Satie - June 18, 2010
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Lilya Brik: Muse of the Russian Avant-Garde - June 15, 2010
Lilya was the muse and lover of the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovski. Almost all of his lyrical poems were inspired and
written for her. For a while Mayakovski lived with Lilya in what could be called a soviet menage-Ã -trois with her platonic
husband the art critic Osip Brik. Apparently while it lasted, Mayakovski had a a penchant for “Russian Roulette – one day
he lost, it was quite comfortable. She lived to be 86, but at one point her name was on list of people to be assassinated
by the Russian secret police – her name was personally scribbled off the list by Stalin himself.
“I am fated to be a tsar-
on the sunlit gold of my coins
I shall command my subjects
to mint
your precious face!
but the earth fades into tundra,
where the river begins with the North Wind,
there I’ll scratch Lilya’s name on my fetters,
and in the darkness of hard labor, kiss them again
and again.” Mayakovski.
Henri Fantin-Latour “Around The Table” 1872 - June 14, 2010
In front, from left to right : Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud, Léon Valade, Ernest d’Hervilly et Camille Pelletan ;
In back: Pierre Elzéar, Emile Blémont et Jean Aicard.
