This event will be devoted to the memory of two brothers, Sergey Petrovich Kapitsa and Andrey Petrovich Kapitsa, members of the famous Kapitsa family, closely linked to Cambridge and to the local Russian-speaking community.

WHEN: Friday 24th May, 7:00pm
WHERE: Scott Polar Research Institute, Lecture Theatre, Lensfield Rd, Cambridge CB2 1ER

With contributions from Maria Kapitsa, Pyotr Kapitsa, Peter Gysin, Isabella Warren, Gareth Rees, Alla Mostinskaya, Galina Scott, and Natalia Budanova.

Featuring: memories, stories and reflections by friends, colleagues and family members, as well as a film with an interview with Andrey Petrovich Kapitsa.

Wine, juice and nibbles will be served.
Entrance: FREE

- SERGEY KAPITSA was a physicist and demographer, and the host of the popular and long-running Russian scientific TV show, “Evident, but Incredible” (“Очевидное – невероятное”).

- ANDREY KAPITSA was a geographer, credited with the discovery and naming of the Lake Vostok, the largest subglacial lake in Antarctica, that lies 4,000 metres below the continent’s icecap.

Both brothers were born and spent their early childhood in Cambridge, and returned to the city many times in their later lives.

Their father was a Nobel-prize winning physicist PYOTR KAPITSA, who worked in Cambridge with Ernest Rutherford in the 1920s and early 1930s.

About Sergey Petrovich Kapitsa and Andrey Petrovich Kapitsa:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Kapitsa
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrey_Kapitsa

Fort St.George, Midsummer Common, Cambridge

Click here to see the map.

Our traditional, romantic, high-spirited, moving, warm and uplifting “White Nights” party is coming up, in the same beautiful setting as usual, by the river Cam.

Everyone is welcome. We shall play the guitars and sing our favourite Russian, Ukrainian, English, Scottish and other songs, eat, drink, socialise, laugh and feel happy!

Map: Click here
When: Sunday, 7th July 2013

About this unique exhibition: http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/ra-magazine/spring-2013/houghton-hall-return-journey,471,RAMA.html

More details to follow shortly.

Tatiana Ruchinskaya – phone: 07824 183 907
E-mail: tvr281@hotmail.co.uk
Website: http://tvrdesignconsultancy.co.uk
6 The Green End, Willingham, Cambridge CB24 5JA

WHEN: Sunday, 12th May, 13:00
MEETING POINT: Market Square, near the Guildhall,
Cambridge CB2 3NH.
DURATION: 1.5-2 hrs (depending on the weather!)

With any queries please write to info@camruss.com or phone 0781 510 1481. (However, this phone will be switched off during the actual tour.)

WHEN: Tue 7^th – Mon 13^th May
OPENING TIMES: Tue-Sat 10am-6pm; Sun 12:30pm-6pm; Mon 13^th May closes at 12 noon.
WHERE: Changing Spaces Gallery, 6-16 King Street, Cambridge CB1 1NL

With any queries please contact Anna Basca on annabasca@googlemail.com

THOSE FANCIFUL BRANCHES OF THE PHOTOGRAPHY EVOLUTION: SURREALISM OR MYSTICAL REALISM?

Contemporary art photography has at least one distinguished advantage over its elder cousins such as painting as the universe of photography still has powerful potential for further development. One of the elements of this potential is the immense information-carrying capacity of photographic images which are used only episodically and another is the immense scope for creativity and adventures into unknown worlds.

Time and again Elena Agafonova surprises viewers with seemingly strange and somewhat weird images. The exhibition is an account of the artist’s recent trip to England.

Take this landmark work from the Essex series and we can see a medieval Gothic church, most probably Anglican. The building appears derelict and abandoned, probably home to ghosts, as per English Gothic tradition. The very setting of the scene, with its Gothic architecture, helps the viewer get into the mystical and romantic mood. But that’s only the background of the image and frankly, just a mere trifle compared with what’s going on in the foreground. There, on the lawn in front of the church, is a fish of unimaginable proportions, as if it has just landed from the space or another, far worse place. Though we obviously realise that a fish can’t be larger than a house and it is just a photographic trick, our emotional and visual perception keeps trying – and eventually succeeds – in persuading us that the fish’s enormous size is absolutely credible. Let’s see how this effect has been achieved.

Agafonova has a penchant for strong and sturdy compositions. In this shot, the fish is leaning on the bottom of the frame, spanning from corner to corner, with the outline of its back suggesting rolling hills, a distinctive feature of the English landscape. Compared to the church, the fish looks massive, tricking the viewer’s vision into believing that it is crushingly heavy. No amount of force will ever shift it. However, the photographer clearly finds that this hill like quality alone is not enough! The curve of its back together with the sloping gables set two other compositional axes, the diagonals which form a cross and thus ‘anchor’ the whole composition. The resulting composition is not just stable but absolutely unshakable and solid creating the indisputable authenticity of the scene. Such is the magic of the composition.

The fish is a reoccurring theme in this series. Appearing in many shots, it seems to be searching for something. So exactly what is this fish? Well, the obvious answer is it’s a bream, unusually large for its own species. Dead, smoked, dried – it seems that there is no life left in it at all. Yet we don‘t really want to believe that. Is that because the body beneath the scales seems too taut, the gaze too animated and full of curiosity, and the facial expression too sarcastic, almost spiteful?

There are other characters in this series which are no less engrossing than the fish. For instance, the dog. It is a guard dog, overall quite the Baskerville-like hound. In fact, it is a sculpture but it is more tempting to call it ‘a stone dog’ rather than a ‘sculpture of a dog’. So remarkable is this character that Agafonova dedicated to it a whole photograph, perhaps one of the best in the series. The dog sits on its pedestal and with intense concentration looking at something beyond our view, at some invisible things happening ahead, in the wasteland. Even from the back, we gather a sense that this dog remembers so much. The clashing of the swords of knights in armour, the loud, colourful celebrations, the corpses of plague victims, the never ending wars, the public executions and the peasant weddings and so much more…

Just like the fish, it is difficult to say whether the dog is dead or alive.

And here, the bream and the dog are together, and are joined by a third companion, a graveyard angel who is clearly a kindred spirit to them both. On another photograph we see the fish lying on an enormous branch, gazing at the dry, dead bark the texture of which resembles that of the fish.

Gradually, throughout the series, Agafonova shows us a peculiar, fanciful and fascinating  form of being, a mysteries existence between the world of the living and the world of the dead where lifeless objects are allowed to live as if they were alive. It finally becomes apparent exactly what the bream in the pictures is looking for –which is companions to share this odd and frankly speaking, tragic form of being. Of course, this form exists only in the in the framed perspective of photographic reality but is it not the point of photography to create a parallel universe which a viewer can explore?

Despite a certain whimsicality of the series, the images do not appear as some bizarre dream or fantasy, instead they are totally convincing and authentic which is a clear sign of artistic health.

The English are known to tolerate eccentricity, even to admire it. When Elena Agofonova walked into a pub and demanded two pints of beer, this went largely unnoticed. Even when she pulled an enormous dried fish from her bag and placed it on the table, no one batted an eye. Only when it transpired that the second pint was meant for the fish – who turned out to be not a snack but instead a drinking companion – the whole pub started to stare shamelessly.  And only when a camera emerged from the bag and the bream, with its beer, suddenly turned into a model, the onlookers began to treat the events before them as some free show. The English adore eccentrics.

When one comes across something never seen before, it is almost impossible to resist linking the new idea or phenomenon with something well known, so it is understandable that some of the reviewers started talking about surrealism.  However, it is probably more accurate to define Elena Agafonova’s art as mystical realism although this term so far has been reserved only for literature.  Anyway, while slapping labels is not terribly helpful, anyone is welcome to guess and wonder.

Nal’ Podolskiy

WHEN: Wednesdays 10.00 – 10.45 am and on Mondays, 13.00-13.45. There is also a plan to start a Friday group if there is enough interest.

Classes are held in the “bootcamp” style and focused on comprehensive improvement of general fitness and visual parameters of the body. The main part of a session is assigned to the “bodyweight” exercises where the force and weight of one’s own body is used. In addition, we use free weights, elastic resistance bands, balls, skipping ropes, some “Boxercise” drills and much, much more, so every workout is unique and will never be repeated!

The bootcamp format is one of the most popular trends of fitness, where workouts optimally combine aerobic and strength exercises with the endurance training. The results become apparent very quickly; within a month of regular exercise, you are guaranteed to become noticeably fitter and slimmer. And in addition, you will have a good mood and a happy company!

The first trial session is free. You are more than welcome to come and have a try!

• FAMILY SPORTS-AND-GAMES ACTIVITY SESSIONS
  

WHEN: during the warm season, every Sunday, between 10.30am-12 noon.
WHERE: Newnham Park (as above)

Children appreciate the time spent with their parents, and this is a great opportunity for the whole family to start a day in a fun and active way! We have loads of outdoor games to play, some fun exercises, little relays and competitions.

Participation price for a family is 5 pounds.
Come along, bring your friends and you are guaranteed a good time!

Please contact Elena Kapitsa if you wish to come
- by phone 0798 332 9708 or e-mail: elenakapitsa@gmail.com

Please bring along your musical instruments, some food and drinks to share, and, most importantly, a cheerful outlook. The BBQ facility has been booked already, so all we can do now is just hope for the cloudless sky!

WHEN: Monday 6th May, from 12:00 noon.
WHERE: Picnic area at Wandlebury Country Park, Gog Magog Hills, Babraham Cambridge CB22 3AE http://cambridgeppf.org/wandlebury-country-park.shtml

DIRECTIONS: Wandlebury Country Park is signposted with brown Country Park signs off the A1307 Cambridge to Haverhill Road, 2.5 miles south of the Addenbrooke’s Hospital roundabout.

MAPS: Please go here for Wandlebury Location, and here for Wandlebury Layout.

PARKING: Visitors’ car park at the Main Entrance off the A1307. Parking charge: £2.50 per car.

PUBLIC TRANSPORT: The Addenbrookes to Haverhill buses are Stagecoach CityPlus X13 and X13A.

CYCLING TO WANDLEBURY: There is a separate, safe, cycle path alongside the A1307 Hills Road, leaving Cambridge, from Addenbrookes Hospital past the Babraham Park & Ride to Wandlebury where it ends. There is no cycle path from Haverhill to Wandlebury.

NB No cycling in the park is allowed, except for under 8s, and cycles should be secured in the parking area cycle stands.

DOGS: need to be kept on a lead in the Park, but can be freely exercised in the adjacent Gog Magog Trust area.

FOR MORE INFO please visit the Wandlebury website: www.cambridgeppf.org, and go to ‘Our Attractions’. There is a number of designated walks there, with guide leaflets.

Click here to see a review of CamRuSS’ May-day outing in 2011, with many attaractive photos.

Please write to: info@camruss.org with any queries or suggestions.