Dark arts of Hans Holbein
QUESTION I read that portrait painters no longer have the ability to paint with the same level of expertise as Hans Holbein. Why is this?
There are several reasons why the work of modern portrait painters could never be confused with holbein or any other classic painter, even by people who know very little about painting.
The tonal range — the variation between the lightest and darkest part of the portrait — is much narrower. In classic paintings, what looks like a white ruff, for example, is usually a shade of medium grey, sometimes quite dark. Modern painters often use very high lights.
Similarly, the colour or chromatic range of classic paintings is much narrower. Before the days of colour in tubes, painters often had to grind and mix colours themselves. Colour from tubes is much more intense, and the range of colours available far greater, so it becomes more difficult to establish a colour harmony.
Modern painters make a painting colourful by using lots of contrasted colours. Degas said that ‘to make a colourful painting, you only need one colour’.
Looking at a picture with an overextended tonal and colour range is rather like listening to an orchestra when the piccolo and bass drum are in constant use and all the instruments are slightly out of tune. A layman might not be able to put their finger on the problem, but they sense something is wrong.
The other main reason for the decline of portrait painting is the neglect of depictive drawing skills, that is to say drawing as a way of examining and recording the visual world. Very few students now leave college with any conventional drawing skills at all.
In the absence of depictive drawing skills, modern portrait painters often resort to colour photographs, so their work looks like copies of photographs rather than paintings of people.
Dr Clive Ashwin, Aylsham, Norfolk.
QUESTION Does bulgur wheat come from Bulgaria?
BuLgur wheat has a long history in the Middle east. It originated in ancient Assyria, an empire that once encompassed modern northern Iraq, north eastern Syria, south-eastern Turkey and the north-western fringes of Iran.
Bulgur wheat is traditionally made by parboiling wheat until it swells, then drying it in the sun. The outer covering of the kernel is removed by pounding in a mortar called a khasholta. using a simple milling instrument called a jarusta, the wheat is ground.
Bulgur wheat is most commonly found in tabbouleh salad, a side dish of bulgur, tomatoes, parsley, mint and onion.
The word bulgur, introduced to the west in the Thirties, is derived from a Turkish word meaning ‘bruised grain’.
It has a different origin from the word Bulgar, the Turkic semi-nomadic warrior tribe who flourished in the ukrainian steppe and the Volga region during the 7th century and migrated along the shores of the Black Sea, settling in the area between the Danube and the Balkans.
Lilly Cora, Birmingham.
QUESTION What is the origin of the word troika and why does it have political overtones?
A TroIkA, a type of sled pulled by three horses, originates in russia, and translates from russian as ‘triplet’ or ‘trio’.
The troika used by the wealthy, was fast and could cross snow at up to 30 mph. Troikas date to the 17th century. Another form of troika is a russian folk dance in which a man dances with two women.
In political terms, the word troika dates back as far as 1918 and means a group of three administrators. The first troika was Felix Dzerzhinsky, Yakov Peters and V. Aleksandrovich.
They were empowered to pass down sentences against people charged with counter-revolutionary offences against the newly founded Soviet union. Later, it came to denote groups of three NkVD officers who served a similar purpose during Stalin’s purges.
Felix Dzerzhinsky, nicknamed Iron Felix, was a Polish- born Soviet revolutionary, remembered mainly for establishing russia’s post-revolutionary secret police, the Cheka.
The square in Moscow where the secret police services had their headquarters was named Dzerzhinsky Square between 1926 and 1990 and is now Lubyanka Square. This square is home to the FSB, the present- day russian intelligence service.
Yakov Peters was Latvian-born and played a less well-known part in the establishment of the Cheka. Aleksandrovich seems to have faded from history, possibly an early victim of the Cheka.
From those origins the term has now come to mean any alliance or grouping of three politicians or political groups. Because of its earlier origins, the use of the word troika to describe these alliances is not a compliment.
A current Troika that is talked about a lot in countries such as greece, Cyprus, Ireland, Portugal and Spain is that of the european Commission, The european Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
This troika is heavily involved in the decision-making around the financial bailouts of these and other eC member states.