Wooden Churches of the Carpathian Mountains #3 - Plopis, Romania

This Romanian Orthodox church is found in Plopis, a village in the Cavnic river valley in the Maramures region of Romania. A superb example of vernacular wooden architecture, the church sits on a small hill above the rest of the village. It was constructed in 1796 by local village builders and consecrated as the Church of the Archangels. The interior wall murals were painted in 1811 by the local artist Stefan of Sisesti.

The murals include an evocative image of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, with the snake coiled around a tree. The layout of the church is rectangular, with a pentagonal chancel apse. There is a porch in front of the main door featuring six pillars supporting the beams that carry the weight of the roof.

The tall pyramid-shaped steeple on the tower is surrounded by four smaller pinnacles in each corner. These pinnacles indicate that the church once served as an official court of law for the surrounding region. The three-lobed ceiling vault of the nave is considered to be a unique feature among the Maramures wooden churches. The structure has been listed as a UNESCO world heritage site, one of eight wooden churches in Maramures region to receive this honour.

Remarkable Relics of Communism #2 - Bratislava, Slovakia

This mural is found in the main hall of the central train station in Bratislava; most passengers pass quickly beneath it on the way to the platforms and don't pause to glance up and see it on the wall above.
The mural contains many of the classic hallmarks of socialist thought. Looking from left to right, on the far left the viewer can see three 'capitalists' in their business suits being driven away by the moral superiority of the group standing to their left beneath the red banner of socialism with doves flying above their heads. One of the capitalists is dropping a gun to the ground, suggesting that their agression towards socialism will be defeated in the end. All of the capitalists are portrayed in cowardly poses which symbolize their eventual defeat. A worker from the capitalist system (dressed in white) is being freed from the chains of his masters so that he can come to join the group on the left. The group beneath the red banner has three dominant figures, a proud steel mill worker holding tools, an intellectual holding a book, and the flag bearer who stands above them providing the foundation for the development of the new society that labour and learning will develop together in partnership. The group standing in a circle at the centre of the mural is composed of women from different countries around the world, implying that socialism is the system that will unite the world in peace and unity. On the right-hand side the viewer can see the symbols of technology and learning that will make the socialist utopia possible; at the top we can see a rocket and a satellite (which looks like Sputnik) representing the scientific advances that socialism has produced ahead of the capitalist world. Below these we see the scientists who have produced these ideas, as well as the students learning from them who will develop the technologies of tomorrow.