Conscripted Into The Emperor’s Private Orchestra
Published by Narratively
Most people in the West would struggle to pinpoint the Central African Republic on a map. Its international claim to fame is the dire poverty of its citizens and its terrifying, bloody, seemingly never-ending wars. In its capital, Bangui, one of the ways of finding normalcy amid the chaotic years of cries and gunshots has been through the country’s rich music tradition. Whether the rhythmic drumming of the tam–tam, the strumming of the guitar, or the bubbling sounds of the balafon, a xylophone of wood and animal skins — music is a constant here. And Charlie Perrière is one of its undisputed kings. His fame probably saved his life - here is his story, and the story of his incredible orchestra, which played for one of the world's most infamous dictators.
Published by Narratively
Most people in the West would struggle to pinpoint the Central African Republic on a map. Its international claim to fame is the dire poverty of its citizens and its terrifying, bloody, seemingly never-ending wars. In its capital, Bangui, one of the ways of finding normalcy amid the chaotic years of cries and gunshots has been through the country’s rich music tradition. Whether the rhythmic drumming of the tam–tam, the strumming of the guitar, or the bubbling sounds of the balafon, a xylophone of wood and animal skins — music is a constant here. And Charlie Perrière is one of its undisputed kings. His fame probably saved his life - here is his story, and the story of his incredible orchestra, which played for one of the world's most infamous dictators.
How One Family Preserved Tbilisi's Hidden Mansion for 125 Years
Published by Town & Country magazine
Every day thousands of pedestrians stroll along a busy section of Rustaveli Avenue in Tbilisi, Georgia, without the faintest idea that just around a corner, on a side street past a crumbling cable car station, stands a mansion that looks as if it has been lifted straight from the pages of a fairy tale. It has intricately carved balconies painted a light turquoise that looks as if it might melt into the sky above. Inside the Blue House, as it is called, the walls are covered with artworks by members of an extraordinary family that has managed—through Soviet occupation, civil war, and a Russian invasion in 2008—to hold on to its precious home.
(Photographs by Daro Sulakauri)
The Hunt For the Romanovs’ Greatest Lost Treasure
Published by Town & Country magazine
Yantarnaya Komnata (in English, the Amber Room) was a royal chamber in the Catherine Palace, just outside St. Petersburg, which had walls lined with panels of amber backed with gold leaf and inlaid with semiprecious stones. Generations of Russian rulers lavished attention on the room—it was said to bathe occupants in an ethereal light—and over a period of two centuries they added new elements and moved it to successively larger spaces. But in 1941 the Nazis marched on Leningrad and soon the contents of the room—including all 600 square feet and 13,000 pounds of amber—disappeared. Hopes for recovering Tsarist Russia's Amber Room heated up last summer only to be dashed once again. But the real mystery might be why we can’t stop looking for it.
Published by Town & Country magazine
Yantarnaya Komnata (in English, the Amber Room) was a royal chamber in the Catherine Palace, just outside St. Petersburg, which had walls lined with panels of amber backed with gold leaf and inlaid with semiprecious stones. Generations of Russian rulers lavished attention on the room—it was said to bathe occupants in an ethereal light—and over a period of two centuries they added new elements and moved it to successively larger spaces. But in 1941 the Nazis marched on Leningrad and soon the contents of the room—including all 600 square feet and 13,000 pounds of amber—disappeared. Hopes for recovering Tsarist Russia's Amber Room heated up last summer only to be dashed once again. But the real mystery might be why we can’t stop looking for it.
In homeland of Soviet dictator Stalin, some Georgians still toast him. Others seek to recount a dark past.
Published by the Washington Post
A shiny shard of nose and a crumbling sliver of whiskers from a long-destroyed stone statue are among Grigori Oniani's most prized possessions.That's because the pieces once were part of a carved effigy honoring Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, which Oniani saw torn down as a student in 1961 while leading a protest to stop the demolition."Stalin," Oniani said, "is a phenomenon." Oniani's private Stalin museum is part of an improbable — and, at times, bewildering — nostalgia that endures in Georgia for one of the most infamous and ruthless leaders of the last century.Meanwhile, the real places that bore witness to Stalin-era crimes — executions, purges and exiles to Siberian gulags — are ignored or have been bulldozed over.
Photographs by Justyna Mielnikiewicz
Georgian women ruled chess in the Soviet era. A new generation chases the same ‘Queen’s Gambit’ glory.
Published by the Washington Post
In a bedroom painted purple, where a picture of chess great Bobby Fischer hangs alongside posters of Ariana Grande and characters from "Game of Thrones," 17-year-old Kato Pipia sits at her computer, nailing chess victories over her opponents.
For decades, tiny Georgia has been punching above its weight on the global chess scene. And for Georgian women, the trail was blazed by its own heroine, Nona Gaprindashvili, whose Cold War-era rise to the top of the chess world has its own parallels to the fictional Beth Harmon of “The Queen’s Gambit.”
Photographs by Justyna Mielnikiewicz
Published by the Washington Post
In a bedroom painted purple, where a picture of chess great Bobby Fischer hangs alongside posters of Ariana Grande and characters from "Game of Thrones," 17-year-old Kato Pipia sits at her computer, nailing chess victories over her opponents.
For decades, tiny Georgia has been punching above its weight on the global chess scene. And for Georgian women, the trail was blazed by its own heroine, Nona Gaprindashvili, whose Cold War-era rise to the top of the chess world has its own parallels to the fictional Beth Harmon of “The Queen’s Gambit.”
Photographs by Justyna Mielnikiewicz
