Vienna Waits for You

off to Vienna until Sunday morning!

Third Times a Charm

Today we went to the Tempietto for class, which is the third time I've been. Its just a small little temple, so there isn't too much to see. But I tried to get a few new sketches in. It is up on the Gianicolo, which has a great view of the city. It was beautiful up there today, so I didn't mind seeing the Tempietto again.


Before the Tempietto we went to Santa Maria della Pace. It was my first time there. It is a small church which is notable because legend has it someone threw a rock at a painting of the Virgin Mary, and the painting bled. Since then it considered a pilgrimage site. There is also a cloister, designed by Bramante (who also did the Tempietto). It was partially covered by a temporary exhibit, which was basically a glass-like tent in the center of the space.


The sunset walking home the other night was incredible....

Why David, What Big Feet You Have!

After Vicenza, Bridget and I headed to Venice. We woke up early and hopped an 8:30 train. We got into the city around 9:00 and made our way across the Rialto Bridge towards San Marco Square. Half of the roads in Venice dead end, so even though we were trying to take the route not marked by signs, it was pretty hard. We ended up on the street below, which was incredibly thin.


We made it to San Marco and did a quick sketch. There were a bunch of tourists standing among the hoards of pidgeons and taking pictures of the pidgeons landing on their arms and heads. It was gross. And at some point during the day I got pooped on, luckily it was on the leg, and I figured chances are it was sometime when we were around the birds. We then walked a little behind the square and went to a museum which was partially designed by Carlo Scarpa. He designed the exhibit rooms so that if the canals flooded you could still walk in the spaces. We weren't technically allowed to take photos, but Bridget and I snuck our cameras in and were able to take a few shots.


After about 2 hours of sketching (we had to make the 6 euro entry fee worth it) we headed to find a mask, Bridget wanted to get one for her godmother. We looked in several incredible mask stores, I couldn't believe how intricate some of the masks were. My favorite ones were scroll cut metal, but they were over 100 euro which was not worth it to me.


After Bridget found a mask, we went and looked for Cannoli. A few days ago I realized I hadn't had one since I had been in Italy. The ones we found in Venice were delicious. After the dessert, we wandered town a bit more, somewhat successfully getting lost, and then we hopped a train to Florence.


Oh and for all you 24 fans, Venice has a Hotel Bauer.


We got into Florence around 9:30 at night and settled into our Hostel around 10. The next morning we got up early, got some cappuccino and made our way to the David (which for some reason I kept calling micheal). We waited in line for about 20 minutes but then didn't end up going in the museum because it was too expensive and there was no student discount. He is right in the beginning of the museum though, so we could see him through the lobby. And man is he huge. We walked over to the Duomo and there was surprisingly no line to get in, so we began our ascent right away.


It was remarkable to be inside the Duomo and once we got to the top Bridget and I hung out for about an hour and a half sketching. And then we ate some potato chips and they were delicious.


On the way down Bridget noticed this beauty of a mural on the inside of the Dome, which yes is a church.


We wandered around Florence for the rest of the afternoon and sketched a bit on a bridge. In the main Piazza they have a replica of David which stands were the original used to be.

We walked a bit more and then headed back to Rome. The only tickets on the next train were first class and so we went back in style. We even got free coffee and peanuts and very nice cushy seats.


Once we were back in Rome we ended up going to get sushi which was delicious. We were both so tired we just lazed around all night.

nuns:223 priests:111

Northern Italy anyone?

The northern trip started the same as the southern trip at 8:00 in the morning. We drove about 3 1/2 hours before hitting our first stop, the Chiesa del Autostrada. It was a church constructed in the 60s to commemorate the workers who died building Rome's autostrada. We were only there about and hour and a half, and the time went fast. The inside was really hard to draw, so sketching took up a lot of my time. As you can see from the picture below, the church is literally right off the highway.


After the autostrada we headed 2 hours or so to Modena to see Aldo Rossi's cemetary. We spent some time sketching there, it is a very modern cemetary, and was designed to be a city. The graves are actually like the catacombs in that they are open squares that are then filled and sealed with a stone. It was freezing there though, and by the time we left it was nice to be back on the warm bus.



That night around 6, we got to Mantua which is where we were staying for the night. Our hotel was in the center of town, and our room looked out over the main piazza. Strangely Mantua is slightly a dead town at night which is unusual for italy. A group of us went to dinner and I got some pumpkin ravioli, it was regular ravioli with a spicy pumpkin filling, yum!


The next morning we went to two Palazzo's in Mantua. The first was the Ducale Palace, it had a hall of mirrors, and a bunch of painted cielings. There was also an art exhibit going on in another part of the palace, and there was one room called an ambient space, and you walked in and it was completely black. I dragged two other people from the class in with me because i was afraid to go alone, and we ended up finding a slightly secret space. There were all of these interlocking basement rooms with low vaulted cielings, at one point we ended up in some kind of mechanical room. The spaces more interesting then the art exhibit, so I'm glad I found them.


The next palazzo was the Palazzo del Te, which was a pleasure palace of the same family who built the Palazzo Ducale. It has a lot of famously painted cielings, one of which is the Hall of Giants. The room was painted to look like an earthquake was occuring. I wandered upstairs to an art gallery space, and then ended up stumbling upon an exhibit space that was built over the front entrance. The floor was built up because the vaulting below is exposed.

After the Palazzo del Te I wandered back towards the hotel, stopping in San Sebastiano, which is a church by Alberti. It was designed in the round, and has a WWII memorial underneath (which is not original to the church). One of my favorite things was the chairs, which had small crosses on the back.


The next morning we headed to Verona to see the Castelvecchio. The Castelvecchio was an old palace which was turned into an art museum by Carlo Scarpa. It is extremely well know amoung architects because of Scarpa's attention to detail. I tried to spend most of my time sketching, although I couldn't resist taking a few pictures.

Then a few of us wandered Verona to look at the outside of another Scarpa building, which was slightly underwhelming. Then we had to get back to the bus for the next leg of our trip.

The next stop was the Villa Rotunda, a country Villa for a former Priest. It was designed by Palladio, who is well known for his Villas. It was designed to be symmetrical on all four sides, with a dome in the center. We couldn't go inside because the inside closes after October 15th. The outside is still amazing though.


Then we settled into our hotel in Vicenza, which is about 1/2 hour away from Venice. A group of us went to dinner, and I had some pumpkin risotto. The next morning we came down for breakfast and it was a huge spread. In Mantua we had only gotten rolls and coffee. In Vicenza though there was fruit, cereal, croissants, cappucino, fruit juice, pastries, it was incredible. It was a good start for the next day which involved an 1.5 hour ride out to the Brion Cemetary, another Scarpa work. It was done for the Brion family, although more for the mother and father of the family. There are only two graves in the complex, which also includes a chapel and a variety of structures and water features. It was a beautiful place, Scarpa liked it so much he asked to be buried there.

That afternoon we went to the Teatro Olimpico which was a theater designed in perspective. There are seven streets that converge onto the center of the stage. From the seats you can see down the streets, which were built as a temporary set but have never been removed.


That night we got dinner in Vicenza, it was one of the best meals I've had. I started with pumpkin soup (a common theme in my norhtern meals) and then pasta with scallops and mussels. It was so delicious and it was only about 11 euro. Brianne, Bridget and I went back to the hotel and ended up watching some strange italian music videos, which are really one of a kind. We went to bed a little early because Bridget and I had to get up early to leave for Venice the next morning.

Weekend Rome-ings

Saturday was a pretty easy day for me, I had some group work to do in the morning and then in the afternoon I walked over to the Piazza del Popolo. I went specifically to check out Santa Maria del Popolo, which has 3 Caravaggio paintings. 2 of them are about Saint Paul, one is his crucifixion and the one below is called "The Conversion on the Way to Damascus."


Then I went to the Villa Borghese to sit and read, it was a beautiful day out, very fall like. There were a bunch of families at the park and a bunch of italian couples doing the only thing they do, which is makeout.

This morning I slept in a bit, and then headed over to a building in Trastevere which has just started to give a series of lectures on Dante's Inferno. Today's was just an introduction to the work, and so I just sat and listened to the Italian. I sketched the lecture room and then made a list of all the words I recognized. It was an interesting way to spend an hour. Next week someone will be reading Canto I, so I'm planning on going back and checking it out. The building itself is medieval looking and when you walk in the front door you end up in a courtyard.


After the lecture I went over to the Campidoglio, which is a plaza designed by Michelangelo, it is right beyond Vittorio Emmanuel and the Roman Forum. The plaza pavement is designed in the shape of an oval star. It was very crowded as usual, but I sat and sketched for about an hour. It was warm today and felt good to be in the sun.


I then walked out to my final Pilgrammage church, San Lorenzo outside the Walls. San Lorenzo from what I read is basically the patron saint of Rome and considered to be a very important early Christian Martyr. The church was constructed over his buriel site. The church has a school and a convent attached to it and is a rather large compound.


Next door is the Verano Cemetary, which may be one of the most beautiful places I've been too. I spent about an hour just walking around and sketching all the monuments. The majority of the grave markers I saw looked like miniature buildings. However I probably only covered about 1/4 of the cemetary at most.


nuns:218 priests:107

Skull and Bones

Friday before class I walked over to Santa Maria del Concezione. It has a crypt below the church that is decorated with skulls and various other bones. There was one portion that was all hip bones. It was slightly strange to see, but surprisingly didn't seem to gross. Even though I got there right before it closed, there were a lot of people there. I found it slightly more claustrophobic then the Catacombs because the crypt only had one was in and out, so people were pretty crammed. I didn't spend too much time in there for that reason.

The other night there was a crazy thunderstorm in Rome. Lightning, Thunder, the whole works. Below is a picture someone took of the storm. The plaza is the Campo de Fiori, our school is right off the Campo.


nuns: 204 priests: 99

studio, studio, studio

nuns:201 priests: 97

Now that we have our project I've been a bit busier than usual with school-stuff, so I haven't been able to see much. We had a paper due today and we have a concept review tomorrow for our building idea.

We only had one history/sketching class this week, we went to Saint Agnese and the Mausoleum of Constantina. The Mausoleum was in the round, and the outer circle had some of the oldest surviving glass mosaics.


After the mausoleum we went into the Catacombs under Saint Agnese, they were slightly claustrophobic, being that we were underground in a cave. The ceiling was pretty close to my head, which gives you an idea of how closed in the space actually was. It was interesting to see how they used to bury people though and the differences between the wealthy and poor. The grave-slots of the wealthy were closed off with marble, which the poor folk were closed with brick. There were 3 floors of catacombs, but only the top was open for the tour, and we couldn't take pictures so I can't show you what they look like. But below is a close up of a cool door.