Trebic UNESCO World Heritage Sites

Trebic, a Czech town about an hour's drive from Brno, remarkably has two quite different UNESCO World Heritage Sites: St. Procopius Basilica and the Jewish Quarter.

St. Procopius Basilica is a Romanesque-Gothic Christian church built in 1240-1280.

Perhaps the most striking of the buildings in the Jewish Quarter per se is the synagogue, no longer used (there are no longer any Jews living in Trebic), but notable for the unique combination of words and images painted on its walls.

The large and attractive Jewish Cemetery - undamaged by vandalism unlike virtually all other such cemeteries in central and eastern Europe - is also part of the UNESCO site, although it lies outside the boundaries of the Jewish Quarter proper.

Brno Scenes

A pleasant day touring Brno, the principal city of the Moravian (eastern) part of the Czech Republic.

We spent the late morning with a guide exploring the medieval center of the city near our hotel, though this photo, taken from the upper floor of a building, shows a relatively modern street with two of the many streetcars that serve the city. (The first ten cars put into service by Portland Streetcar were built in the Czech Republic, and all since are of the same design.)

In the afternoon we took a cab to the Villa Tugendhat, a pioneering example and masterpiece of modern architecture, designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe for a Jewish family, in a wealthy suburban neighborhood. It is virtually impossible to get tickets to tour the interior of the house unless you plan many months in advance, but we learned that access to the garden is readily available for a very modest price. The garden is large and lovely, and affords views of several rooms of the interior. This photo shows an interior view overlaid with reflections of the exterior in the large glass windows.

From Vienna to Brno

We left Vienna and took the bus  to Brno in the Czech Republic. There was not much opportunity for photography, but I like the pictures I got of the silvery surfaces in and around the Erdberg bus terminal in Vienna, and of the smiling woman in the donut bakery in Brno. (The flying donuts brought to mind the good donut shops in Portland.)

Belvedere Sculptures

The Belvedere is a historic building complex in Vienna, Austria, consisting of two Baroque palaces (the Upper and Lower Belvedere) and other smaller buildings, set in a Baroque park landscape. The complex was built as a summer residence for Prince Eugene of Savoy, but the palaces have served in one way or another as museums for much of the time since the late 18th century.

The grounds have many attractive sculptures, including a set of remarkably beautiful sphinxes.

In contrast, the Upper Belvedere holds a collection of "character heads" by Franz Xaver Messerschmidt, including "The Simpleton", done about 1770.

Pieter Bruegel Exhibit in Vienna

Pieter Bruegel the Elder painted some of the best-known pictures in the world, so his comprehensive exhibition at the Kunst Historisches Museum Wien (Art History Museum of Vienna) has been massively attended. In fact, massively over-attended, so that it was very hard to see the art.

I took this picture to try to convey the overcrowding that made looking at the art very difficult. It was hard to get closer to the paintings than this.

Outside, after we left the exhibit - which was interesting and exhilarating despite the crowds - we found this duo making loud, cheerful music. Somehow it seemed to fit with the intensity of the exhibit and the frequent fantasy in Bruegel's painting. 

Two More Vienna Composers

No city honors its cultural icons, especially composers, more than Vienna. Here are two more sculptural portraits in the Stadtpark.

Franz Lehar

Anton Bruckner

Vienna Composers in the Park

Walking through the lovely Stadtpark in the center of Vienna, I came upon statues commemorating (in very different ways) two of the great composers who lived and worked in this city.

Johann Strauss II, who was not only "The Waltz King" but also, apparently, a violinist.

Beethoven - not the standard heroic statue that you'll find on Google and TripAdvisor, but a modern version, near what I think is an academic building, that seems to speak to his torment.