Category Italy
Picnic at the Cathedral of Modena
When we arrived off our flight from Chicago, we planned to take a short train ride and spend the night in nearby Modena. We bought train tickets from a machine in the Bologna station but we couldn’t find the right departure track because it wasn’t posted on the electronic board, so I asked a station […]
Venice is not ideal for picnics or Parkinson’s
When I booked our trip to Italy, I had a choice to fly out of either Milan or Venice for the same amount of frequent flyer miles. As a smaller and car-free city, Venice seemed like the best option for HOB, who has Parkinson’s Disease. We had visited Venice one other time, and that was […]
Teatro all’Antica, Sabbioneta: ideal city as theater
Vespasiano I Gonzaga had a lot going on for him; he was a duke, he had an awesome name, and if this statue of him is realistic, he was a total hottie. But was he satisfied? Nuh uh—Duke Hottie Gonzaga wanted his very own ideal city, so in the mid 1500’s he commissioned Sabbioneta. Sabbioneta […]
Empress Theodora in the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna deserves her halo
If there was Venn diagram of things I can’t get enough of: Byzantine architecture, Western art history and Sears catalogs from the 1980’s, The Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna would be right in that sweet spot where they come together. It was built 540 in a double octagonal Byzantine-stye design that was all the […]
Art history tumbles forward with Giulio Romano’s giants in Mantua
Here’s how they did things in Italy for around 1400 years; popes, baby Jesus, really fancy places to put the popes and all the church people in, saints, more baby Jesus, everyone dies from the plague, more baby Jesus, oh hey, look— some ancient stuff—maybe we should rediscover it, let’s make some art and buildings […]
Graduate like Dante in Padua
It’s springtime in Padua, a university town, and that means graduation parties. So many wholesome scenes. Extended families presenting flowers to the proud graduate, who is decked out in a Dante-style wreath of laurels. Grampa, grandma, parents—everyone raising their spritzes in a toast which I was easily able to interpret having learned Italian as a […]
Mantua, Italy: once more, with trip hazards
I’m not a do over person, but I’ve never been able to get Mantua out of my mind. We were last here in spring 2009, after the economy crashed and flights got super cheap for a while. It was the first time we didn’t travel in winter and I remember stumbling out from looking at […]
A wardrobe malfunction in the Legend of the True Cross fresco, Arezzo
We arrived in Arezzo, a lovely art-laden town in Eastern Tuscany, with reservations to see Piero della Francesca’s Legend of the True Cross fresco cycle. Actually, I’d booked two separate viewing times, since reservations are compulsory and limited to a 1/2 half hour and that’s not enough time for us. As it turns out, we were the only visitors during both […]
Michelangelo’s strange stairway at the Laurentian Library, Florence
How can a stairway start an architectural revolution? When it’s designed by Michelangelo. Construction on the Laurentian Library of Florence began in 1525, and plans for the vestibule and stairwell to the reading room were conceived by Michelangelo when he was 50 years old. Several architects continued the project, keeping with Michelangelo’s design concept, until […]
Palazzo Schifanoia: boredom sucks, why not take a ride on a swan boat?
One day at work I made friends with an intern. His cube was across from mine and when I was walking by his desk I noticed this artwork as the background image on his computer: “Oh hey” I belted out “that’s from Palazzo Schifanoia!” You should have seen this intern’s face. “You know about Palazzo Schifanoia?!?!?!” As it […]
Picnic at the Cathedral 