Hidden treasures

It's raining and cold today, but I walked up to the Main Square to see if I could get some pictures inside the Jesuit Church I visited briefly on New Year's Day. Unfortunately, it was locked up tight.

So I walked up a few doors to the north to the Franciscan Church, dating to the late 13th century, the oldest church in the city. It has seen many additions and alterations over the centuries and was used for parts of the coronation ceremony of Hungarian royalty once held in Bratislava. The exterior doors were open, but the interior was so dark none of my pictures came out.

Tucked into a corner in front of the church is this monument, with fresh tulips. The weather-beaten engraving is almost illegible, but I did find the date 1745. I often see fresh flowers in front of statues and memorials around this city. Somebody cares!

As I was heading back down to Billa's, I spotted this painted wall on a narrow little side street, Biela. No signs explain what this is. It appears that the blue paint has been carefully removed to reveal the drawings underneath, which seem quite old, and work remains to be done.

That bronze plaque on Biela, in Slovak and English, was another surprise. This building was the home for most of his youth of the great sculptor Arthur Fleischmann, who was born in Bratislava in 1896. As an adult, he travelled extensively and studied art and medicine in Budapest and Vienna, finally settling in London. For more on Fleischmann:

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/dom.fleischmann/index.html

NOTE: Click on any image in this blog to see it full-size.