Czech handicrafts



Czech handicrafts have also caught me by surprise, since everything from cut crystal (which I thought of as Austrian) and egg painting (which I thought of as Russian) and wooden toy making (which I thought of as German) is all to be found here as Czech handicrafts. The one though that surprised me the most was the marionettes, I do not know why. I have no reason for thinking they belong elsewhere, and in fact I now suspect it to be the most authentic of these Czech handicrafts. 
I have not however bought any of these, as of yet. What I did buy was another, perhaps more particularly Prahaish handicraft. Intricate, sometimes tiny, ink drawings that are then filled in with extremely bright wa
ter colors. Seems like a Byzantine mosaic, or a Italian stain glass window. 

The one I bought shows the exact part of town where we are staying, and in point of fact, our apartment would be just to the right of the bottom right corner of the painting. Directly adjacent to the naked woman in the window. I noticed this before purchasing it for Palmer's room, since in fact, Prague is a surprisingly sexually liberated sort of city. And not afraid of death either, as far as I can tell. 

And least it seem I am being sexist here in my parenting choices, I 
offer up this bit of evidence of how well rounded his experience in Prague has been. 

My hostess notes that they are peeing on the Czech Republic, the shape of the fountain. She also notes that her daughter has a similar ink drawing water color, with naked ladies everywhere, some of them "occupied." 

Ah, the portion of my blood that is Eastern European is swelling up with pride. The Icelandic part of me is not so much for direct representation, but has no problem with the content. I suppose the American in me would have to at least slightly object to the content, though not the form. 

Comments

Anonymous said…
Well, I've always thought of cut crystal as very Czech, Bohemia Crystal being the flagship. (or at least the most known one). Swarowski is Austrian though, but they don't do glasses and carafes and such. We bought incredibly beautiful crystal (not cut, though) champagne glasses in a shop in the Jewish district when we first came to Prague, 18 years ago.

Then there's one more handicraft, pictures with tiny clay houses, actually I didn't see many of them this time round, but they're nice. We got one, showing the alchemist street up in the Castle.

And yes, the paintings are often really nice, some of them garish but some beautiful, I like the one you bought :)
July 5, 2009 at 9:01 AM
Lissy said…
Hey Hildigunnur -

Was that statue of the men peeing in front of the Kafka Museum there when you went there?

Yep, that city is a keeper!
July 7, 2009 at 8:05 PM
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