ICV 27 - Speaker 25: David Chkheidze

We saw an overview of municipal flags about the nation of Georgia.  Chkeidze's paper was entitled The Flags of Contemporary Georgia.

Chkheidze noted that the Republic of Georgia's post Soviet flag is an ancient design dated back to Pre-Columbian times.  Georgia's flag is essentially a heraldic flag.  Currently there are 66 districts and 12 self governing cities in the Republic of Georgia.  Chkeidze gave a delightful overview of Georgia's modern day flags that incorporate good design linked to real geographic elements. He also noted that the Republic of Georgia has many local ethnic groups.  Even the touchy subject of the break away territories were included: Abkhazia and Adjara.

Origin of Republic of Georgia's Flag 1367

He also noted the Republic of Georgia is proud of its wine producing heritage, which dates back some 8000 years ago to about 6000 BC, before the rise of the Egyptian Empire and Pyramids.  Also noted was the cross of St. Nino which has its arms on a slight bend.

He said the hardest part about making flags was that people sometimes want to include too much: every historical symbol and icon, making the flags virtual tourist guide maps, which results in very 'ugly' flags.

ICV 27 - Speaker 24: Jos Poels

Poels gave us a paper on evolution of the Gambian flag with the title of Evolution of the Gambian Flag.  

Poels pointed out that the geography of Gambia was due to Imperial powers needs, named the UK and France, who gave little thought to the tribal areas.  Poels also pointed out that the colonial badge of Gambia had an elephant trumpeting on it, and not from the back end.  However Gambia does not have any elephants.  Additionally there were hills on the badge, but there are not hills in Gambia.   Later the trumpeting elephant of Gambia was used on several other English colonies in Africa with letters underneath to indicate which was what.

Jos dedicated his presentation to Louis Lucien Thomasi (1910-1985), who was the designer of Gambia's modern day flag.  Also note that Jos Poel was also present for the birth of South Africa's modern day flag, a fun yet quirky fact.









 

ICV 27 - Speaker 23: Herve Calvarian

 

Calvarian presented information about researching flags, as to the ways to classify certainty.  Calvarin's paper was entitled Doubts and Certainties in Vexillology.

Among primary sources for flags comes via written laws and ordinances, archives, photos, videos, and postal stamps.  Secondary sources include vexillological work, dictionaries, reference books, press articles, and testimonials. Calvarian noted that written descriptions can be wildly interpreted.

Essentially many flag designs can be lost in the march of history, being real or not.  But Calvarian established an efficient rubric that allows one to grade the source as to its reliability.

ICV 27 - Speaker 22: Stoyan Antonov

Antov showcased the Bulgarian municipalities.  Antov's paper was entitled Flags of Bulgarian Municipalities.

Antov pointed out that most Bulgarian flags are mono-coloured.  It is also a Bulgarian law that chauvinistic symbols are forbidden.  Unlike the USA, where local municipality flags are essentially unregulated by any kind of higher authority.  It really is up to the people to select and design their own flag.

Since Bulgaria has been a EU member since 2007, a new push for new flags has swept the nation.     

ICV 27 - Speaker 21: Bruce Berry

 

Bruce spoke about the old green Rhodesian (Zimbabwe) flag and all the modern issues that follow.  Bruce's paper was entitled The Beloved Green and White - (White) Rhodesia's  [Modern day ZIMBABWE] Search for a Unique Symbol of Identity.  

Although Zimbabwe was the first 'white colony' to leave the Empire since the exit of the United States in 1776,  the story of its independence is topsy-turvy.  Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia was considered on the UK's most loyal subjects.  They were the first nation to declare war on Germany in 1939 during WWII, remember that the USA entered at the tail end of of 1941. 

The declaration of Rhodesia's independence was passed with Parliament of UK's consent.  On November 11, 1986 the first flag of Rhodesia was flown, the tribar of green-white-green with a coat of arms.  However many of citizens of black-Rhodesia were terribly upset and saw it as the 'White-man's flag.'   Eventually Rhodesia was of the few colonies to revert to the Union Flag of the UK in 1980 for a short while. 

Today, many of those persons of white heritage who lived though that turbulent era, look back with a  certain kind of fondness for the old green and white flag.  Most white Rhodesians (Zimbabwians) see it in nostalgic, non-extremist, almost friendly cultural sense. 

However many extreme white pride organizations have projected this flag as an inflammatory racist symbol.  This unfortunate reputation was further abounded when Dylan Roof perpetrated the mass murder at Charleston, South Carolina Church Emanuel African Methodist Church, on June 17, 2015.  Roof had photos of himself next to Confederate, South African, and the old green-n-white Rhodesian flag.   Sadly this flag's association with hatred and suffering was further ingrained in the collective mind. 

But surely as time passes, views of the flag will perpetually change. Perhaps its best to focus on the positive?

ICV 27 - Speaker 20: Marcel Van Westerhoven

Westerhoven spoke about, polderboard flags which are flags of local pumping stations that maintained dikes across the Netherlands.   Polderboards were mostly responsible for maintaining water quality control and regulating water flow.   His paper was entitled Polderboard Flags - a Requiem for a Dream.

An interesting fact that Westerhoven states was the popularity of the clover.  According to Marcel the clover often represented dairy farming, since clovers are a favorite item of dairy cows.  Consequently as the clover is a national symbol for Ireland, could this be part of the cause for its popularity in Ireland?  Although the story of the trinity is already set by St. Patrick, maybe dairy farming in Ireland had some influence?


Originally there were about 3500 active water authority pumping stations in the Netherlands in 1850, but now there are only 22 left. It was due to modern technologies that reduced the need so many "Pump-Board Hydrolic Stations." The older Polderboards used beautiful heraldic arms to represent their pumping stations, but modern day Polderboards use logos and 'ugly' logos on flags.   In the old style these flags typically had wavy lines to represent the water and many used the colour blue to indicate water. 

ICV 27 - 25th General Assembly FIAV

 

The fairly normal congressional meeting, of yeas and nays.  Nothing much to report but business as usual.  The most exciting news brought to the table was China's to host the ICV in 2023.  It was presented by Xinfeng Zhao.  Zhao was responsible for training China flag hoisting staff for the Beijing 2008 Olympics.  If China were selected he promised that everyday would be a new venue. 

However there was one dissenting voice, of Roman Klimes, who protested the politics of China and the situation in Tibet.  There was also some concern that China did not have a strong vexillological society, as Zhao's group was more of a patriotic organization, rather than academically focus group dedicated to vexillology.  Nonetheless, it nearly set that China will host the lovely 30th International Congress of Vexillology.

There was also one call to elect a new president of FIAV, that of Alfred Z as nominated by Roman Klimes

ICV 27 - Heraldry Society of Slovenia

The Heraldic Society of Slovenia presented the pitch to the congress to hose the 29th International Congress of Vexillology in 2021. 

It was a well presentation, with video, music, and splendid colours.  It would have made the current first lady proud, Melania Trump, since she is Slovenian.  In the photo above the Slovenians are holding the potential flag for the ICV 29?  Will it come true?  Only time will tell. 

ICV 27 - Speaker 19: Pluethipol Prachumphol

A short history of the Thai flag was given under the paper History of the Thai Flag.  Prachumphol also showed us that Thailand recently obtained the title for the world's biggest flag in 2016.  Since the Thai flag had reached its 100th year of use in its modern form, his group was responsible with creating worlds largest flag to celebrate its centennial.  Thus on November 30th 2016, Thailand became the nation with the largest flag in the world.  In the image below you can see the world's largest flag being hoisted on three flag poles.  His speaking partner is holding the Guinness World Record's certificate.

The Thai flag has undergone many changes. But the current flag was adopted with the middle blue stripe when the Thais entered on the side of the allies in 1917 during WWI, thus the flag you seen now is the flag modern flag of Thailand.

ICV 27 - Speaker 18: Ladislav Hnat

A plentiful discussion about political party flags were showcased.  Hnat's paper was entitled Party Flags, Colours and Logos in the 8th European Parliament. 

Hnat focused on the red rose, which has become a popular symbol of the socialist parties in Europe.  Even the UK's Labour party has a red rose in its flag, although the rose is deeply connected to the English history rather than socialism. 




Labour Party Flag Image
http://www.rogercee.com/labours-internal-war-raising-a-white-flag-killed-the-conservative-party-labour-must-keep-its-red-flag-flying/

ICV 27 - Speaker 17: Cedric de Fougerolle

Fougerolle spoke about the publishers book stamps from a vexillological perspective.  His paper was entitled Ex-Libris and Vexillology.  Those decorative labels on books typically are used to identify the owner.  But many times over a heraldic style coat of arms is used, often including flags.

Fougerolle broke up the these book marks into five different categories: patriotic, military, heraldic, maritime, and artistic. 

ICV 27 - Speaker 16: Ralph Kelly

Empire Flag at Imperial University, The Huxley Building, London

Kelly spoke about the Empire flag of the UK, so appropriate for a talk at Imperial University.  Ralph Kelly's paper was simply entitled A Flag for Empire.

The Imperial flag for the British Empire has been carted to dust bin of history.  But for a little while, persons across the British Empire were encouraged to celebrate 'Empire Day.'  The British were heads and shoulders leading the world with technologies and other important discoveries at the time.  Likewise the connectivity between the colonies were rather strong, at the beginning of the 1900s.

Kelly noted that Empire Day started in Canada, but become a global holiday across the Empire.  Eventually a flag was created to honor this day which featured the coat of arms of Australia, Canada, South Africa, and the Star of India in the center of the cross on white canton UK flag. 


Here is a photo of the Empire Flag being waved at the end of WWII.

ICV 27 - Speaker 15: Alan Hardy

Hardy spoke about new ways to format flags and code for the various national colours.  In an effort to standardize colours and ratios of flags a cutting edge set of new flag proposals for the nations were illustrated.

Notice that Hardy added a yellow ring to the national flag of Bangladesh to provide contrast.  China's flag was given a major zoom in, with the flag of South Korea underwent a major change.

ICV 27 - Speaker 14: Scot Guenter

 

 Guenter illustrated the various on goings within and the varied approaches to vexillology.  The traditional route according to Scot is the scholarly approach that requires lots of reading and sifting through books.  A second avenue is the active vexillologist who promotes certain ideas, mostly centered on reforming bad flag design. 


Guenter cited Roman Mars as connected to Vexillology in action and discussed the effect of such promotions in the media to cause of vexillology. 

Always giving a delightful and well presented paper, Scot Guenter is a corner stone in modern day post-Whitney Smith vexillology.   Guenter adheres to the original academic aspect of Whiteney's work. 

He also ended his presentation with a homework assignment, that everyone in vexillology should read the thesis of William Crampton, the UK's version of Whitney Smith.   

ICV 27 Speaker 13: Manuela Schmoger

 Schmoger revealed the on going personal efforts to catalogue flags of local municipalities flags in Germany.  It is often a time consuming practice, yet the rewards are compelling.  Often it is that local municipalities are not aware of local symbols.  But Schmoger was able to get most of the local flags charted in Bavaria and publish the date on newer easy to use Wikis.

Schmoger ended the talk by recruiting others to help.

ICV 27 Speaker 12: Roberto Breschi

Breschi discussed how the local municipality flags from the 1860s were rediscovered. 

Breschi ran into an old index book of flags for Italian municipalities.  Although index publications are often less than friendly reading, they are trustworthy resources.  The index that Brechi discovered was dated to 1869.

Apparently several flags were created to celebrate Alighieri's 600th birthday, who was influential in establishing modern Italian; Dante Alighieri was born in 1265.  Alighieri is best known for his work the Divine Comedy 1320. 

Eventually Breschi was able to match up index numbers from a lost collection of flags were literally wafting away in a museum basement.    

Identifying lost flags is a cumbersome process, but Breschi was able to reconnect unidentifiable flags to their celebratory event in 1865, it was true tale of a successful vexillological archaeologist. 

IVC 27 - Speaker 11: Rachel Phelan

Phelan discussed in exquisite detail the preservation efforts of the Irish Republic Flag of the 1916 Easter Rising.  Her paper was entitled What's Up with the Big Green Flag?  The Conservation of the flag of the Irish Republic.   Phelan was charged with honoring and preserving the original Irish Republic flag which is now 101 years old. 

Phelan showed us that flag was captured by the British and treated as a hunting prize, hung upside down in imperial contempt.  However, as relations between the UK and Ireland eased she showed us a short clip of its honorable return to Ireland.

The paint on this historical flag was turning to dust and major distortions were noticeable, which required the use of expensive and impressive machine technologies, something of the gelatine solution was used to preserve the flag itself. 

Rachel also corrected the legendary tale of its creation.  Flag restoration is complicated process that involves many individuals and specific experts.  But Phelan was the lead coordinator to help preserve and establish one of Ireland's Original flags.  It is now under proper care and can be seen by the public at large in Ireland.

ICV 27 - Speaker 10: Ralph Bartlett

The flags of a local artist were featured with his paper Flags by King for Country.  The title is wonderful play on words of the featured flag designer named Robert King Crawford.  Crawford designed several flags for social events in his local community in Australia.  Crawford often used Good Flag principles before the publication of Good Flag, Bad Flag.

It was keenly notes that documentation of early flag exploits before the rise of the internet is important.  Many flags can get lost in the shuffle, but by focusing one persons unique and collection of flags is solid work within vexillology.

Vexi-Bits ICV 27 London at the Huxley Building

This year, there was the smallest of smallest Vexi-Bits at an ICV.  Usually Vexi-Bits take place in an informal matter.  Typically a NAVA person is chosen to organize an after hours meeting to discuss random flag topics, where each speaker gets 1-3 minutes to talk about his or her flag related item.  At ICV 27 Lodon, Vexi-Bits were set up at a last minutes notice.  But the schedule was already heavily booked with activities, consequently Vexi-Bits ICV 27 London ended up as a solo act.  But it was a powerful Vexi-Bit nonetheless, that may effect all other Vexi-Bits to come!

Ted Kaye, Holding a Vexi-Bit Flag: London ICV 27

Interestingly the solo Vexi-Bit saw the first design proposal for a Vexi-Bit flag.

The Vexi-Bit flag like the UK Union Flag is a combined flag, derived from three flags.  With the UK Union Jack, the three components that make up the British Ensign are the banners of Scotland, England, and Irish St. Patrick's Cross flag.  Likewise the three elements of the Vexi-Bit Flag are the NAVA flag and two of the International Maritime flags: the letter V and letter B.  Obviously V stands for Vexi, while the B stands for Bits.  The Vexi-Bit flag has a swallow tail design, as it is for the wholly red Letter B-Bravo flag.  Thus it is fitting that the first Vexi-Bit flag should manifest itself in the UK under a triplet flag, being a triplet flag itself.

Thus the Vexi-Bit flag declares subconsciously, "Victory for NAVA, Bravo!"

https://nava.org/

Random Flags at London

ICV 27 - Speaker 9: John Cartledge

 

Cartledge presented an overview on the particular attachments to the colour red.  Often described as passionate colour of life and blood, Cartledge gave a brilliant and often amusing battery of red's symbolism.  No doubt the associations are red are established deep in the collective mind as a leading brilliant colour that can easily catch ones attention.

ICV 27 - Speaker 8: Sekhar Chakrabarti

Variant of Dominant Political Party Flag as National Flag: Confusions and Controversies - a Case Study was title of Chakrabarti's paper.  Chakrabarti gave us a deeper story unto the unfolding of the national flag for India, which took many turns and twists before arriving at the modern day flag that we know today. 

ICV 27 - Speaker 7: Victor Lomantsov

Victor Lomantsov's paper was entitled Flags of Trade-Unions' Sport Societies in the USSR.  Although the Soviet Union was known for its big red flag, there was still a need to play sports.  Lomantsov gave us a general overview of the varied and colourful, and often non-communist, flags of the sports clubs in the Soviet Union.

ICV 27 - Speaker 6: Pierre-Jean Guionin

Pierre-Jean Guionin's paper was entitled The New Edition of Album des Pavillons et des Marques Distinctives.  Guionin gave his presentation mostly in French.  Guionin discussed the ins and outs of editing the important work for France's Department of Oceanography.  

ICV 27 - Speaker 5: Christopher Maddish

The title of the paper was Colour Coding and New Vexillological Avenues for Flag Design.  The framework for colour coding flags to numbers was presented.  Examples were given several areas including: longitude and latitude, altitude, chemistry, and even postal zones.  In the second part of the lecture other un-flagged areas were presented: geographic birthright flags, maritime flags areas without a flag, and many more.  

ICV 27 Speaker 4: Kevin Harrington

Kevin Harrington's paper was entitled Flags and the Anniversaries of 2017: Myths, Mistakes, Misconceptions.  Harrington spoke briefly about flags that were changed due to the Socialist Red Scare, namely of the old red Oklahoma flag and a few others.  Harrington also gave an enchanting retelling of his youthful excitement in 1965 when the current Canadian flag was adopted, which he instantly loved. 

Harrington proposed that the some Canadian flags with the red and blue ensign may have never existed, and only came into existence due to assumptions and errors.   Essentially the Admiralty was making mistakes and assumptions, based upon the hypotheticals.  As of yet there is no direct evidence that some flags existed.  Perhaps the flags were proposed, but none were created to fly on a flag pole? 

Much of flag history comes about though the official publications of government issued Naval Communications and Flag Authority books.  In this case, the Admiralty of the UK were responsible for organizing, cataloging and charting proper use of flags for use at sea.  They were never intended to be a target of vexillological or academic use, but they have become trustworthy sources for researching flags. 

ICV 27 - Speaker 3: Ted Kaye

Ted Kaye gave an overview on the current state of flag redesign with bad flags across the nation in his paper American City Flag Redesign: a Welcome Change.  Ted discussed the current spur to get new flags based upon the recent Ted Talks program by popular Internet voice Roman Mars.

Kaye attributes much momentum to change 'Bad Flags' to one particular pod cast, which you can below on YouTube or visit the site directly with the link.   It was due to 'shaming' efforts of Roman Mars that Potacello, Idaho was able to get a flag redesign for a 'Good Flag.'

Ted Kaye also analyzed why flags get stalled in the flag changing process.   Many times flag changing event are stalled due to internal politics, resentment of current political situations, and the old attachment to the original flag.




https://www.ted.com/talks/roman_mars_why_city_flags_may_be_the_worst_designed_thing_you_ve_never_noticed

ICV 27 - Speaker 2: Tiago Jose Berg

Tiago Jose Berg spoke about Vexillology with High School Students.  Since Brazil was the recent host to the International Olympic games in 2016, much of the nation was swept by that magical wand of international connections.  Berg spoke about a flag making project amongst his student body.

The high school students in Brazil were charged with recreating by hand, with paints the flags of the world.  This project slowly took over the school and the completed flags were exhibited all across the school.  Due to the quality craftsmanship of the students, their flag art was exhibited further out at universities across Brazil.

Olympics or not is always a great way to teach history by having the students create well crafted flags; as students make the flags, they are often encouraged to understand why and how the colours are used.  

ICV 27 - Speaker 1: Annie Platoff

Little Leninists: flags, symbols, and the political socialization of Soviet Children was the title of Platoff's presentation.  In the United States we have the cub scouts, boy and girl scouts, but during  the Cold War the Soviet Union had parallel organizations like the Little Octoberists and the Young Pioneers.  These often patriotic organizations are just one aspect of 'civil religions' in academia, whereby positive moral values are emphasized and patriotism for the state is encouraged.
 

Annie Platoff in 'US Civil Religion Outfit' Left - 1978

A curated selection of emblems and symbols for Soviet Era children were shown and discussed.  Platoff also emphasized that she dose not encourage nor promote the political values of the Soviet Union, but rather finds the culture of Russia to be a point of personal and professional interest.  In addition Platoff is nearly fluent in Russian and has extensively traveled across Eurasia.

The theme of the three races was also prominent of Soviet Era multiculturalism: that of the generic Sub-Saharan African, Far East Asian, and White European.  Coincidentally today the theme of the three races can be found in a similar manner in American Media parallel to Soviet Era and modern day times.

Platoff closed that nations should also explore their own 'Civil Religions'.  Essentially a key component of many Civil Religions are youth programs that teach about one's  nation and political history, in addition to giving them task oriented survival skills. 

ICV 27 Open Ceremonies

No issues, a cloudy day.

Don't Tread On Me, Cobra Kai

Cobra Kai is the fictional Dojo in the Karate Kid that trains the bullies.  Their motto is "Strike First, Strike Hard, No Mercy."  Although Cobra's don't have rattles, they do have hoods, that tell their opponent to back off or else.

An Appeal To Heaven, Christmas Flag

Merry Christmas!  Christmas in July?  It is the 25th after all.  This flag is play on the Appeal to Heaven 1776 pine tree flag.  But note that there are 13 lights on the tree, and 50 snowflakes in the background.

Feel free to make your own An Appeal To Heaven Christmas flag, but the rules are they need to have 13 decorations on the tree and 50 snowflakes or stars in the background.  And one star, angel, or whatever on the top. 

An Appeal to Heaven, The Karate Kid

The Appeal to Heaven flag was one of the original flags from the American Revolution of 1776.  It features a pine tree on a white background and the words, "An Appeal To Heaven."  But with this flag the pine tree logo of The Karate Kid takes the place of the pine tree and a slightly different saying.  Thanks to this movie a grain of love between American, Japan, and Japanese-Americans was created.

This is the second place flag with the original Appeal to Heaven mantra.

Here is the original type from 1776.

Gannon Republic Flag, California Style

Finally we have some respect for the baddest and bad guy in video games.  Gannon is the anti-hero of the Zelda universe.  Without him there is no game, no adventure, no fun.  So in honor of the great of great bad guys we have the Gannon Republic Flag, based upon the California Flag.

An Appeal To Heaven, Original Zelda

An Appeal To Heaven combines with the background trees from the original Legend of Zelda 1986.   This flag is based upon the patriotic pine tree flag from 1776.  But here the iconic trees from first Zelda game replace the tree.

Here is the second place flag that has the trees in Triforce formation.

An Appeal To Heaven, The Kite Eating Tree

Charlie Brown and the Kite Eating Tree, or rather the Charlie Brown ONLY Kite Eating Tree, makes a good fun flag with the Appeal to Heaven upon it.  In this version the Kite Eating Tree has not only ate Brown's Kite but also gave Charlie a little twist.

The original USA Pine Tree flag from 1776 had more positive connotations.

An Appeal To Heavenly Minecrafting

Minecraft is still in its initial stages, but wait till the internet goes deeper and more virtual; then this stuff will get really real.  We have a fun Minecraft Flag that plays upon the Pine Tree Patriot flag from the American Revolution of 1776.

 Here is the second place flag, that mentions Minecraft, combining the two flags more effectively. 

Here is the original flag, compared to the Minecraftified version.