Cimitero Monumentale di Staglieno

Genoa Cemetery- September 22, 2011

Today we visted the biggest cemetery in Genoa, and one of the biggest and most imporatnt cemeteries in Europe. I was wondering how we were going to fit just a cemetery into a half day trip, but when we got there and started walking around I realzied how big it was(more than a square kilometer) and how much there was to see. You could easily spend a few hours just walking around, enjoying the scenery and sounds and artistic quality of the place- it was very peaceful. This cemetery was created as a monument to the Plague in Europe, and it doubles as an open air museum of sculptures that extends from the valley up the hill where there is a great view of Genoa. Over 3 million people have been buried here and I can see why, it is a beautiful place. The cemetery was full of giant tombs that families own, and when a member of the family dies, they open the tomb for that person(this seemed a little odd to me). The richer families have giant tombs with detailed statues depicting a trait or mourning of the family that is still living. Guiditta told us some meanings behind the statues- some dealing with men who have died in war, or people who were charitable and so on. More than anything though, this graveyard we just a very peaceful and beautiful place.

Tomorrow we have the Villa Party!

I can't complain, I'm in Italy!

Vicenza and Verona- September 16th-18th, 2011

The next day we headed to Vicenza. We had a chartered bus for class which took us around to see the sites. We were following an architectural trail throughout the region, visiting different important sites by architects of the area (mainly Palladio and Carlo Scarpa). We started at a Gipsoteca museum in Possagno, Italy (on our way to Vicenza) which was home to Antonio Canova who was a famous sculptor. A gipsoteca is a museum that houses plaster casts and rough models of what later would become sculptures. This was cool to see how these sculptures were created and the tactics the artists used to keep the proportions right throughout the sculptures.

After this museum we went to Brion Cemetery which was completely designed by Scarpa. At first I was thinking we are visiting a cemetery? It ended up being really neat, with interesting buildings and more importantly interesting details and lighting of the buildings. Unfortunately I could only appreciate the building and landscape for so long before the onslaught of mosquitos began. Luckily we were only there for a few more minutes before heading to lunch. For lunch we ate at a pizzeria which was basically in the middle of nowhere… as much as I enjoyed the pizza here, the prices of the pizza were better. After being in Vienna and Venice for 6 days, a 5 euro pizza was great compared to the 10 euro pizzas which didn’t taste as good!

images from Brion Cemetery

a cool plant I found in Brion Cemetery

After lunch we visited two Palladian villas. The first villa we visited is owned by a couple from Atlanta who happened to be there at the time, so the wife showed us around the house which was neat. Once again, there was an absurd amount of mosquitos in the area. The second villa has been in a family forever, and they still live there as well, so the son of the couple who owns it now took us around. Here, there was a fish pond in the back yard which attracted what seemed like millions of (you guessed it) mosquitos. At one point I looked down at my legs and saw 5 mosquitos on one of them. Anyway, I was at a Palladian villa in Italy so I couldn’t complain. Anyways, I can’t begin to imagine what it would be like to own a historical Palladian villa in Italy. That night we stayed in Vicenza which is full of more Palladian work! (I was a little Palladio-ed out but the end of these few days). I counted my mosquito bites before I went to bed…I got to 57 before I gave up. But as a few of us began saying, "we can't complain, we are in Italy!"
Tomorrow we were off to the Villa Rotunda and a tour of Vicenza.

second Palladian villa we visited

the pond where I recieved most of my mosquito bites

The Villa Rotunda(yet another Palladian villa) was cool to see since it was something I studied in school, however I was not overly impressed with it. It might be a result of seeing nearly 10 Palladian buildings on this trip before this one! Later that day we had a tour around Vicenza to see even more Palladian palaces! I won’t go into details, but I have now seen A LOT of Andrea Palladio’s work! That night we headed to Verona,Italy (where Romeo and Juliet are said to be from).

Villa Rotunda

I am pretty sure the main reason we went to Verona was so that our Brazilian professor could go to this Brazilian steakhouse that he raves about. I didn’t go because it would cost 30 euros+, but apparently it was amazing and I wish I could have gone! I had Italian instead. After staying in Verona for the night, we began our last day on this trip, which was by far the most relaxed day of the entire week, and the only rainy day we have had since being in Itlay. We just visited the Verona coliseum in the morning, and then we went to Castelvecchio, which is an old medieval castle/museum with modifications made by Carlo Scarpa. It was actually really cool to see how the modern touches connected with the old medieval aspects of the building. We were done with those two things by noon, so we had the rest of the day to get lunch, shop and explore before finally heading back to Genoa at 5.

view of Verona from the Colliseum

view of Verona from Castelvecchio

The train ride home was a little chaotic at first. Every once in a while, trains will go on strike and they just won’t show up at the station when they are supposed to. This happened with our first train to Milan. Luckily, there was another train going to Milan, and just as we realized our train wasn’t coming the other train pulled in. So we booked it through the crowd down the stairs and back up again to hop on the new train before it pulled away. Apparently many other people had this idea as well since the one train was on strike, so this new train was soooooo crowded I could barely move. After standing in the hallway of this train for an hour and a half we made it to Milan where we had plenty of time to get to our much more comfortable, reserved train back to Genoa. As much fun as I had on this first trip, I was very glad to be back!

Venice.

Venice- September 13-15th, 2011

I went into Venice not expecting to be blown away. I have heard from many people that the city is overrated and dirty. After making my own impression, I would say that Venice is a beautiful city, full of character and history- but at the same time I wouldn’t say that it is a clean city.. how could it be when it is packed full of tourists and pigeons?

We took the overnight train from Vienna to Venice which was not as good of an experience as the first overnight train we took. This train packed six couchettes (beds on the train) into a cabin, as opposed to the four in the previous train. Basically it was hard to sleep and our first day in Venice I was pretty tired and felt very dirty. We started by visiting a museum created by architect Scarpa which was nice, however I was too tired to really appreciate it. After that, Guiditta gave us a few hours to freshen up at the hotel and get lunch which was a much needed break. At about 3, we continued our tour of Venice visiting Piazza San Marco, which is the main plaza in Venice. Guiditta gave us the history on all the buildings in the square - she is very knowledgeable as she lived in Venice for 7 years, and she has an architecture history background. We then went into the Basilica di San Marco, and into the Doge’s palace which are both located on the square. After that we were free to explore. Our hotel for the three nights in Venice was once again very nice. It was located on a small canal and it had a nice balcony looking over the canal which we all hung out on every night.

The next whole day, we visited the Biennale exhibit, the arsenale (an old arsenale which housed many exhibits) in the morning and the gardens in the afternoon. I had no idea what I was getting into with this exhibit, but it was not your average museum. The arsenale was full of crazy installment- anything from wax figures that were burning, to architectural models made from anything you could think of, mirror art, movies.. pretty much anything you would not find in your average museum. One exhibit was a projected video in a big area with a bunch of big white couches. Naturally, I took advantage of the chance to take a break and sit. The video projected was hard to understand at first- it was a bunch of movie clips (old and new-each for about 10 sec.) all complied together. I was trying to find a connection between them for the longest time, but the only thing I could make of it is that in all of the clips there was something to do with time. Finally I looked at my watch to see what time it was only to realize that the time shown in the clip was like a clock for the present time. All of the clips were put together to have a part reflecting the present time of the viewer. After walking through this exhibit for a while, I realized that most of these installments just made you think about what they were or what they represented. After lunch, we went on to the next part of the Biennale exhibit which was the Giardini della Biennale. This part was a bunch of architectural buildings that housed different exhibits. Each country had a building, and the exhibits inside of them sometimes related to the country, but sometimes they were just weird. This second part of the Biennale was similar to the first, with odd exhibits... the best way I can describe this part was that it is a bunch of little fun houses. I liked the second part(the gardens) more than the arsenale. That night we took the waterbus (they have boat buses here since they have no car roads) to some nearby islands which have 3 Palladian churches. We visited 2 of them, and went up in the tower of one to get a really nice view of Venice. These were buildings that I studied in art history as well. That night I was pretty tired, so I grabbed a slice of pizza from a vendor and got some gelato and went straight to bed!

Our last day in Venice, we visited two museums and a church. We went to the Punta Della Dogana, which is a museum by architect Tado Ando, which once again housed a lot of strange art. The design of the building made up for the odd art. We also went to the Peggy Guggenheim Museum which was Peggy Guggenheims old house on the main canal. This was the only museum we went to in Venice that had “normal art” that you would find in a museum. It had a lot of modern and impressionist works. The church we visited was the Chiesa Della Salute which was yet again another Palladian church. We finished our tour with Guiditta at about 3, so we had the rest of the day to ourselves to sketch and shop and explore!

After Venice we were off to Vicenza and Verona!

What is so special about Vienna?

Vienna- September 9th-12th 2011

We started our first week of travel in Vienna, Austria! I was a little hesitant about what we were going to see that was of any importance, however Vienna quickly became one of my favorite cities thus far. I don't know if it was the refreshing change to German culture after being in Italy for four weeks(not that I don't love Italy) that made me appreciate this city, or if it was recieving something that I did not expect from this city... I just know that I had a great time here and would love to come back someday!

view from top of Stephenplatz

We started our first day in Vienna fresh off the overnight train from Genoa.. which surprisingly was not that bad of a nights sleep(I just wish I could have had a shower!). We went straight to Stephansplatz which is the main square in Vienna to start our sightseeing. We started by climbing 300+ stairs to the top of the St. Stephans Cathedral to get a view of the city. I didnt think the spiral stairs would ever end, however once we got to the top the view was great! It was good to get an overview of the city before we visited different places. After that, we went to the American Bar, which is a famous restauarnt by architect Adolf Loos, and we saw many more of his creations. After lunch, we went to the Albertina, which was a great museum housing mainly modern and impressionist art- Monet, Gustav Klimnt(which is all over Vienna), among others. The entrance to the musuem was very neat as well... the steps each had a strip of a Monet painting to create a whole painting when looking horizontally at the staris. I was very impressed with this museum!

Albertina stairs

Throughout the next two days, we saw so many things I cannot remember which day we went to them! We went to the Kunst Haus Wein(which I learned translates to House of Art after I asked why there is another Kunst Haus (Graz) in Graz, Austria). This building was designed by artist Hundertwasser, who I had never heard of before this trip, but who I love. The building was very eccentric itself, and the art inside was of the same style. I ended up liking this museum so much I bought a poster of one of his works. We also saw another one of his creations which was an apartment building with the same eccentric style. We visited some buildings I studied in my architecture hisotry classes which I had forgotten were in Vienna(the Looshaus by Adolf Loos, and Postsparkasse by Otto Wagner). We also visited a few new interesting apartment complexes that have really transformed Vienna into a great place to live. One of them had an outdoor play area which of course we took advantage of... they also had outdoor work out equipment such as a two elliptical that ended up being more fun for us than a work out! Ive realized that studying these buildings in class, while maybe a little boring at the time, really makes visiting them more interesting. It was also very nice to have a guide (Guditta- who lives in Genoa and takes us on all of our travels.. who is awesome by the way) to take us around and show us things that have architectural interst.

Kunst Haus Wein

We visited three more museums in Vienna(yes.. I am museumed out for a while). The Succession, which was a small Gustav Klimnt museum with one mural, would have been to small to call interesting except for this mirror installation that was a lot of fun to take pictures on. There were hanging circular mirrors that reflected all over the room so you could get views of people from strange angles. We also went to the Belvedeere musuem, which had a very impressive collection and a great garden area. Finally we went to the Leopold Museum, which if you asked me I couldnt really tell you what it held. I dont know if I was over museums at this point, but this was definately my least favorite. I guess they didn't save the best for last this time!

at the Belvedeer

fun mirror installation

Normally endless museums would not make me like a city this much, however the combination of musuems and the culture of the place(people/street preformers everywhere) was great! Not to mention, our hotel (Hotel AM Konzerthaus) was very comfortable and had an AMAZING breakfast(coming from someone who is not a huge breakfast person.. not to mention good breakfasts seem to be rare in Europe). I would highly recomend this hotel to anyone visiting Vienna. I was sad to leave Vienna(it is a pretty special place), but very excited to be going to Venice! We just had another overnight trainride to get there...

street preformers

Nice is Nice!

Last weekend, a bunch of us headed up to Nice, France for the weekend. We planned the trip very last minute (the night before we left) so we were a little leary of the reservations and the hostel we booked. Fortunately, the hostel(Hotel Baccarat) was very nice! Almost nicer than some of the hotels I stayed in with my parents the first week(which isnt saying much in once case)! And by coincidence, there was a large group of Georgia Tech engineering students staying at the hostel at the same time. It was really nice to meet people who live so nearby to home! One of them even graduated from the same highschool and same year as my friend Kristen! Small world! While in Nice, we did not really see any big sights(lack of planning), but we shopped around(very good shopping in Nice, but I didnt buy anything) , went to the beach, and had some good dinners. The first night I got some pasta dish with shrimp in it. This was leaving my comfort zone.. I dont usually like seafood. The dish came out and the shrimp still had their whole bodies entact. At first I was a little disgusted, however it ended up tasting great! Who would have known. Dinner the next night was really good as well. It was a pizza and bread dish- I dont really know how else to describe it.. but it was good. Sunday morning we planned on going to Monaco on the way home, but it was pouring down rain so we ended up staying on the train back to Genoa. This weekend ended up being a good break from the busy schedule we have had in Genoa! It was really nice to arrive back in Genoa... it is already starting to feel like home. This Friday we leave for our first week long trip to Vienna, Venice, and Verona!

the beach in Nice

finding sea glass

Portofino

Last Sunday one group headed for the beach and the other group headed for Portofino. I decided to go to Portofino and I am glad I did! This was the most beautiful place I have ever been to! We got off the train in Santa Margarita and walked 3 miles along the ocean to get to the Portofino. There wasn’t a lot to see in terms of sites, but I could stare at the landscape and colorful buildings for days. We also hiked up the peninsula a little more to get to a lighthouse and to see the ocean better. This town is where the movie stars all used to vacation in the 70s and 80s, and we were told that Denzel Washington was there the week before with his family! I guess I was a week late! I’ll let the pictures do the rest of the talking!

The Villa!

The villa is very nice! While I had some idea of what I was getting into before I came, I had imagined this place to be completely different. The main levels are coated with marble flooring and details that you cannot find in construction these days. The bottom level is the kitchen, dining area, and laundry (in the garage); the second level is studio and the library, and this is the level that opens up to the garden area, and the third level is all of our bedrooms and bathrooms. I have found in my first week here that it is pretty nice to be able to walk down the stairs to get to studio- where at school you have to get in your car, drive to studio, find a parking spot and then hike to class! Everyone seems to get along pretty well, and everyone seems fun to hand around! I was worried about not knowing anyone, however everyone seems very nice!
At the beginning of each semester, students are given a chore or responsibility. My chore (along with Laura Lynn) is to run down the stairs to the local bread shop and buy the bread and focaccia for the day. It is kind of fun to talk to the ladies at the bread shop in Italian and order bread each day. It is a nice way of life to get what you need each day (since everything is so fresh). Sometimes, after my bread run, I go for a jog up the hill behind the villa. It took me a few times to get used to the hills, but once you get to the top the views are amazing! You can see down the other side of the mountain to the towns below, there is part of a fort up on the hill that I run near, and you can see the other direction towards the ocean, which gives you an exaggerated view of what I see at the villa every day.
On Saturday afternoon, our professor (who is from Brazil) had a Brazilian BBQ in the garden. We sat out there all day, eating the steaks he cooked along with some sides Laura Lynn cooked. It was fun to relax and get to know everyone better!

The first week here, we have had Italian lessons for 2+ hours each day. I pretty much know the basics of Italian and I know how to ask essential questions now! Sunday night, we went to a nice Italian restaurant with our teacher and had a 5 course Italian meal. It started with an appetizer, which I am not entirely sure what it was, but seemed like two different breads- one with cheese and the other more potatoey with rosemary in it... needless to say it was delicious. The second course was pasta, and we were given a tortellini type of pasta (but not exactly tortellini) with a walnut cream sauce. This sauce was the best sauce I have ever had... I need to find a recipe! The other pasta we were given to sample was regional pasta with pesto sauce. For our main course we were given the choice of a local fish, or chicken along with potatoes. I chose the chicken of course. It was very good but by this point, I was pretty full! Finally we were given desert, and later coffee. The desert was an ice cream/pastry mix (so I was told). It was not as cold as normal ice cream, but it was very good and refreshing!

The rest of my weekly schedule:
Monday: Studio
Tuesday: Travel days- visit nearby towns/cities
Wednesday: Modern European Architecture and Studio
Thursday: Sketch class and Studio
Friday: Italian Rationalism... then we are free to leave for the weekend!

Now that I am all settled in Genoa, I have become familiar with many of the streets (and hills and stairs- they are everywhere) and ways to get around! I am having fun noticing all the little differences between our cultures. And I am starting to adapt to the Italian way of life!