Blog post alert: Paintings of the Hutsuls in the Carpathians has artwork by several 19th and early-20th C artists depicting the life of the Hutsul people in what is now Ukraine. It reports that of twenty-five thousand remaining Hutsuls, twenty thousand live in Ukraine—may they be safe. Many of the pictures in the post could suggest stories; and it interests me that at least one of the artists, Teodor Axentowicz, studied with Carolus-Duran. I've chosen this Madonna by Kazimierz Sichulski, however, just because it is gorgeous (well, and because of its 1909 date, so close to my magic year, 1908).