Capri, Sorrento, Pompeii, Naples

We are lucky to get all of our Fridays off so that we can spend time traveling throughout Italy and other countries. At the end of September the art school organized a trip for us to go to Naples and Pompeii. Naples is kinda dirty and not very safe at night. The mafia still exists and has a huge presence in Napoli. The public notices when the garbage collectors strike. Italians are known for their frequent strikes. The mafia owns the garbage collection agencies an they are the only ones who can do this cheaply because they don't really care where the garbage goes mostly they dispose of it in open fields. All of this leads to piles of garbage in alleys and side streets for the duration of the strike. One just ended before we got there so there were still some streets.


So we stayed in Sorrento, just south of Napoli, on the ocean. These fist three pictures are actually of the island of Capri, but Sorrento looks very similar. The next two are of Sorrento at night.










We took the ferry to Capri on Saturday after visiting Pompeii to see the Blue Grotto, but it closed do to choppy water 10 minutes before we got there. :(














On the very left hand side of this picture are the buildings that lined the harbor. We ate outside at a restaurant in front of the building furthest left. Mussels a Limone and gnocchi with clams to follow. A shot of Limoncello, a traditional Italian liquor, was desert.















This next group of photos is from the city of Pompeii. In 79 a.d. Mount Vesuvius erupted, something it hadn't done in the 700 years since the city was founded. The southeast section of the volcano exploded off, sending ash to the south and southeast. Pompeii remained buried in ash for over 1500 years before being rediscovered as a perfectly preserved, ancient Roman city. Naples is about the same distance from the base of Mount Vesuvius but was spared because it is to the northwest.

Pompeii is also home the most intact amphitheater, the Colosseum in Rome is in shambles compared to this one.

The Romans also hated plain, white walls and sculpture. Most of what we see in museums is white marble because the paint wore off years ago. During the Renaissance the artists decided that they liked the unpainted marble of the worn out sculpture. So even though they copied and were inspired by the classic sculpture of the Greeks and Romans they left the marble blank.

The paint on the walls here has not been retouched at all.

This is also one of the best preserved Roman frescoes.

An Ancient local bar.

While excavating they found old grape vines and have been able to replant and grow more grapes. they have enough that they can make wine as well.

Almost everything lies as it did when the volcano erupted. This is in a workshop just off the main forum. Inside the glass box is a plaster cast of the form left by a body that had been covered with ash.

The city of Napoli. It is built up of very narrow streets and tall buildings, as evidenced by all of my tall skinny photos.

Spike Lee

I meet the director Spike Lee at the opening of his movie Miracle at St. Anna. As students we were not really supposed to be at this press release but a couple of us looked like we knew what we were doing. Having a good camera does one of two things, it either gives a person complete, unquestioned rights to be everywhere or it gets one kicked out quickly. Fortunately it was the former.

Here's a link to other movies he has directed.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000490/#director




One of several, Art directors I think, (the entire press conference was in Italiano)













Brian(on the left) Paul (on the right) are two other CEA students I sat with during the press conference. They look deep in thought but probably understood about 1 in every 20 words.

Bike Trip

So Ashley and Michele thought it would be a good idea to go on the CEA bike tour of Florence.  I thought that sounded good but it was all day, so I asked what else was included.  The answer was lunch with as much wine as we wanted and a tour of a small vineyard.  Now I'm a klutz as it is so wine and a bike did not sound like a good combo.  It took them two weeks to convince me that it would be fine and that we were probably biking, eating lunch, then taking the bus back to town.   Wrong, after three miles uphill (with stops along the way to see olive groves and great views over Florence) we stopped in Fiesole.  After a short break there we continued slightly uphill to our lunch destination.  We had gnocchi with spinach and gorgonzola cheese, another spicy pasta, bruschetta, cheese, and a lot of fabulous Chianti Classico, straight from the vineyard we were going to visit.   After the vineyard we had only a downhill route that included 8-10 switchbacks.  It was so much fun, I loved it.  Ashley and Michele road the the van back, they didn't think the downhill would be as much fun as I did.  

This is the really funny couple from Norway we met.  They were a little more prepared for the biking part.

These are some of the small barrels for fermenting wine in, the large ones take up most of a room. 

And this is a terra-cotta pot full of extra virgin olive oil.  

Photos for class...

Here is the first series I put together for class.  We just printed on normal paper because it was the first time for most of us to print on fiber based paper.  We were told to to create a series on symbolism.  Florence just happens to be one of the densest tourist cities in all of Europe, especially the old city center.  There are other cities that attract more visitors each year but they are larger cities and the natives still make up a large portion of the population on any given day.   

My series is based on two symbols of Florence, tourists and how they behave in a foreign city and Michelangelo's David.  The two are so visible that they start to resemble each other.  

From this first project of 5 photos I have 4 new paths to keep exploring.  The first is more pictures of the David, each store owner sets them up in different ways that no two pictures I have look the same.  (yes I already have more taken) The next is continuing to photograph tourists and document the large group mentality.  I only have to stand outside my apartment for that because Via Ricasoli is the main road from the Florence Cathedral and the Academia, where David is housed.  The next is to go back to the space that I photographed the first group of tourists and continue to photograph in the same space at different times of the day.  This would be another exercise in how people relate to the space they're occupying.  The last is to photograph the odd behaviors of tourists near monuments.  The man in the last photo has stopped looking at it and is only focused on his guide book.     

Drawings so far...

We've been in class for a few weeks now but have only had a live model twice.  We've been working with still-life too much.  These are a couple of my favorites right now, I'll probably add more as the semester progresses.  We're working with vine charcoal on newsprint and a basic white charcoal paper.  I definitely like using the white paper better.  The charcoal sticks but I can push it around the paper if I need to.  It also gives a wider tonal range because more layers of charcoal can be built up.  

This first drawing is three 4-5 minute gesture drawings on newsprint (drawing would cost me a fortune if I did all of these on nice paper)  

This drawing was 15 or 20 min with the same model, its a good start to the semester, I like the tonal range.  

This might be my favorite drawing, I love the line quality in the arms and legs with the tonal quality of the body.  

Look closely.  There is a basic blind contour in pen.  No I didn't forget how to draw I just put my pen down on the paper and drew without lifting it up, while only looking at the model.  

I apologize for the turned picture, I forgot to rotate it while sizing it for the internet and I'm to lazy to fix it now.  I started these last two drawings the same way with a blind contour underneath and then went back over the top with charcoal.  There not perfect but if you look at the left side of this man he is in proportion from the feet to the shoulder.  On the right side he got to wide but his shoulders and hips line up.  It's amazing what the mind sees, when one is focused on looking.