WI-FI WAYS TO ENSURE YOUTH’S INFORMATION PARTICIPATION IN ENSURING COMMUNITY “MORALS” OR PEACE

SHARIPOV DILSHOD BAKSHILLOEVICH –

Bukhara State Pedagogical Institute

Senior teacher of the “Social Sciences” department,

Republic of Uzbekistan

e-mail: dilshodsharipov70007@gmail.com

Аннотация: В данной статье автор определяет «общество wi-fi», влияющие факторы на него, информационное участие в обществах запада и востока и влияние информации на слои общества, принесены некоторые социологические и дидактические мысли и анализы по получению информации и в целом информационное участие молодёжи в обеспечение мира в обществе.

Ключевые слова: молодежь, родитель, учитель, общество, информация, медиапродукт, медиаобразование, интернет, «общество wi-fi», глобализация, мир, мирное сознание.

Abstract: In this article, the author describes the “wi-fi society”, the factors affecting it, information participation in western and eastern societies and the impact of information on the layers of society, some sociological and didactic thoughts and analyzes on obtaining information and informational participation of young people in ensuring peace in society.

Keywords: youth, parent, teacher, society, information, media product, media education, internet, “wi-fi society”, globalization, peace, peace consciousness.

It is known that in the current globalization conditions, the formation of peace consciousness among people, communities, nations and societies, states and regions and ensuring peace is the most important issue. Ensuring sustainable peace and development is becoming more important than ever.

In the era of the development of the media, especially in the era of the development of internet-journalism, the selection of any information, the evaluation of the emotions and worldviews that come or are conveyed through the process of globalization, certainly creates the need to form an information culture in every person, first of all, in our youth.

What is information? What is information participation? Young people, in general, what is the information culture of all Internet users, is there a measure or scale of this issue? What is the state of spirituality or culture on the Internet? What are moral factors and their role in using the Internet? Isn’t the concept of morality falling behind the “domestic desires” of society members? What common and simple “immune systems” exist against the manipulation carried out by the mass media and media products?

In the era of the development of Internet and Telegram channels, most social groups, teams in workplaces, any person who is active in higher educational institutions and professions, and in general social relations, communicate through telephone, Internet/telegram communication. Each of us is an information consumer. It has been a long time since information has become a media product.

Various markets, people’s occupations, including household affairs, official channels are becoming a daily source of information. Different social strata of the people look for the information they like, everyone looks for the information that is of interest to them. A researcher who wants to do scientific work will look for OAK sites, connect to official channels, like journals and networks with various scientific news and innovation. Housewives watch channels that cook all kinds of pastries. Parents watch the channel administrated by the headmaster of the school where their children are studying, and they see the site dinky.com. Masters see master sites. Auto repairer and drivers view social media/channels related to auto service.

There are almost no houses, streets, or workplaces without WI-FI – people can enjoy a concert program or a music video of their favorite singer when they are tired from work. Or people can order food from the comfort of their homes by phone or online. Thanks to WI-FI, the pace of life has changed and accelerated.

In today’s media world, you can order any product you want through a social network. These are also conveniences for the people, this is also a trend observed worldwide. Phone companies are engaging their customers with various internet packages through various promotions. But at the same time, the phone and the Internet have become a source of good and bad, goodness and evil. How can this be explained?

First, the internet has anything (information) you want and you can get as much information as you want. The Internet has become a total information space. As the media field and the mediasphere expands, it goes towards infinity.

Second, the Internet has no owner, but the entire population of the globe uses it. This is one of the biggest risks for all subjects who are internet users. Because in society, the thing that is owned does not exist, and the thing that is not owned is dangerous.

Thirdly, the Internet can be used by all the peoples of the earth, which differ in their culture and lifestyle, mentality and moral dimensions or criteria, political systems and systems, political and religious views, social and national issues. In the age of the global information society, something that is a common and everyday thing in European and “western civilization” societies in general may not be accepted in Islamic and Eastern countries. However, in the Eastern world, there are religions such as Islam, Buddhism, Shintoism, Hinduism, and Christianity/Orthodox. This “no-acceptance list” includes marriage (is it necessary/absent), family building (attitudes), independent opinion of young people (is it possible/not to marry independently), the head of government (or the leader of this or that political force) in parliamentary debates , of course, whether it is possible to make a well-founded criticism) etc. can be included. Islam is absolutely against national discrimination, religious and racial discrimination. At the same time, this difference is clearly visible in issues such as tolerance, tolerance and the right to freedom of belief.

There are also some differences in continuing education and teaching technology. For example, no eastern nation burns the holy book of another nation in front of the public, under the permission and protection of the special police (it was observed several times in Swedish society), or caricature the holy person of another nation or entire nations and bring it to a history lesson. vices do not exist. It is inexcusable that such senseless and unspiritual actions were supported by the official politicians and leaders of those societies. Don’t you think that these societies are recognized as examples of democracy and political culture?!

An independent position or an independent worldview is a cultural expression of freedom, or it should be that it should not be at the cost of restricting someone’s rights, but should be related to the integrity (inseparability) of each person (in this society, in life) and the indivisibility and limitation of the integral rights. No Muslim person will caricature Jesus – because in Islam, a Muslim does not insult the name of a Muslim, he respects the prophet – this is a condition of faith. Or, no Muslim will desecrate and burn the Bible in front of the public, or under cover of it, etc. All this is what Oswald Spengler once wrote about “the fading of Europe (the sun)”, which means that the values ​​that have been formed and preserved for centuries are being eroded from the roots in some societies. The historical fact is that the European continent is the starting point of both world wars. It is also true that the “European concert” (G. Kissenger’s expression) played the whole globe to its “song”. However, as a center of modern civilization, many learners, job seekers, and peace and political asylum seekers from all over the world are looking for Europe. So, development has always attracted others to itself, occupied the center of human interests… Or family education work, the relationship in building a family is also different. Because ideas, values, ideals and cultures are different. Differences are also visible in the differentiation of information. Today’s society is governed by information. For this reason, media culture and information participation are gaining importance in the information society.

Fourthly, there are all the shows on the internet that have the evils of cruelty, terror and obscenity with scenes of oppression, blood and the like. This leaves aside all the positive aspects of the internet and shows the negative ideological-ideological aspects of the internet.

Some media products can serve to depersonalize and de-ideologize society – nothing happens as it is; nothing happens by itself; and nothing exists by itself; and worst of all – nothing can replace the personal depreciation and so on. Every move can be a product of “big game”, various political “settings”, or really some societies are really becoming demoralized – and it is impossible to determine this – this is the Internet – this ocean, it is impossible to look for something special. .

The internet has no morals. Behavior is in the individual. But both of them can be used for the peace of society, prosperity of nations and human happiness.

Fifth, in societies where bread and education and human survival are still a problem, the penetration of the Internet and communication into the society or the way of life of the society may be far away.

In today’s increasingly complex and tumultuous world politics, this issue is evident in some societies that are in turmoil, or in societies that have not developed programs to get out of poverty.

At the moment, peace on earth, being the greatest blessing, is falling to the level of the most despised value – this is being watched not only by the mass media, but also by social networks.

Sixth, at the same time, the Internet has become a sign of progress and development, a factor of integration of (some) society with the world community.

Nowadays, international communication of ordinary people, communities, social groups is increasing more than political structures. Because it is determined by many factors, such as work or finding a job, studying or getting an education, learning the secret of a profession or trade, interests or free time, and cooperation and solidarity in official organizations and communities. In today’s communication, e-mail and telegram channels are the main means of communication. Scientific circles, scientists, specialists can participate in online conferences, webinars or defense of scientific work, one or another course from their office or home; they can learn a language, take lessons, post video lessons. From the other side of the world, you can publish a scientific article in a famous magazine on the other side, or you can go to the website of the University of Chicago, any so-called “open” (i.e. free) library through your personal laptop and download this or that article, book, Oxford, Harvard and other universities. you can see free “open classes” on social networks on the Internet, in particular, on “Google”, “YouTube” (although these free classes on the networks serve as an advertisement for the higher education institution, but as a good ped-technology and methodical guide for the people of science on the way to learning) can serve) and so on.

Seventh, we should introduce “wi-fi hygiene” in the family and in educational organizations – this should be determined by a single date and announced as a day without internet, and everyone should follow it. Because we need to pay close attention to internet hygiene and internet ethics, which are the main rules of media education, and we should introduce our children to honest work, education, reading books, professions, and nature, without exposing them to phones and computers as a condition of the “technological age” from childhood. it is permissible for us to teach to love. We need to instill nursery care into the child’s mind from an early age. Honorable President Sh.M.Mirziyoev’s work “New Development Strategy of Uzbekistan” rightly emphasized one fact: “Because now our children are being “educated” not by parents, kindergartens, schools and institutes, but in most cases by the phone in their hands.” Unfortunately, this small phone is no longer a simple means of communication, it is often turning into a big weapon that promotes foreign ideology, a source that spreads the “virus” of violence and evil, we would be telling the truth” [Shavkat Mirziyoyev, 2022, p. 284]. In this statement, the phrase “the phone is “educating”” is in quotation marks and can be interpreted as “the phone is leading”, “seeing through the phone”, “connecting to the phone”. Because in some cases, by uploading the tasks to the phone, the parents give the child the right understanding and the right way about the upbringing, kindness, etiquette between adults and children, and the culture of behavior in society in general. We think that they are not paying attention.

Also, our children go through all kinds of manipulative mental processes such as igromania, cinemania, mobimania, sometimes if you see adults playing “games” on the phone or computer – you wonder what happened to people, why they are the greatest of blessings – time and health. We think that they should spend it in vain. Or, as a result of the advertisement of certain products, which is repeated over and over again on television, the whole nation puts only that product on their family and relatives’ events – “because it is advertised”, they say, “good things are advertised”. If we name them now, it will be an advertisement. In fact, it is called mind manipulation. Social consciousness does this in reflexive conditions, because social consciousness does not have a mind, a mental state of the world. The mind is in the person, the outlook is in the person, the behavior is in the person, and so on.

American sociologist Alvin Toffler in his work “Third Wave” made a prophetic conclusion regarding the concept of “wi-fi society” that we are emphasizing (considering the consequences of social development and technological changes) before the advent of the Internet age: “A new technosphere together with a new other-sphere (also) is taking shape, and it has (will) far-reaching complications that cover all areas of life, especially our consciousness (covers)” [Elvin Toffler 1999. p.276-277].

Know-how, innovation and any (technological) innovation is supported by any society aiming at proper, sustainable development. The idea of ​​sustainable development should also demonstrate the commitment of the international and global “wi-fi community” to the principles of peace. But any technological innovation should not lead away from a certain value system of the society, and ultimately should serve the well-being of the society and human happiness.

Eighth, media education penetrates into everyday life and explores the issues of our information security – because it is connected to the rights of the person, individual life, right to life, privacy. For example, on October 25, 2023, the demonstration of the “arm’s length stroller” of the “Junama” company was leaked to the social networks of our Republic – this is an innovation, a novelty, well, of course. When the marketer presented the “hand-end stroller”, she demonstrated that she could turn, follow, and “wheel” this household item without touching it with her index finger. But what is the purpose of creating a stroller – why does the buyer, the consumer buy it – to turn the baby in the fresh air, to help with child care – if the product is turned at the tip of the hand and controlled with finger gestures, the attention, education, care is not on the child inside the stroller, “foreigner” ”, “valuable”, “excellent” – the demonstration becomes more important – it is not important – what will happen to the child – will the young man not cripple his child in order to gain prestige in front of women and girls, the way to treat a person as a human being will fail, which will affect the rights of the child contrary to the inherent right of the child. It’s like putting a phone in a young child’s hand. However, the rays coming from the phone, constriction of the eye vessels, enlargement of the pupil, etc., have a negative effect on the child’s health. We believe that in this matter, the symptoms that lead to psychological stress should be researched separately, and special “smart commercials” should be developed and presented to the public on TV – this would also be a way to teach “wi-fi hygiene” and call for a healthy spiritual lifestyle.

The telephone and the Internet are a means of communication and communication, a source of information for young people and adults – this cannot be limited to anyone, of course. But the culture of using it should be explained by parents at home, and by teachers and coaches at educational centers. Unlimited opportunities and unlimited values ​​may hinder or develop the abilities of an individual, because some achieved result may create “sufficiency coefficient” and lead to static in the mental state of mind and mental development. And life is a lifelong dynamic event, consisting of change and development. In order to survive in it, it is necessary to rely on certain values. A person without value, society loses its way, suppresses the idea of ​​development from the social consciousness – even if it is developed, it remains undeveloped – a phenomenon of statics occurs under the imagination of dynamics. This also applies to the “wi-fi community”.

At the same time, young people, due to their youthful curiosity, may turn from the “information menu” in the media field into witnesses of social situations or relationships that are foreign to them, and become participants (such information) – this may have legal, political, and moral complications. Because young people are interested in expressing their opinion by seeing a situation in a certain network, reacting to it, putting a like or other emoticons – we, teachers, parents should show our young people the right way to do this. “Father of cybernetics” (founder) N. Wiener “information is a meaningful signal from the external world as a result of our adaptation to it and the process of adaptation of our emotions to it” [Yakupov P.V. 2016.s.261], does not describe it in vain. Feelings, like mind and consciousness, should be pure, but information and the world of information are not – there is no such thing as pure information or pure information space, or all information does not serve our Self.

So, how to form or implement the culture of information selection in the society?

For this, we believe that every parent and employer in the field of education and workplaces should be medically literate. For this reason, UNESCO describes media education as a lifelong discipline. The English scientist L. Masterman wrote that “Media education is a lifelong process” [Masterman, L. A. R. 42].

With the increase of information channels, the role of television or other types of mass media in people’s life is weakening, reading newspapers and magazines is decreasing in our society, such a culture is becoming a historical memory. True, our people have long watched TV programs, in particular, entertainment, various shows, watch movies, but at the same time, they always monitor various social networks through the phone (the Internet or “wi-fi”), their favorite they listen to music from their creators, watch clips, communicate with their friends or, let’s say, get the relevant information they need.

A “wi-fi society” is rapidly forming in our society. “Wi-Fi society” means the use of the Internet by almost all strata of a certain society, streets, families and houses, trade and service, household and general social life systems, education, profession, language, science, and information. we mean the lack of restrictions, the development of communication and communication tools, the development of internal and external intercultural cooperation, the socialization processes of young people, the development of household or home information participation, the rapid growth of household journalism, blogging and consumer culture. Even the streets and apartments where newspapers and magazines are not read or not entered have Wi-Fi, there are almost no areas and strata that are not reached by the Internet.

So, we understand that there are no areas of social life and people’s lifestyle that the Internet has not penetrated. In such a society, there is unlimited Internet in every household, and everyone – young and old – uses the Internet, in which the education of young people, checking the channels for receiving information, directing them to networks that are interesting and useful according to their educational direction and interests, and Internet hygiene, which we emphasize, “wi-fi Teaching hygiene is the responsibility of parents and adults. This is explained by the fact that people’s access to information through the Internet has greatly expanded in society, and it has penetrated not only young people, but all layers of society. It also shows that there is no center or specific program that monitors or evaluates all this, or researches or researches the criteria and laws of social thought and social consciousness, the consciousness of peace or the spirit of pacifism. However, it is becoming clear that there is a need for projects that are specifically developed and thought out in this matter, as well as spiritual, sociological, psychological and political research.

Books:

1. Shavkat Mirziyoyev. Development strategy of new Uzbekistan. – T.: “Uzbekistan”. 2022. 440 pages.

2. Alvin Toffler. THREE WOOL. Moscow. AST.1999.783 pages.

3. Yakupov P.V. Communication: opredelenie ponyatiya, vidy kommunikatsii i ee barery// Vestnik universiteta (MGU). Social structures, institutes and processes. – 2016. – S. 261-263.

4. Masterman, L. A Rationale for Media Education. In: Kubey, R. (Ed.) Media Literacy in the Information Age. – New Brunswick & London: Transaction Publishers. 1997.

Pillow feather hunts pillow feather

The bed still remembers the shapes of our bodies

Outside the window the air turns into graves for the missing pilots

I dream of fucking you as before as before your funeral

***

I want to be the rain that washes off your skin

I don’t want to be the tear that washes away your joy

The tree controls the leaves and the soil controls the dead

You control my heart and I have nothing left but my heart

My brother Brutus is shaven and white like ivory

I’m coming from to your house to save you from my brother

I’m not going to your house so I’ll save you from myself

I never had a brother in reality and I will never betray myself again

I’m walking down the street in the middle of the day and it’s dark all around

***

ring on my finger

centenary rings belonging to a tree

I freeze unable to say a word

my hope is my leaves

months of my existence pass in anticipation of the birds

but the birds scattered all over the world in search of a new home

only the little boy inside me is still hiding in the basement

of his parents’ house trying to escape from air bombs and missiles

***

birds drink the silence

of a broken sakura

branch like for the first time

***

eyelashes tied in knots

but the eyes still see how the oak says

goodbye to yellowing leaves

Unloved Woman 2

I was alone for years…

Like a tree

During the rain

So when I met this man

It was love at the first sight

I think

Talking hours on the phone

Talking hours over the dinner table

-U are only mine, he Whispers for years

– U belong to me, he repeat day after day

I didn’t react when he searched my bag, my phone, my Facebook account..

He told me to delete my social media accounts

He told me no need to go to work because he will take care of me

He told me, never go out alone…

I do not like!!

I did not react,

I did not go away

I did not talk to anyone

I keep my secrets deep inside

Without smile

Without tears

One night, they found me

In a fetal position

Covered with blood

He stabbed me with the kitchen knife….

After we had celebrated our 5th anniversary

The police described the whole scene

as a

Crime of passion

……….. 

Speak up!!!! 

Open the door and run!!!!

Do not be afraid!!! 

THE WIND THAT KILLS LOVE

The wind rises from distant lands,

carrying cold and fury.

It rushes through valleys, crashes against cliffs,

sweeps across fields where young trees struggle to find their footing.

The weaker ones bend, some break, some are uprooted entirely.

Love is like that tree.

If its soil is not firm, if it is not nurtured with care,

warmed by tenderness, strengthened by trust,

the first storm can shatter it.

People have forgotten that love must be tended.

They have forgotten that a tear can be water,

that a word can be light, that a touch can be shelter.

The winds are growing stronger.

The world is cracking under their force.

Love vanishes in the grip of fear,

in the silence of cold stares, in the emptiness of unspoken thoughts.

And yet, all it takes is a hand to steady the young tree until its roots grow deep.

It is not too late. The wind is just the wind—

unless we give it the power to break us.

Maja Milojković was born in 1975 in Zaječar, Serbia. She is a person to whom from an early age, Leonardo da Vinci’s statement “Painting is poetry that can be seen, and poetry is painting that can be heard” is circulating through the blood. That’s why she started to use feathers and a brush and began to reveal the world and herself to them. As a poet, she is represented in numerous domestic and foreign literary newspapers, anthologies and electronic media, and some of her poems can be found on YouTube. Many of her poems have been translated into English, Hungarian, Bengali and Bulgarian due to the need of foreign readers. She is the recipient of many international awards. “Trees of Desire” is her second collection of poems in preparation, which is preceded by the book of poems “Moon Circle”. She is a member of the International Society of Writers and Artists “Mountain Views” in Montenegro, and she also is a member of the Poetry club “Area Felix” in Serbia.

Achievements shine like stars in the night, A journey of effort, a remarkable sight. From dreams to reality, we forge our own way, Through struggles and triumphs, we learn every day. Each step is a milestone, each fall a guide, With passion and patience, we walk with pride. The sweat and the tears, they pave our path clear, In the heart of persistence, there’s nothing to fear. With courage as compass, and goals in our sights, We rise from the shadows, embracing the lights. For every small victory, a story unfolds, In the tapestry woven, our dreams turn to gold. So celebrate each moment, let joy fill the air, Achievements are treasures, beyond compare. In the journey of life, remember this truth, Every step leads you closer, to the wisdom of youth.

Peer Smits (The Netherlands), writer-prose, poetry-photographer, composer, visual artist. Likes music-punk, reggea- as an inspiration and for fun. Three books-Het hanenei, 2007, Compositions, and We do stencils-2024.Artist since 1982. Poetry published in (inter-)national magazines.

Trip to London and Italy 2/25

on February 14, 2025, Mary and I caught a flight from MSP to SNA to spend a week with our daughter and her family… we celebrated birthdays and spent time with our grandkids…  it is always fun to get out of the cold of a Minnesota February…  on Wednesday, February 19, we caught a flight from LAX to LHR…  we were lucky enough to go first class which makes the ten hour flight a bit less of a strain… although, I do not sleep well on planes, so just watched several movies and ate too many snacks…

the weather in London at this time of year is with highs in the upper 40s and lower 50s, which is cool but warm compared to Minnesota… we are getting older, 77 this year, so we spent the first day just unwinding from the jet lag and went to bed early…  we stayed in a small hotel near Paddington Station…  at Paddington, we can catch buses and subways (referred to as tubes in England) to pretty much any destination in central London… so, we took a bus on Friday to Trafalgar Square…  it is fun to take the buses because, even though the tubes are faster, from the bus, you can see a bit of the city as you pass through various areas…  on these trips, we usually spend the day going to museums or art related venues and the evenings going to plays on the West End…

the National Gallery is on Trafalgar Square… unfortunately, the room that houses my favorite paintings at the National Gallery was closed…  but, that wound up being ok because there are so many treasures in this Museum that I found plenty of amazing paintings to feast my eyes on… as a person who makes oil paintings, I love to look closely at the paintings by the old masters to see just how they created their effects… and then to step back and see the whole piece…  this trip, I spent some time looking at two Vermeer paintings…  especially looking for traces of his almost invisible brushwork and appreciating the tonal quality of his paintings of fabrics…  there was a lovely calm to these paintings that I enjoyed… and the images are almost magical in their glow of painted light…

I also spent some time with the work of the great Spanish artist Diego Velasquez…  one of the very few nudes he ever painted is there, called the Rokeby Venus…  the figure of a reclining woman is so amazingly beautiful…  for anyone who has ever tried to paint a nude figure, this is about as well as that task can be done…  I have been painting landscapes more lately, so it was good for me to walk through the galleries and look at all the amazing landscapes that have been painted since the renaissance in various schools and styles from the renaissance masters to the great British Landscapists like Constable…  I also enjoyed reseeing the Caravaggio which reminded me, I guess that light is only half the story when painting figuratively, shadow is really cool and interesting in this kind of painting…

we went to an experimental play at a little distance from the West End, and, it was fun to see what the young playwrights and theater people are excited about…  in the case of the first play, called, Stalled, it was about grief and the trials facing a group of women who meet in a “ladies room” in Seattle…   it was an amazingly moving and well acted piece and we both loved it… although it was pretty sad…

the next morning, we decided to do something different, so we took the bus to the Tower Bridge, probably the most famous landmark in London, and walked across it… from the bridge, you have a nice prospect of the city with the towers of glass and of the rehabbed warehouses fronting the water that look to be now, high end condos… we then took the subway to Notting Hill because that was near where our play that night would be…  we planned to look around the area…  when we got off the train, we found that there was a huge open air market on Portobello Road right near there…  so, we spent the afternoon looking around the market…  there were hats, scarfs, clothing, antiques, flea market type stuff, just a wide variety of stuff people were buying and selling in the stalls… I remembered the song from Mary Poppins about this market, “place where the riches of ages are stowed…”  other than the song, I know nothing of the history of this market but it was fun to wander through the crowds and look at all the stuff on display… we had a soda in a small bar where we rested our feet and sat and watched the people…  when we tired of the market, we took a bus to the actual location of the play for that night… we were hungry by then, so had a nice meal in an Iraqi café…  there are Middle Eastern cafes all over London and they always have interesting and delicious food… after a lovely leisurely supper,  we walked a couple blocks and had another small theater experience at an equally fine play…

the next morning, we took the bus to the Tate Britian to see my favorite pre-Raphaelite paintings… unfortunately, the museum was closed as they were setting up cameras on the outdoor steps and also inside the museum for some kind of fashion show… since the venue was closed, we decided to do a boat ride to Greenwich… so, we took the bus back to the Embankment ferry stop and got on the ferry for Greenwich…  it was a particularly chilly, blustery and rainy day but we had warm and rainproof layers, so were fine…  after enjoying the view of the city from the river, we got to Greenwich…  disembarking from the ferry, we stopped to look at the Cutty Sark…  the famous old clipper ship that is in drydock there… we last saw this ship in 1972 on our first trip to England…  it looked as stately and elegant as I remembered even though I knew that the ship had been extensively damaged in a fire in 2007…  fortunately, the bow and the stern of the ship had not been much damaged by the fire and from the outside, the ship looked as good as new… as a child, I had been much fascinated by sailing ships, drawing them and making models for example, and it was fun to learn that, even at 77 the sight of the lovely old clipper gave me a bit of a flutter… the play that night was also a small theater production at a small playhouse at Elephant and Castle, which is across the Thames from Central London, and was very interesting, a musical based on the movie Edward Scissorhands…  the first three plays were these small theater productions away from the West End because the West End theaters were all very expensive for those days…  the last three plays we saw were in huge old West End theaters…

Monday, we went to the Guildhall Art Gallery to see one of my favorite Rossetti paintings… La Ghirlandata (the garlanded one) is a painting Rossette made in 1873, when he was at the height of his powers as an artist…  it portrays one of his favorite models, Alexa Wilding, one of the pre-Raphaelite super models, with garlands of flowers and two portraits of May Morris, daughter of Rossetti’s girlfriend, Jane Morris (who was married to his friend William Morris, the famous wallpaper and furniture designer, poet and stained glass manufacturer)… Rossetti considered it his best painting…  I love this gallery, not only because it holds one of my favorite paintings of all time, but because it is clean and quiet and I can go there and enjoy that painting without distractions of other compelling favorites to look at… it is located near St. Paul’s Cathedral so, it was nice to see that building again too…  then after a great pub dinner, we found our way to the beautiful old Prince Edward Theater…  our seats were high up but we could see the stage perfectly… the play was basically a concert performance by a Michael Jackson impersonator… it was an interesting blast from the past, and had us remembering when those songs were everywhere back in the day… and certainly gave us a fresh appreciation of the unique talents of one of the most successful pop artists of our lifetime…

the next morning, we went back to the Tate Britian and I got to look again at all those pre-Raphaelite paintings that I have known and studied for so many years…   I especially took a close look at the GF Watts painting Hope…  and at the two Rossetti paintings now facing each other in a corner of the room, one of his wife and one of his lover…  funny how through a hundred and forty years, the passions and lives of those people have survived to some degree in these paintings… the painting Beata Beatrix is a posthumous painting of Rossetti’s wife Elizabeth Siddall painted in fits and starts from the time of her death and finished around 1870…  the painting on the facing wall is a painting of which Rossetti made several versions called Proserpine… the one on the wall in the Tate Britain is the 7^th Version painted in 1874… this painting portrays Jane Morris, who was married to Rossetti’s friend William Morris and with whom Rossetti had an affair with the apparent approval of his friend… these paintings have titular subjects, but the real subject is the personal relationship the artist had with the women…

so after another great dinner, we went to another of the great old West End theaters to see the play by John Cleese based on his British television show, Faulty Towers…  it was very funny…  and fun, at the Apollo theater in the heart of the West End theater district….

the next day was our last in London, so in the morning, we found a laundromat near our hotel and did our laundry…  then we went to visit the Leighton House in Holland Park which is in the Kensington area of London…  this is a house where the Victorian and sometime pre-Raphaelite painting Fredrick Leighton lived…  we have visited it before…  it is kept as a memento of that artist, his life and work… Leighton was friendly with the pre-Raphaelite group but never really a part of the group…  in his lifetime, he was immensely famous and successful… he eventually became president of the Royal Academy and earned a vast fortune from his painting, part of which he spent on building the splendid house which is his monument… like all of the Nineteenth Century painters, he was an expert at drawing the figure… his most famous works are beautifully painted figures of nude or semi nude women in classical settings…  although he also painted expertly done landscapes and large set pieces of historical and mythological subjects for the annual shows of the Royal Academy, and lovely portraits…  Leighton lived alone in this large house with a few servants…  the entire upstairs is taken up by a huge studio with big north facing windows…  the floor is planks and there is a stage at one end with a grand piano…  his drawings and paintings are displayed around the studio…  it was great to me to see his beautifully done drawings of the figure…  one of his lovely nude paintings is in the Tate Britian near the Rossettis…  his most beautiful and famous work is titled Flaming June and is in an obscure art museum in Ponce, Puerto Rico…  many years ago, I made a pilgrimage to Ponce to see that painting…  funny that Mr. Leighton was so enormously successful in his own lifetime but by 1950, only fifty years after his death, he was almost totally forgotten and even today, his work is only known to a handful of people like myself who have a special interest in painting of that era…  I guess there is a lesson for those who seek fame here in how fleeting fame can be…

that night, our final play was Mean Girls at the Savoy, a large old theater on the Strand just a few blocks from Trafalgar Square… it was lively and entertaining…

the next morning, we got up at five and headed into Paddington to catch the Elizabeth line tube to Heathrow…  there we got a British Airways flight to Florence, Italy… the Florence airport is fairly small…  they do not use jet bridges, so we embarked via stairway onto the ramp to get a bus to the terminal which was kind of fun and old school, for those of us who love air travel… there is a tram that runs from the airport to the train station in the center of Florence…  we had a hotel within walking distance of the tram so, after a brief tram ride, and a bit of a walk, we were at our hotel… the hotel was just a block from the Duomo, the mighty multicolored cathedral which is the center of Florences tourist district…  I had last been in Florence in 1972, and it was interesting to see how much busier and bigger the city had gotten…

in the tourist area, there were many many shops selling designer clothing, shoes and accessories…  and people from all over the world loaded down with shopping bags with designer logos… the tourists were very fashionably dressed and certainly seemed very affluent… there were restaurants everywhere and the Italian food was, of course, terrific… we walked around and looked at the cathedral that first evening, had a light dinner and went to bed…  the next morning, I figured out how to get a bus, so we caught the bus to the Uffizi Gallery… I had not booked tickets in advance, but we were lucky and there were no lines to get in…  we had not eaten yet, so had a nice light brunch at the rooftop restaurant overlooking the famous crenellated bulk of the  Palazzo Vecchio…

for anyone interested in Renaissance art, the Uffizi is ground zero… Titian, Botticelli, Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael are all well represented along with a host of lesser masters… when I go to an art museum, even one as enormous and filled with masterpieces as the Uffizi, I like to look at mostly my favorite paintings, paintings that I have known all my life and not spend a lot of time exploring… so we went straight to the room where Michelangelo’s only complete easel painting, the Tondo Doni which is… this piece is a 47 inch in diameter circular painting…  the subject is religious, but what interests me is the immense beauty of the figures, how the light caresses the draperies and the perfectly drawn arms, hands, etc… I believe that this painting has a deep and complex symbolic meaning both related to the religious story on the surface and going deeper into the psychology of the family and the nude figures in the background… anyway, what a treat to see this painting from only a few feet away…  a true masterpiece by Michelangelo who considered himself more of a sculptor than painter!!!

in the next room is Leonardo’s famous unfinished Adoration… with this painting being left unfinished, it is possible to study Leonardo’s drawing and preparation for a finished painting…  again to stand a few feet from a piece that the master worked on and to see his ideas coming together in the moment, is, for me an enormous thrill…  my two favorite paintings of all time just a few steps from each other….

we also looked at a marvelous painting by Raphael and a beautiful Titian, all of which I remembered fondly from our visit here so many years ago… perhaps the biggest treat of the whole trip for me was seeing the Portinari Altarpiece by  Flemish painter Hugo Van Der Goes…  this painting was commissioned for a chapel in Florence and remains in Florence, now at the Uffizi…  this is a wondrously weird painting with the odd looking “realistic” faces and figures of the people portrayed, but there are double images hidden in the background, one of a howling face (the entrance to Hell?) and one of giants hidden in the rocks in the background, which, once you see them, you cannot unsee and which give the painting a whole new level of psychological meaning in addition to the very complex symbolism of the details of the objects and people portrayed… not a lot is known about Van Der Goes except that he suffered from mental health disorders, and was actually considered to be mad before he died in 1482…

the next day in Florence, we went to an open air market and enjoyed seeing all of the fancy leather goods for sale… and then walked on to the Medici Chapel…  the chapel itself is an uber fancy high roofed building of multi colored marble, but spectacular as the chapel is, down a hall and into another room, you come to a room of Medici tombs in which there are 7 statues carved by Michelangelo…  the four reclining figures are if not Michelangelo’s finest works, certainly his weirdest… the twisting torsos of two hugely muscled women and two equally twisted and muscled men defy gravity and seem to exist in some primal, erotic natural order far beyond the normal… Michelangelo, what were you thinking when you carved these gorgeous unsettling figures???  maybe I will someday write an essay about these figures…  there is also a Madonna and child by Michelangelo in the room and two conventional figures by lesser artists… I left the room gobsmacked by the beauty and power of these figures and the “terriblita” of Michelangelo…

On the upper floor of the Uffizi, there is a long hallway that leads past the rooms of Renaissance masterpieces… this hallway is lined with Roman statues… some of which are Roman copies of Greek originals…  these statues are made of carved and polished white marble, but it is interesting to note that in Ancient Roman and Greek times, these statues were colored, polychromatic…( https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/10/29/the-myth-of-whiteness-in-classical-sculpture ) although this has been known now by at least some scholars and art historians since the late 1700s, it was not known in the Renaissance…  during Michelangelo’s time, Roman statues (including the famous Laacoon) were being found and dug up all over the area that had once been the city of Rome during the time of the Roman Empire… in fact, Michelangelo was often called upon as an expert when one of these statues was found and was actually in attendance when the Laacoon was dug up… while these statues had almost certainly all been painted with lifelike skin coloration and various colors and patterns in the fabrics, the time underground had removed most of the pigment from these pieces, so they appeared, when pulled from the ground and cleaned, pure white…  so, the aesthetic of the Renaissance sculptors including Michelangelo was based on the erroneous notion that ancient statues were created in the white marble and not intended to be painted…   

there is great beauty in these white marble and bronze colored statues, even if it is not the way that the classical sculptors intended them to be seen…  if Michelangelo had known that these pieces had been polychrome 1500 years before they were dug up, I wonder if that would have changed his own work… creating marble carvings of figures,  Michelangelo thought he was following in the aesthetic footsteps of the ancient sculptors and even though his aesthetic was based on a lack of our modern knowledge of how the ancient statues were finished and presented, Michelangelo took the aesthetic he had with its limitations and its possibilities of creating powerful art and did what he needed to do to make the art… had he been aware of the polychrome nature of ancient statuary, my guess is that he would simply have shrugged his shoulders and gone on cutting stone acknowledging that the colorlessness of the work he saw around him from the ancient world and the work he was crafting anew in his own workshop had such infinite possibilities of expression that he would  just continue carving and not take time to worry whether he was redoing the ancients in an archeologically accurate way,  or creating a new aesthetic of monochrome “classical” pure marble sculpture… but, just maybe, he would have painted his statues…  an interesting thought when looking at his sculpture…

the next morning, we caught a flight to Rome…  we stayed in a lovely resort hotel in Fiumicino, Italy, next to the airport of the same name… we had a nice walk around the residential area and around the lawns and gardens of this lovely hotel and the next morning went to the airport…  unfortunately our ten hour return flight to Atlanta was delayed, but eventually we got out and were in first class again which makes the flight much easier…  the delay caused us to miss our connection to MSP, so we spent a quiet night at the Holiday Inn and caught a flight the next day back home…  it was a great trip and at our age, who knows when if ever we will get to travel again to these great and interesting destinations…   we arrived in Minnesota the day before a ten inch snow storm…  so, back to reality and a chance to give my new snow shovels a workout…