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Showing posts with the label Spain

Pollok House and Estate, Spanish Art, European Emblems and links to European language learning

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  Pollok House Pollok House is the last of a series of houses built on the same site, as homes for members of the ancient and celebrated Maxwell, later Stirling Maxwell family. Pollok House was gifted to the City of Glasgow in 1966, and is managed for the city by the National Trust for Scotland. https://www.nts.org.uk/visit/places/pollok-house Photos of Pollok House : J Wilson Spanish Art The elegant Georgian House, with a magnificent view south over and beyond the White Cart river, was built in 1752. It is fundamentally Georgian with sympathetic early twentieth-century additions. One of its most important aspects now though dates from rather later: the collection of Spanish art (as well as works by Rubens, Raeburn, William Blake and others) amassed by Sir William Stirling-Maxwell (1818-1878, initially William Stirling) who at different points in his career was the MP for Perthshire, Rector of both St Andrews and Edinburgh Universities, and Chancellor of the University of Glasgow. ...

Whitelee Wind Farm

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Renewable Energy - Our Future The Whitelee wind farm which can be seen from most parts of Glasgow is a vast wind farm on the southern edge of Glasgow. The main visitor centre is located in East Renfrewshire, but the majority of turbines are situated in East Ayrshire and South Lanarkshire. It is the largest on-shore wind farm in the UK and second largest in Europe after Fântânele-Cogealac, in Romania. It has 215 Siemens and Alstom wind turbines and a total capacity of 539 megawatts (MW). Whitelee was developed and is operated by ScottishPower Renewables, which is part of the Spanish company Iberdrola. https://www.whiteleewindfarm.co.uk/whitelee-windfarm-about-us The Wind Farm also has an excellent visitor centre and receives many educational visits. For example, to teach primary school children about renewable energy: And, as well as being popular on Instagram, Wind Farms are popular with young Scots! 67% of 16-24 year olds in Scotland support the use of onshore wind to generate power:...

Which Museum was European Museum of the Year?

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Glasgow's Riverside Museum was named European Museum of the Year (EMYA) 2013 at a ceremony in Belgium.  The prestigious award is presented to museums which have been built or extensively refurbished within the previous three years. ( https://europeanforum.museum/winners/emya/ ) The £74m Riverside Museum, on the banks of the River Clyde, opened in 2011 and features the city's transport, shipbuilding and engineering heritage. It was designed by award-winning architect Zaha Hadid .  The European Museum of the Year Award (EMYA) was founded in 1977 under the auspices of the Council of Europe.  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-22587979   The sail training ship the Glenlee which is docked here was from  1922 the sail training ship  Galatea  in the Spanish Navy. Photo: J. Wilson (2011) Map Reference: Eurowalk 2: Along the Clyde

La Pasionaria - a Spanish connection

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La Pasioniara” (“The Passion Flower”) sculpture by Dan Dooley (http://www.glasgowsculpture.com/) La Pasioniara was Dolores Ibárruri, a Spanish Republican politician, communist, and prominent anti-fascist propagandist during the Spanish Civil War of 1936 to 1939.  Her phrase "Better to Die on your feet than live forever on your knees" is carved on the plaque. La Pasionaria served as inspiration for sculptor Arthur Dooley in 1974, when various trade unions and Labour movement supporters funded the memorial. It is a memorial to British citizens who served in the brigades during the war. Photo: J. Wilson On the plinth it says: " 2,100 VOLUNTEERS WENT FROM BRITAIN; 534 WERE KILLED, 65 OF WHOM CAME FROM GLASGOW".  These volunteers  from across Europe went to Spain to join the brigades and help in the fight against a fascist insurgency, all sadly in vain as the fascists rose to power under the leadership of Francisco Franco. An interesting blog about some of this ...

Kelvingrove - masterpieces of Spanish and Dutch Art to be seen! And The Glasgow Boys!

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The European Commission commented in 2019: "As the UK’s top cultural and creative city, Glasgow is home to world-class museums, galleries, family-friendly attractions and an edgy contemporary art scene that shows the city at its energetic finest."  And surely the top Museum venue in Glasgow is Kelvingrove Museum, which was constructed as the Palace of Fine Arts for the Glasgow International Exhibition of 1901 and designed by English architect Sir John William Simpson using red sandstone in Spanish Baroque style .  One of the external sculpted figures was carved by the Italian sculptor Aristide Luigi Fabbrucci (1859 - 1903) http://www.glasgowsculpture.com/pg_biography.php?sub=fabbrucci_a# . And another, representing "Religion" was carved by Johan Keller, born in the Hague, Netherlands and who became professor of Sculpture at Glasgow School of Art : http://www.glasgowsculpture.com/pg_biography.php?sub=keller_j# Within the museum itself, probably the most well known an...