blög!: praha

10. - 13. June

prague is the coolest place i visited this summer; the city rocks and it's one the least expensive european capitals. the weather was much better in prague and so the pictures are better too, but some of the coolest things are not on camera at all. in particular, the art that you see in paris or london or vienna (to a lesser extent) is heavily from western europe. prague was behind the iron curtain until the velvet revolution in 1989 and so the museum of modern art here has entire galleries of artist you've never heard of. that's not to say that they dont have everything else too. i spent three hours on the first floor (20th century starting with art decco, so klimt, shiele, kokoshka through expressionism and into the craziest modern stuff) thinking it was the main gallery. then i got to the second floor - czech cubists: woa, that stuff is good, and there is so much of you'd need a week and its goddamn good. you can see communist art and not just the propaganda but by people who really believed as well as those that rebelled against it - communism never looked this good. and so when i got to the third floor i couldn't feel my legs - or rather i could feel them all too well - only to run into ALL the impressionists. i mean the only ones there were missing were manet and degas and they were on the periphery of the movement. there are 5 floors, i didnt make it to the rest. each floor also has an adjunct gallery with non-canvas type art - for instance architectural models from wright and gehry as well as design art like jugenstil, a couple of vitra chairs etc, etc, etc. oh i almost forgot, they had an entire rodin room too.
three words: off the hook
apart from the art, the city has an awesome night life. the czech republic has the highest per capita beer consumption in the world (160L/yr), and if you buy it in the supermarket it goes for about 40 cents a bottle. so there are pubs and restaurants on every corner, and you can get a decent meal for $5. on to the pictures...

pražský hrad (prague castle) is the enormous complex including the cathedral in the background on the left. construction of the castle began in the 9th century. in the foreground is the karlův most (charles bridge); the bridge has also existed in some form or another for 1000 years.

from katedrála sv. Víta (st. vitus cathedral) at the cener of the pražský hrad.
the part of the river you see here runs along the north end of the old town.

vladislavského sálu (vladislav hall) in the královský palác (royal palace) in the pražský hrad.
are you learning czech yet?
63m long, 16m wide, and up to 13m high - archietectural masterpiece

main entrance of the katedrála sv. Víta at midnight shortly after a down pour

south side of the katedrála sv. Víta
the panorama below is taken from the top of the tower on the right.

back side of the katedrála

the two bridges in the middle of the picture (mánesův most, left and karlův most, right) originate at the staroměstské náměstí (old town square) identified by the spires of the týský chrám (teyn chruch). the copper green dome on the right of the picture is chrám svatého mikuláš (st. nikolas church) from which the next two pictures are taken.

original is 11 x 5 megapixels (6' 9'' x 9''). it so big you almost dont need to go to prague. if you want it ill send the original.