Author: Maarten Koning

BIBLIOTOPIA

The Jan Michalski Foundation Montricher (canton of Vaud) presents the BIBLIOTOPIA festival. BIBLIOTOPIA provides an opportunity for international writers to meet and share experiences.

The festival will take place from the 4th to the 6th of June at the Foundation. The festival focuses on the theme of change seen through the lens of literature, as far as social justice, work, our past or personal life, environment, education, and race.

The festival will look at how countries change and the countryside evolves, how novels celebrate the agents of change, how experiences of violence or historical trauma can be captured in literature.

This journey goes from Russia and Portugal to Palestine and Japan. Colonialism and the ways in which it shaped the world will be reassessed, our attitude to animals and nature will be reevaluated and there is a look at the way families and societies deal with mortality and disease.

Finally, the festival will also reflect on the new forms that contemporary writing can take, and the inventive fusion of genres and approaches.

(Source and further information: www.fondation-janmichalski.com).

The Mazot or Raccard

Who doesn’t know them, the chalets in the Swiss Alps? On the other hand, far less well known are le raccard or le mazot, two typical buildings for the Valais.

This wooden building on four stone pillars about 50 centimetres high was used to store and process hay, grass, or grain. The pillars prevented mice and rats from entering.

The mazot always had only one entrance door and was not intended for habitation.
In many villages and hamlets, the mazot has been preserved in good or less good condition.

Nowadays, they often have a tourist, cultural or social purpose.
The grenier is very similar to the mazot but is larger and always has two or more entrance doors for several users and is also intended for living, often on the second floor.

The chalets had a different purpose. They were always located outside the village and high up on the mountain pastures. They served as summer quarters for the cattle breeders.

However, the (English) tourists in the nineteenth century called every wooden building a chalet. Nowadays, the mazot or raccard is part of the (alpine) cultural heritage.

Tourbillon Castle

The medieval building is perched high on a rock above Sion (canton Valais) and offers a beautiful view of the Rhone Valley and the Alps.

Around 1300, Bishop Boniface de Challant (1240-1308) built a castle on the hill. The castle served as a residence for the Bishop of Sion.

It was destroyed in 1417 during the Wars of Raron (1415-1419). The castle was rebuilt by Bishop William III (1407-1451). Destroyed again in 1788, the castle remained a ruin.  Wall paintings from the 14th and 15th centuries in the chapel bear witness to this past. The chapel was built at the same time as the castle.

Saint-Pierre-de Clages

The Romanesque church of Saint-Pierre-de-Clages (canton of Valais) is located between the Great St. Bernard Pass and the Simplon Pass, connecting the south and the north of Europe. The church was built in the first half of the 12th century. A document from Pope Eugenius III (1088-1153) mentions the church in 1153.

It is a priory of the Benedictine abbey St. Martin-d’Ainay in Lyon. This monastery belonged to the Abbey of Cluny. The architecture of Saint-Pierre-de-Clages is similar to that of Cluny. The octagonal tower and the interior bear strong resemblances. The architecture also shows Burgundian and Lombardian elements of Romanesque art.

The remains of medieval wall paintings are still visible in the intact interior of this beautiful three-aisled church.

(Source: H.-R. Meier, Romanische Schweiz, 1996, Würzburg).

New Members and the Book

The small town of Diessenhofen (Thurgau Canton) is located between Schaffhausen and Stein am Rhein, on one of the most beautiful river landscapes in Europe.

Bosco Gurin (Ticino Canton) is the highest village in the canton and lies in an alpine basin at an altitude of 1,500 metres.

The mountain village of Albinen in Upper Wallis (Oberwallis) impresses with its spectacular location above the Dala Gorge with the imposing rocky basin of the Daubenhorn in the background. The village is a dense cluster of houses consisting of chalets, barns and lofts, all perfectly oriented to the south.

In the first edition of the official guide of the organisation Les plus beaux villages de Suisse/ Die schönsten Schweizer Dörfer (The most beautiful Swiss villages), these villages will also be introduced as new members.

The book is available after June 15th. It offers a careful portrait, practical information and beautiful illustrations. On 208 pages and with more than 200 photos, the guide lists no fewer than 43 villages and small towns, spread across 15 cantons and 2 countries (Switzerland and Liechtenstein).

The guide is published in three different languages (French, German and Italian).

(Source and further information: www.borghisvizzera.ch).

Johanneum in Neu St. Johann

The Abbey of St. Johann in Alt St. Johann, founded around the middle of the 12th century, was severely damaged by a fire on 8 February 1626.

The Abbot of St. Gall decided to rebuild the building and church about ten kilometres down the valley. In 1629, the construction of the new priory building was completed. A year later, most of the interior was finished, but the church was not completed until 1680.

The site of the new priory was named Neu St. Johann. The monastery was abolished in 1805. The building houses the Johanneum, an institute for people with mental or learning disabilities.

(Source: www.johanneum.ch).

Obstalden Church

The church in Obstalden (Canton of Glarus) was built in 1300 as a church of the monastery of Schänis and belonged to the Diocese of Chur.

Between 1260 (Matt in Sernftal) and 1349 (Schwanden), four new churches were built in Glarus: Mollis, Obstalden, Linthal and Betschwanden. The construction and furnishing of these churches coincided with the consolidation of Habsburg rule in the area. The church was reformed in 1528 and formed its parish in 1593.

(Source: Historischer Verein des Kantons Glarus, Glarner Burgenweg)