evilbuildingsblog: Field of octagons… National Library of Belarus, Minsk You don’t ofte

evilbuildingsblog:Field of octagons… National Library of Belarus, MinskYou don’t often seen Belarus on the internet. Most people probably don’t know where it is. It’s a small, relatively-impoverished small country that was formerly part of the USSR, in what is currently considered to be Eastern Europe. It has been ruled by the same authoritarian dickbag since like 1994, and he’s buds with Putin. There is no free press, anyone who opposes the current government is violently oppressed, Amnesty International Disapproves Of How Things Are Run There.How did Belarus get to be so fucked? Aside from the rampant authoritarianism, aside from the Stalinist purges of intellectuals, or the fact that Stalin and Khrushchev imported lots of Russians there to try to make them lose their distinct cultural identity? The Nazis, actually. In WW2 they occupied Belarus for 3 years and destroyed 2/3rds of all cities, 85% of all industry, and over 1 million buildings. “ The Nazi Generalplan Ost called for the extermination, expulsion or enslavement of most or all Belarusians for the purpose of providing more living space in the East for Germans.[78]”It was brutal. They created art like this in commemoration.The Jewish population of Belarus has never recovered.Reading through the wiki page, like those of other small countries, they will share the names of all sorts of minor celebrities no one has ever heard of. The only name there I recognize is Marc Chagall, an incredible artist.Back to the National Library. Supposedly, the people of Belarus are very proud of their unusual library, which is well known in architectural circles. It was designed in the 1980s, but not actually built until around 2006. It lights up at night.So fancy! While not the tallest building in Minsk, it does have some good views, which you can check out on google maps.!! Can your library do that?Daytime photo, featuring a sculpture of Francysk Skaryna, who was hellbent on translating and printing a version of the Bible in the common tongue, proto-Belarussian, in 1517. He wanted people to directly access their own religious text by - gasp - reading it themselves. Revolutionary stuff at the time. His books were burned in Russia.“Skaryna also composed prefaces to his editions, in which he emphasized that the purpose of his publishing activities is to help ordinary people ‘become acquainted with wisdom and science’. … Skaryna’s Bible breaks the existing rules of that time. It contains text from the publisher, his comments, forewords and afterwords. In addition it contains prints with his image. It is the first such case and the last in the history of the publication of Bibles in Eastern Europe.“ SourceAnyway this is an interesting country and I haven’t even touched a lot of topics but I hope this increases your appreciation of Belarus. -- source link

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