Shamakhi Astrophysical Observatory to host “cosmic” show at Nasimi Festival
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By Trend
Azerbaijan will hold the Nasimi Festival of Poetry, Arts, and Spirituality for the first time on September 27-30.
The festival, dedicated to the work of Imadaddin Nasimi (1369-1417), one of the brilliant poets and thinkers of the East, is being implemented under the organization of the Heydar Aliyev Foundation and support of Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Culture.
The first day of the festival will be especially a bright one - participants will visit the Shahendan cemetery in Shamakhi city, where Shahendan, the brother of Imadaddin Nasimi, as well as outstanding poet Seyid Azim Shirvani, were buried.
The participants will also visit the Juma Mosque built in 743, one of the most ancient mosques in the Caucasus, the Pir Omar temple in Avakhil village and the Shamakhi History and Local Lore Museum.
The exposition in the Shamakhi History and Local Lore Museum will be presented in the form of a story about the history of important events from the life of this part of Azerbaijan.
In particular, there will be a section dedicated to the strongest earthquake in the history of the city of Shamakhi, which occurred in 1667, resulting in almost full destruction of the city. According to historians, the number of victims was between 40,000-80,000. This event greatly influenced the appearance of the city, which was situated on the Great Silk Road.
The gift of Heydar Aliyev Foundation to this museum - three unique engravings of the 17th century, which were found in Europe, purchased and delivered to Azerbaijan, will become one of the significant events.
These are engravings of three travelers who visited Shamakhi city at that time. They include the views of Shamakhi from the book of the German geographer Adam Olearius, who, as part of the embassy of the Schleswig-Holstein duchy (now a part of Germany and Denmark), twice stopped in Shamakhi en route to Persia (modern Iran) (from December 30, 1636 to March 28, 1637) and on his way back (from February 20 to March 30, 1638), and then his observations became part of the book where he described his journey.
It is also worth mentioning the description of trips of a Dutch sailor, Jan Janszoon Struys, who lived in Shamakhi for over a year - from September 8, 1670 to October 30, 1671. He saw the city after the earthquake of 1668 and left clear descriptions of its buildings. The most interesting is that in these engravings it is possible to see the greatness of Shamakhi city of that time, including buildings, mosques, streets, as well as developed infrastructure.
Poetical and musical gatherings will be held in Shamakhi before Nasimi’s monument, as well as an event with the participation of the winners of a literary contest dedicated to the memory of Imadaddin Nasimi and held by the Ministry of Culture as part of “The Word” literary project. At the contest, young poets will present works inspired by the genius of Nasimi.
The opening of the International Ethical Design event - “Sensitive Fashion” will also take place in the Meysari village in Shamakhi district.
The event created on the basis of content published systematically during the last few years in the Baku magazine under the heading “ECO. Fashion Route”, will carry out the functions of informing and educating about environmental sensitivity in production of clothing and interior items, reproduction, restoration of forgotten and outdated traditional methods and production technologies, and will also serve as the showroom and the sales salon.
The works of Azerbaijani and foreign designers will be presented there. The exhibition will showcase the styles of clothing that were used in Azerbaijan for centuries, clothes decorated with various national ornaments that were in vogue in different periods of time.
The ethical fashion in general, and the eco-fashion in particular, have long become popular trends, which are developed by many fashion houses advocating clean environment. The very concept of ethical fashion is associated with the production of clothing made from organic and recycled materials, as well as socially responsible attitude to workers participating in the entire production chain.
Guests will also be presented the performance of the Azerbaijani group “Les Gardiens du Silence”, which will perform spiritual and meditative music at the junction of different cultures. The performance will be presented on national and foreign (in particular Indian) musical instruments.
An incredibly interesting show, which can be safely called “cosmic” - an evening of acoustic and electronic music called “Closer to Stars” will be held at the Shamakhi Astrophysical Observatory named after Nasraddin Tusi of the Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences (ANAS).
Performances will be held on two stages, under the open sky, accompanied by visual effects by media artists Orkhan Mammadov (Azerbaijan) and Maotik (France). Spectrograms and photos taken from the telescopes of the Shamakhi Astrophysical Observatory will be used in the design of the concert.
DJ Irshad Huseyn (Azerbaijan) with a selection of ambient music, audiovisual artist Elemaun (Iran), electronic music DJ Rabih Beaini (Lebanon/Germany) and Sufi singer Abdel Karim Shaar (Lebanon) will perform on one stage.
On another stage, old and “new” ethnic music will be presented. This program will involve performance of jazz duet “Ha Noi Duo”, which includes guitarist Nguyen Le (Vietnam/France) and ethnic singer Ngo Hong Quang (Vietnam).
Besides, the Ar Berd duet (France) will present the program on reconstructed medieval lyres, Gorkem Sen (Turkey) will perform on the “yaybahar” instrument, which he himself created, popular Russian singer Sati Kazanova (Russia) will perform compositions of the peoples of the world on the spiritual theme from her Sati Ethnica project.
Meanwhile, Sahib Pashazade (Azerbaijan) will present an unusual project - he will perform Steve Reich's "Electric Counterpoint” written for the world-famous guitarist Pat Metheny, on tar (Azerbaijani string instrument).
Calm, spiritual music that calls for meditation, will leave the most amazing impressions on guests.
For the first time, such a grandiose festival will be held though sales of tickets and invitations, but exclusively through registration on the official nasimifestival.live website.
The festival will be held under the slogans “Beyond the limited self”, reflecting the philosophical views of Nasimi, and “I am a particle, I am the sun” which are the poet’s lines.
The program of the large-scale event covers various types of art and knowledge fields. During the festival, programs will be organized in various places in Baku, as well as in Shamakhi, the native city of the poet.
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