06 Tuesday Oct 2015
Posted in Education
“Hurry up” the hill, I tell Rebecca, on the way to Pegasus concert.
“What’s your hurry?” (or something like that), the guardians ask.
06 Tuesday Oct 2015
In our little town, half the fun of it is that you never know what’s going on. (Half of that half, it seems, can be traced to Piazza del Mercata, where the misnamed Information Center prefers to dispense maps and little else. A long story, quite needless to say or tell.)
Back to the fun of it. Last year, we ran into a music competition, totally unawares, that kept us entertained for almost a week. This year, using a printout graciously provided at the Information Center by the one kind soul we’ve met there, it looked as if we were in for a return engagement.
And so we are, just not the one we expected. Instead, Concerti Pegasus 2015 will be performed in one of the deconsecrated churches around town. For four nights, with the participation of Teatro Lirico Sperimentale, we’ll be treated to Mozart, Puccini, Verdi, Rachmaninov, Chopin, Liszt. What an unexpected treat!
05 Monday Oct 2015
Posted in Travel
Rebecca is going to have to stop singing Quando Men Vo from La Boheme.
First, it was with Italian men, like that cute little five-year old yesterday morning, winking back and forth without a single qualm.
Now it’s with Italian women, like that young apprentice at the fruita e verdure, each exchanging laughs over every nuance of translation.
05 Monday Oct 2015
Posted in Uncategorized
05 Monday Oct 2015
Posted in Education
Remains of a Roman fortification can be seen alongside Via Mura Ciclopiche.
I’m still working to decipher the meaning of the name for the pathway. (One answer I’ve seen invokes Greek myth; the other says it’s so-named because it follows the line of a fortified road that ran along the outside of the walls. Reason fails me.)
Elsewhere, another stretch of wall readily displays three phases of construction.
05 Monday Oct 2015
Or else, the fool can’t stop shooting off his mouth with pixels?
04 Sunday Oct 2015
Posted in Art
Two different views of the garden, on an earlier day’s outing, from above:
The widest angle, by far, on the house. Of note from an earlier post: to enter the garden, you step right off the walk beside the Roman wall (Via Mura Ciclopiche).
04 Sunday Oct 2015
Venture down the steps below the Duomo to feel the magic of an unusual and enchanting garden surrounded by medieval houses. There is a likely chance you will meet the artist. It surely will be a highlight of your visit to Spoleto.
Unsure who wrote these words, sitting invitingly on the flip side of the Open Art Spoleto brochure. But they capture the feeling we’ve had each time we visited.
With one exception: the chance of finding it open, much less meeting the artist, never seemed all that likely. (Many photographs we have, certainly, from afar.)
This year, all that changed. After pulling on the locked gate, hearing the hidden dog bark, we turned to leave … before an English-speaking Italian appeared.
He fumbled through a set of keys; joked about the last one holding the charm; then ushered us into a truly enchanting garden surrounded by medieval houses.
The brochure forgot to mention all the art works, spread throughout the garden, in the open air. Small sculptures, mostly figures and faces, hanging everywhere.
Some of these photos online, from a garden party, come close to the feel (if you subtract the important-looking people and flip the setting from night to day).
Predictably, neither the brochure nor the website carries any of the delight of the conversation. Born in Spoleto, Giampiero Panella returned home ten years ago.
He lives and works in this fabulous old house, realizing the human form in terra-cotta figures, then converted to bronze before being placed in a garden setting.
<The Machine in the Garden is an old book of mine. After my fall from grace with technology, I fear promises. If some of the pixels turn out, you’ll see.>
04 Sunday Oct 2015
Posted in Uncategorized
Two chance encounters, one yesterday and one this morning.
Both prove utterly delightful, each in their own peculiar way.
In the first, a couple from Pittsburgh get off the Rome train.
Before long, they spot an American by the photos he takes.
It turns out they are on a pilgrimage to a family homestead:
Spoleto, for her; an unheard/unfamiliar town or region, for him.
Each in a day’s journey from Rome to see what they could find.
She carried a photograph; he, a complete set of Italian passports.
Stories shared. Directions given. Finally, best wishes extended.
Unknowns encountered on both sides: a chance meeting we keep.
03 Saturday Oct 2015
Posted in Education
I was preparing to explain about the four bas reliefs (from the 13th and 14th centuries) on the facade to the Duomo in Orvieto.
But then one better qualified appeared to expound on the Last Judgment.
