Tuesday, September 25, 2007

reading in the roses


(copied from journal entry written in the Boboli Gardens)

This is so weird, but I am SO happy to be home in Florence. Or maybe what's weird is that Florence IS home, and is now really starting to feel like it. Capri was obviously incredible, but I must admit, by Sunday afternoon I was really looking forward to coming home to Florence. Home.. to Florence. Weird. And I was also strangely excited to be back in school - this week it suddenly feels like I am actually IN school again, but IN Florence, which is really exciting.

For example, yesterday our Italian teacher told us that instead of having class today, we were going to meet all the way across the Arno in Piazza Pitti to visit an artisan woodworker’s workshop. Um, okay!?!? This is so cool for many different reasons. Firstly, we got to talk to this adorable little old carpenter man in his workshop, where he restores antique woodwork, particularly frames from the Renaissance. Getting to talk to this guy who has spent his entire life making tangible things with tangible tools, all by hand, was really really inspiring. It felt like we were in the presence of an endangered species or something, or at least it felt that way to me.

Secondly, the trip was awesome because today is Tuesday, one of my amazingly free days, in which this “Italian class” (if you can call it that) is my ONLY class. Therefore I was able to wake up late (and therefore go out last night to an adorable little bar downtown called Art Bar, where the drinks themselves are like works of art, with like pounds of fresh fruit hanging over the rim of every glass, and the best mojito this side of Havana), take a nice long stroll to class, chill with a cute little craftsman, then spend the rest of the day hanging around on of the most interesting and beautiful areas of Florence. Pretty cool.

So after “class” I grabbed myself a prosciutto, mozzarella, rucola, tomato, and grilled eggplant panino with pesto from Gustapanino (I am forever indebted to you, Ashley Martin – it was the most delicious thing EVER), and headed over to the Boboli Gardens – the gardens attached to the Medici Palace, Palazzo Pitti. And with my fucking AWESOME museum card, I strolled right up to the ticket kiosk, past the 20-minute line of sad-sacks waiting to pay a full-price entrance fee, flashed the card, and was given a free ticket not only to the Gardens but to the Palazzo’s museum as well – and I could technically do this every day if I wanted to. I freaking LOVE this program.

So I am currently laying on a shady bench along an elevated rose garden that overlooks the Tuscan countryside south of Florence, with a belly full of cured pork and olive oil, about to do my Art History reading – I can’t imagine how life could get any better, really.

And it’s not just today – tomorrow my Art History class is meeting onsite at the Casa Buonarroti (as in Michelangelo Buonarroti) to look at the Michelangelos we have been studying in class, and right after that, my Italian class is watching an Italian film for the entire class period called La Finestra di Fronte, featuring the hot limoncello guy from Under the Tuscan Sun. AND, after class tomorrow, I’m going to my first football game – Roma vs. Firenze. So exciting.

And thankfully for my poor wallet, I have been given so much painting homework that I’m going to have to stick around Florence this weekend, however, I’m actually excited about it because the homework is actually really cool. Thursday after my lone Italian class, I’m gonna stick around school and do my regular painting homework, which is to do a subtractive self portrait in oil (aka painting the canvas a uniform dark tone and then carving out the lights with a rag – pretty much the most therapeutic process EVER). Then, for the next 3 weeks, the advanced students have an extra assignment to go to a different one of Florence’s more strange, lesser-known museums each week and pick out 3 scenes/objects/whatever that we are particularly drawn to, and do three separate sketches of each object: one quick sketch, one long tonal study, and one study in color. She’s really adamant about the advanced students exploring our interests and figuring out what we are attracted to, visually, which is really cool, but man, 9 separate drawings per week is VERY intense. But cool.

So Friday morning I’m hitting up this weird, somewhat-outdated zoology museum, Il Museo di Specola, to sketch badly-stuffed animals and wax figures of the human anatomy. Hahah. But luckily the museum is RIGHT in Piazza Pitti again, in the cool part of town and a block away from Gustapanino (is it sick that I’m already anticipating Friday’s lunch and it’s only Tuesday?).

Then Saturday I’m signed up for an optional trip to Ravenna to check out the Byzantine mosaics with all my Architecture friends, which should be fun and will be a nice break on the wallet (the school provides the busses and entrance fees to all the museums, etc.), and Sunday I’m wide open. I am so excited for this week.

Ok, time to leggere – a presto!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

you answered my question about the drinks in this entry. That looked like a crazy mojito in your facebook album. Can you post pictures of the sketches you made or the self portrait?

Paul said...

Love your blog, Alex. It makes me hunger for Italian sight-seeing and Italian food. The drinks at Art Bar intrigue me to no end. I wonder if there is a drink of choice among the people of Firenze, like Campari or Cynar or Aperol.