A colleague and I recently returned from a week in Latvia, a trip made possible thanks to a wonderful benefactor who has invested in MIA staff innovation. And a week hardly makes me an expert on this Baltic nation, almost continuously occupied—by Russians, Germans, Swedes, Soviets—for the better part of 1,000 years.
Still, what struck me was the brio a people can muster once free to govern themselves. In 1918, Latvia achieved its first, fleeting independence; its current self rule dates to 1991. In the capital, many buildings from this initial period of liberation are dazzling, albeit degraded, examples of Jugendstil, a form of Art Nouveau that flourished in Riga more than in any other European city.
A typically fabulous building in the Quiet Zone of Riga.
Entire neighborhoods are filled with facades bedecked with Metropolis-like robots and females, their hair entwined amid the exuberant floral ornamentation. You can practically hear the corks popping. Soon, though, the Soviets would move in with their Brutalism, and World War II would leave its indelible mark; for instance, the city’s Central Market is now housed in four former German zeppelin hangars. And so ended the party.
Yet, during this 20-year period between Russian and Soviet occupation, Latvians played and painted and wrote poetry and lived in buildings that inspired sheer joy. And they will soon have a new reason to revel. In 2014, Riga will become a European Cultural Capital, a designation given to two EU member cities each year. It’s a yearlong event designed to draw participation from Europeans and Latvian citizens alike, and it’s why my colleague and I visited in advance of the MIA’s centenary in 2015. Construction cranes are reworking the face of Riga as I write. And the Jugendstil ladies are being primped for the coming party.