of arias and choruses. Yet already here I am most moved by the unity of the suspense that begins with the Vorspiel and holds until the tragic finale. 

Later Wagner works have been compared with the stream of consciousness and inner monologue, but already here it is the most compelling feature. "The poet's greatness is mostly to be measured by what he leaves unsaid, letting us breathe in silence to ourselves the thing unspeakable; the musician it is who brings this untold mystery to clarion tongue, and the impeccable form of his sounding silence is endless melody" (Wagner 1860).

The cast of characters are like sleepwalkers in a shared dream, which we are invited to join. The most striking feature of the music is its gentleness and tenderness. It is an experience of serenity, nobility and a presence of the sacred. The Arthurian element (Lohengrin, Graal) belongs to Christianity, but there is also a presence of the ancient Teutonic gods of Wotan and Freya invoked by the witch Ortrud, Lohengrin's formidable adversary.

The most famous feature of Wagner's music is das Leitmotiv, although Wagner was not the inventor of the method  nor did he use the word himself. He only spoke of motifs (Motive), but did not accept the standard discourse about his work. Wagner's emphasis was always on organic unity and the integration of elements, including motifs.

I stumbled upon a beautiful online lesson by Professor Laurence Dreyfus (Faculty of Music, University of Oxford, 7 Nov 2019) in a "Lohengrin TimeMachine app". He discovers 14 motifs in Lohengrin and selects one of them for close study, das Frageverbot ("don't ask"), which appears 18 times in the opera. Dreyfus really opens Wagner's way of composition in a fascinating way.

After the Olavinlinna performance I have been listening to the opera on cd, and for the first time registered something that aficionados must have always recognized: the affinity of the Frageverbot motif with the "Flight of the Swans Theme" (the key theme first introduced in Act I:9: Finale andante and Act I:10: Scène moderato) in Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake (comp. 1875, perf. 1877). A profound and meaningful homage by the Russian master to the creator of the Swan Knight.

The prohibition to ask the question is at the core. Elsa is the suspect of the murder of her brother, but comes a knight in shining armour drawn by a swan to save her. He also proposes to her, with one condition:

Nie sollst du mich befragen,

noch Wissens Sorge tragen,

woher ich kam der Fahrt,

noch wie mein Nam' und Art!

(Never shall you ask me / nor trouble yourself to know / whence I came / my name nor my kind!)

The most famous passage of the opera is the Brautlied / Bridal Chorus in the first scene of act three ("Treulich geführt" / "Here comes the bride"), probably the most popular and joyous of all Wagner melodies. Again, I am impressed by the sober and gentle interpretation. Less is more. The restraint and the solemnity make it feel special.

But: in the context of the opera it is a tragic song, because Elsa breaks her vow never to ask the question. The mysterious stranger is compelled to reveal that he is Lohengrin, the son of Parsifal the Grail King, a guardian of divine power, which he loses if he reveals who he is.

Lohengrin gets ready to go and leaves his horn, sword and ring for Elsa's brother. The swan sinks, and Lohengrin lifts Gottfried from the water. Gottfried will be the new ruler of Brabant, Lohengrin vanishes in his boat now drawn by a dove. Ortrud collapses. Elsa embraces Gottfried and sinks lifeless to the ground.

For the first time in my life I see Karita Mattila in a live performance. It is also her first visit to the Savonlinna Opera Festival. I am a long term Karita Mattila admirer. The title of her biography is characteristically Korkealta ja kovaa ([High and Loud], 2019). Her star quality is ideal for the biggest arenas, and only they are big enough for her. As a radio listener I have never felt that I have really known her.

Now I do. All singers are great, but I focus on Karita Mattila because this performance revealed a new aspect that I did not know before. She is the villain and the monster, and she commands the stage effortlessly with her mere presence. It is an understated performance with psychological nuance. There is bitterness, and a barely hidden sense of condescension and superiority. And a pathos of evil. The monster is finally a victim of herself.

This is a new Karita Mattila. Even her voice has changed. The soprano is a mezzo-soprano for a change.

Lohengrin is a mystery play, but it is never confused or insecure. It is always compelling, often in a quietly self-assured manner. It is based on myths, but there is nothing decorative in Wagner's approach. Claude Lévi-Strauss admired Wagner's audacious way of grasping complex associations from various myths and his ability of conveying a profound and genuine emotional impact via them. Lévi-Strauss even called him the "father of the structural analysis of myth".

Otto Rank put Richard Wagner on the couch, paying attention to the hero's arrival on "the billows' azure mirror", the forbidden question and the white swan pulling a newcomer out of the water, and the even more devastating implications of the unknown identity and the anxiety with triangle situations.

Otto Rank's suggestions may seem preposterous, unless we pay attention to Wagner's recurrent obsessions both in his work and his life: Already in his first opera, Die Feen (comp. 1833, unproduced until prem. 1888) includes themes of the forbidden question, search for father, conflict between worldly and otherworldly love, compassion for an animal and a key musical motif expressing aspiration towards transcendence. Wagner never found certitude about the identity of his father. He hardly knew how to live except in a triangle situation, usually with a married woman. But this private trouble he sublimated into works of universal grandeur.

The Wagnerian swan image in Lohengrin and Parsifal stems from the Knights of the Holy Grail for whom the swan was a sacred creature. Universally swans are also a symbol of everlasting love. Universally and since ancient times birds in general are sexual symbols. But often birds also appear as images related to death: harbingers from beyond, images of souls flying to heaven. I also think about The Swan of Tuonela by Sibelius based on Kalevala mythology but also "Sparven om julmorgonen" ("Sparrow on Christmas Morning") written by Zachris Topelius in memory of his little son, in the superior Finnish translation "en mä ole, lapseni, lintu tästä maasta ; olen pieni veljesi, tulin taivahasta" ["My child, I am not a bird from this earth, I am your little brother coming from heaven"].

Because this is the first production of Lohengrin that I have seen I cannot compare it, except perhaps with Lohengrin scenes in Luchino Visconti's Ludwig. I was impressed with the musical achievement, the performances and the Olavinlinna Castle. I was puzzled by the production and costume design. They look impressive in photographs, but in the real experience I felt like following a children's room performance. I was asking: are we still too close to Hitler that we must deconstruct Wagner glory to the max? Are we living in an écolo period of opera design that the approach must be ars povera, recycling. (I don't mean that this is the third revival of this production in Savonlinna, seen before in 2011 and 2013). Video: whenever there is video in a stage performance or art exhibition I look the other way or close my eyes.

I guess that the director Roman Hovenbitzer does not believe in transcendence. The sacred dimension may not be mean much to him. From the first notes to the last, Wagner's opera is an exalted piece of spiritual poetry, but Hovenbitzer's stage interpretation remains in the world of prose. Entzauberung instead of Zauberfeuer.

But the musical performance is triumphant.

...

Wagner and the cinema? "The Wedding March" from Lohengrin has been one of the most popular themes in film music since the early days. For some reason I'm thinking about the double wedding of Dorothy and Lorelei in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: "Remember, honey, on your wedding day, it's alright to say yes." Today the wedding ceremony might be between Dorothy and Lorelei.

Les Timidités de Rigadin (FR 1910) is an early comedy with Rigadin (Charles Prince) as Lohengrin, the knight in shining armour. Luchino Visconti's Ludwig (IT/FR/DE 1973) is a key film about Wagner's faithful patron of arts, with a lavish scene about staging Lohengrin at Schloss Neuschwanstein. Lohengrin was for Ludwig a point of complete identification.

In a class of his own is Hans Jürgen Syberberg, especially in Parsifal. His Ludwig, Requiem für einen jungfräulichen König (DE 1972) is naturally deeply Wagner relevant, including Lohengrin passages.

Not Wagnerian but Arthurian: two unique films untypical for them by Frenchmen: Lancelot du Lac by Robert Bresson and Perceval le Gallois by Éric Rohmer. Walt Disney's The Sword in the Stone (1963) and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975).

A book could be written on Wagner and the cinema, and probably has. Suffice it to mention the controversial side: "The Ride of the Valkyries" in The Birth of a Nation and Apocalypse Now. Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg inevitably in Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph des Willens (shot on location in Nuremberg). In Brute Force, a prisoner is sadistically beaten to the accompaniment of the Tannhäuser overture of Richard Wagner.

À propos: Daniel Barenboim in dialogue with Edward Said on Wagner and Ideology: " A lady who came to see me in Tel Aviv when the whole Wagner debate was taking place said, “How can you want to play that? I saw my family taken to the gas chambers to the sound of the Meistersinger overture. Why should I listen to that? ” (Daniel Barenboim.com, 1998)

One film is genuinely Wagnerian. Vertigo.

BEYOND THE JUMP BREAK: MORE DATA FROM THE SAVONLINNA OPERA FESTIVAL WEBSITE: