Lectures, Art and Fashion from Firenze

While studying in Florence we attended lectures morning and afternoon at sites similar to Santa Croce, The Bargello, Santa Maria Novella, Uffizi Gallery, or the Pitti Palazzo and Boboli Gardens. The amount of walking we did was unbelievable and the artwork we were exposed to is unfathomable. I will link several sites for those of you who will be interested in looking at some of that art.

Also, I will add some other links of interesting design houses in Florence, that are worth viewing. We walked by these design houses to and from school everyday. I am interested in textile prints used and created by the fashion industry as wearable art. I believe art should be something we live with and enjoy. Not something just for museum galleries. For that reason, I look at fashion designers because they have the greatest opportunity for this type of exposure to a large mass market, they have been most innovative and influencial in this arena. The Italian designers reign supreme in this highly specialised area, and those of you who enjoy the impact of wearing livable art will understand where I am coming from. Salute, to the Prince of Prints, Emilio Pucci, Valentino and others that have reigned supreme in the design world. They have created over the years some of the most interesting and provacative art anywhere in the world. Bravo!

Fine Arts:
http://www.polomuseale.firenze.it/english/musei/uffizi/
http://www.sbas.firenze.it/sanmarco/index.html
http://www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/bargello/
http://www.polomuseale.firenze.it/musei/palatina/default.asp


Living Art:
http://www.emiliopucci.com/main.html
http://www.valentino.com/
http://www.robertocavalli.net/
http://www.missoni.com/eng/index.html

Home sweet Home in Florence

Via Santa Maria No.3, was the apartment we stayed in while studying in Florence, Italy. This is the outside of our apartment building its just around the corner from Gucci headquarters. It was always a welcomed sight to me after a long day. We walked over some pretty rugged streets and my feet took a beating. It was a place to rest, to wash off the dirt and grime from the day. I always stopped at the market just around the corner for fresh vegetables and fruit before going to the apartment. On certain days they run out of the special things you need in your house...like teepee. Remember many of our days started at 5:30am, and didn't end until late. I signed up for classes from 10-12 everyday..well that never happened. I think we were given some very wrong and misleading information. I suffered with my share of blistered feet, and sore muscles, I should have went through basic training before this trip! It may have slowed me down and it always seemed I was the one in the back of the group but that allowed for extra time to see things that I would have otherwised missed. Santo Spirito neighborhood had many artisan shops where still today they create the crafts that their families made centuries ago.

Ancient Rome

Roman Coliseum © 2006 LLA













Roman Forum © 2006 LLA

Sunsetting in Ancient Rome

High relief carving and coffered ancient Roman Arch of Titus, close to sunset.

If one breathes you cannot help but be moved...

Photograph taken over the Tiber River looking towards the Vatican on Pentecost Morning, just after sunrise.
© 2006 LLA

















This photograph taken from inside the Sistine chapel halls looking out into the Vatican Gardens.
© 2006 LLA

Roma..Exquisite, Eternal City, Most Magical

I fell in love with Rome the moment I arrived. Rome captured my mind, and heart with such interest and intensity because I have spent several years studying Ancient Rome from politic, city plan to art and archictecture. You cannot escape the grandeur in Rome, it captivates your eye first, then grabs your heart. I know that it is Rome, that I will return to some day. Discovering Rome with a school group is nearly impossible, and we had to move quickly through very large crowds.

Thankfully, I am a intensive observer, willing to take bits and pieces, learn what I can from them and remember to revisit those thoughts later. Rome needs careful and thoughtful attention, it is discovered by revealing layer upon layer of 2700 years of history. The food, the sounds, the people are a tantalising benefit of just 'being there', but Rome is so much more!

At Villa Borghese, I saw the most beautiful and elegant sculpture by Bernini, his David is prepared to conquer the giant and reign victoriously. His masterpiece for Cardinal Scipione Borghese depicting the chaste nymph Daphne being turned into a laurel tree, pursued in vain by Apollo god of light, will linger in your thoughts for days. It was truly exquisite. Upon entering the room you first see Apollo from behind, then the fleeing nymph appears in the process of metamorphosis, brak covers most of her body. Ovid wrote that Apollo's hand can still feel her heart beating beneath it and you sense she is still pumping. Thus the scene ends by Daphne being transformed into a laurel tree to escape her divine aggressor. The presence of this pagan myth was justified by a moral couplet composed in Latin by Cardinal Maffeo Barberini, who later would become Pope Urban VIII, and engraved on the cartouche on the base, which says: "Those who love to pursue fleeting forms of pleasure, in the end find only leaves and bitter berries in their hands".
At Villa Borghese you cannot disregard the pines of Rome, they dance with the breeze that glides over the beautiful gardens and landscape. The pines hang like shadows over the entrance to the catacombs. When you stand at the navel of the universe, above the Appian Way, you can see the pines there also, standing guard. I imagined the army of the Consul advancing towards the Sacred Way, mounting in triumph the Capitoline Hill. I was in awe!

The photograph I took from the Sistine Chapel looking into the Vatican gardens through the window, elegantly captures what I Rome gave to me in my short time there, I will carry that in my soul, until I return there someday.

"The most important monuments I take very slowly; I do nothing except look, go away, and come back and look again. Only in Rome can one educate oneself for Rome."
Goethe

View of Florence from Fiesole

"...that which half emerges from the dim background of time is strangely stirring" D.H. Lawrence

Mantova...the delights and taste of the table

okay..so we ate a lot!

Mantova is a beautiful, historic city surrounded on three sides by lakes. It was one of the greatest Renaissance Courts in Europe and home of the wealthy Gonzaga family. The town's center has three piazzas that join together. And someone thought it was a good idea to stuff tortelini with pumpkin, it is delicious!

Siena...

First settled in 900 BC, by the Etruscans, a Tuscan hillside town is rich in history with Romanesque archictecture and Gothic influences has the most interesting piazza's. It is fan shaped and the Roman aquaducts end there in the piazza. We had a three hour lunch here in Siena. I have never seen so much food, from raviolni to boar meat and peccorino cheeses. The special wines are a delightful part of the meal. The town of Montepulciano is the home of a celebrated wine amongst connoisseurs and is one of the oldest Tuscan reds, Vino Nobile. Our professors and some of my fellow classmates.

Tuscan landscape in San Gimignano

Dreaming through the noble Tuscan landscape...I feel that life is altogether bounteous and good, lovable, manageable and sweet even in the rain.

Reached Pisa by Train...

This was our illustrious leader Dr. Medicus, my room mate Brittany and myself standing at Campo dei Miracoli, (Field of Miracles). aka. Piazza del Duomo, (Cathedral Saquare). This complex was started in 1064 by Buschetto. Giovanni Pisano's pulpit is an amazing marble structure that shows nine different scenes from the New Testament in high Relief, carved in white marble. The influences of Byzantium are numerous, and add an elegance all their own to this site.

Update from the author of this blog

This blog is a work in progress. The dates will not reflect the actual date events took place. I am not sure if I can change the dates when I edit my journal. I don't know that it is possible. I will share with you as much as I am able to...there is a lot to share. I will want to tell the stories of the people I met, the things I discovered about myself and others, as well as the friends I made and the lovers I left behind...jk. Okay, I got your attention which tells me you are reading the journal! Be patient, make a hot cup of tea and go on a journey with me through my eyes and experiences in Italy. I hope you enjoy what I've written, I know that the photos will help to tell the stories. The photographs I took are in high resolution, so it will take time for me to resize them for the blog. Ciao, Ciao!

View up the Arno River

This was what I looked at every morning on my way to school. This is about 7 am. on my way to the train station. The photograpgh is undeniably beautiful, what it doesn't capture is the cool breeze on your face, or the sounds of the birds swooping down at the water probably looking for breakfast. This will be the only quiet time of day in this city of 400,000 inhabitants and all of those tourists, and of course those students too!



© 2006 LLA

6AM typical start time

Two of the "Visconti Girls", Megan on the left and Arianna start their morning with some breakfast while everyone else is asleep. Our apartment had three bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, a common area, kitchen, laundry room and a lovely courtyard, which I found to offer up some very nice light into the apartment. The sounds of the common scooter took some adjusting to and start whizzing by outside pretty early in the day!

My idea of how to start the day..

The heart of any home...la cucina

This is where the most activity was throughout our stay in Florence. We hosted dinner parties for twenty people plus, packed lunches, studied into the wee hours, and drank our share of chianti at this table. I gave the roses to Bruno,64 and his lovely wife Castalina, age unknown but she was a true Florentine Beauty. They invited me into their workshop often. I took them cappucino when I didn't have to race off to school.

Santo Spirito at Sunset

This is the neighborhood that I shared an apartment with five other room mates known as the "Visconti Girls", a bunch of crazy girls that didn't let me sleep much. There was never a dull moment at Via Santa Maria No.3. which isn't far from Via Porta Romana. Remember, this city has ancient ties...the Romans had been here and there is a wall around the whole city to prove it, not to mention an ancient amphitheatre and Roman baths in Fiesole. Many artisans still have workshops in this neighborhood that go back many generations.

San Giovanni Duomo

This is the city of Florence, I called this place home from May 16th until July 10th. Florence (Firenze) is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance and is the pulse of Tuscany. During the Renaissance out of the 1000 of the most important artists in Europe at least five hundred of them lived and worked here in this most magnificent place on the Arno River. Brunelleschi's cupola, is probably the most photographed structure in all of Italy. Influenced by Roman archictecture and the pantheon, Brunelleschi's cupola is an engineering marvel. Over 500 stairs to climb to the top of the cupola and I did it twice.

Santa Maria Novella Train Station

I flew into Milano days ahead of my group and travelled three hours by fast train to Florence (Firenze) Italia. When I stepped off the train this is where I found myself inside Stazione di Treno Santa Maria Novella. This is a very important place...especially when you have no other mode of transportation and you need to get in or out of town. This is the main train station in Florence , I learned in the upcoming weeks how to buy tickets, no need to be shy...I just watched what the Italians did and then bought our biglietti. When I was running late I bought my espresso and my favorite breakfast treat burdino di risso at the station, and boarded the trains in and out of the city to Pisa, Rome, Venice, and the Italian Riviera for over two months. Its very loud in this space and you have to pay attention in and around the station. There are those who lurk in the shadows, and sometimes they hang out in open spaces too, often they do not have your best in mind! It doesn't hurt to know some rough Italian either, "Cose voi?", no.. I don't mean a rough Italian guy either. On a side note that could be helpful, I guess! Usually, rough people run with other rough people, so be cautious who you hang out with!! I had to be aggressive with a few people, something I refrain from doing unless i feel threatened! Never go into the train stations without some loose euro because you must pay for the bathrooms and I found out it is difficult to get change. Somehow I did more than manage to be safe and mindful of my surroundings. I had fun and lively conversations with crazy-smart people in the process and learned to be autonomous and enjoy where I was.

The Dreamer that Travelled

Ciao..This is me 'Linda', just days after final exams and the day before my departure to Italy. I am studying with the Art and Culture Program through Kent State University Florence, Italy for three months. I have travelled only once to Europe, I spent some time in Munich, Salzburg and Vienna, five years ago. I thought then that I grew as a human being, from my experiences and interactions with people from those travels. I can't wait to begin this new adventure, to walk the halls that many great historical figures have walked. To stand high on a hillside and take in the vistas that many a great man and woman have viewed, including some of my family, who left Italy over a century ago. I can only imagine how this will cultivate my interests, and how it will effect the way, I see the world, the people, the art and history.
This blog and all photographs are Copyright 2006 by Linda Lee Andi, Garrettsville, Ohio