Barb Baur

We are exactly at the midpoint of our 16 weeks in Rome. In eight weeks, we’ll be on a plane home to Philadelphia. Spring Break is over for me and I was sad to see it pass so quickly.

The last few days of break were spent at the Colosseum, the Forum, the Spanish Steps and a quick tour of Temple Rome’s Villa Caprioni. Temple Rome is located in the Caprioni family villa and two members of the family still live in the upper two floors overlooking the Tiber River. Caprioni was an airplane designer and amassed quite a fortune to build this spacious building in a wonderful location. It was fun to show Mom and David where I go to class when I’m not drawing or photographing around Rome.

But the week came to an end too quickly without seeing everything and I sadly escorted them to the airport Saturday morning. Then it was time to get caught up on all the homework assigned over the break.

Realizing we are at the halfway point was part of the impetus that drove Patty and I out on Sunday to catch a couple more churches. I had hoped to take Mom and David to San Pietro in Vincoli (St Peter in Chains) to see the Michelangelo Moses, not to mention the chains that were supposed to have been worn by St Peter, but we ran out of time. I needed to do more photographs for a project with my observation of metal and this seemed as good a place as any to start.

And we ran into a media circus. There were film crews and tour groups. We only had about five minutes in the church before Mass started, an American Cardinal was giving the sermon apparently. So we wandered off and found a few more less crowded churches, including Santa Maria Maggiore, another of the Papal Basilicas. We also found St. Pudenziena, the oldest place of Christian worship in Rome. Unfortunately it had just closed, so we looked around the outside and decided we have to get back there, too.

Today my drawing class met at the school and we had a figure model. Pat and I came out of the session with some lovely drawings. I was really in a groove and thoroughly enjoyed this session since I don’t get much opportunity to do figure drawing these days.

Patty’s daughter and her boyfriend arrived today. They’ll be here in Rome for a little bit before they move on to Florence. After dinner and homework, we all started down to the Vatican to watch for the “Pope Smoke” from the first round of voting since the Conclave of Cardinals started today. We were a little late though. En route, we saw on Twitter that the black smoke had been spotted. We deftly changed course and made our way to the 24 hour bakery so as not to waste our trip out in the damp night.

We do plan to try to catch the crowds in St Peter’s square at least once over the next few days, figuring this conclave will last at least until the weekend. I’m sure there will be some photos to share. I’ll keep you posted.

The last seven weeks here in Rome have really flown and it’s my Spring Break already. Wendy and I both made it through our midterms and began preparing for our visitors that were due on Sunday.

Friday we took a break from cleaning and laundry to go to the Etruscan Museum. My goal there was to look at the granulation jewelry. Granulation is a technique that has fascinated me since high school. I wrote a post on our excursion. (http://silvergoldberry.com/?p=298)

Saturday was spent cleaning up and catching up on laundry and communicating with the folks in Philadelphia who were getting to the airport. And finally the long awaited flight arrived at Fiumicino airport on Sunday morning with David and my Mom.

We made sure the travelers were nourished on their arrival in Rome and then we headed to St Peters so my mom attend Mass. We got a good look around in St Peter’s, too. It was a tiring day for travel, so we took the tram back to the apartment instead of walking.

Monday we arrived at the Vatican Museums first thing with our tickets, bypassing the massive line. We followed the museum through the Raphael rooms to the Sistine Chapel. We spent about 30 minutes there just admiring the lovely work of Michelangelo. The crowds were much less than the last time we had been there, it was delightful. And we got in under the wire, too. The Sistine was closed the next day to prepare for the Cardinal’s conclave.

We had a nice pasta lunch nearby and walked to Castel Sant Angelo to see the Bernini Angel bridge. Then back to St Peter’s one more time for an English speaking tour run by seminarians from the American College of Bishops. This tour was interesting because our guide gave not only a historical perspective, but gave the spiritual significance of the art there.

Tuesday we visited seven churches. Starting on Piazza Navona with St. Agnes of Agone and Our Lady of the Sacred Heart. Then St Andrew (San Andrea) on the way to Campo di Fiori, followed by the Pantheon, which is also known as St Mary and the Martyrs.

Then we had lunch where my Mom had her first Italian pizza, then on to Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, San Ignazio and San Luigi Francesi. We came home, rested, had some dinner and then made our way back out to the Trevi Fountain for an evening photo together and threw in some coins.

Today we went to the Colosseum after a crowded metro ride. We were able to walk all around and take plenty of photos. It is was quite a view. The most fun about showing Rome to my Mom is that she is enjoying it all so much.

Then it was time to head to San Giovanni in Laterna. This is the pope’s cathedral and it is a beautiful church with huge statues of the twelve apostles. From a viewing perspective, it’s not “sneaky huge” like St. Peters, it’s more like just straightforward huge. We had another wonderful lunch across from the church. On the way back we stopped at the bakery for some dessert and made our way back in the pouring rain.

Only two more days with David and my Mom, then I have to get a move on the projects that I’m supposed to be completing over spring break.

Gwen’s only been coming along on some of our excursions this week. She does not have break this week and decided to sit in on an icon painting class in addition to her Fresco and Archeology classes. She’s also been finalizing her presentation for Archeology that is scheduled to be presented to the class onsite at a museum on Friday. So we have all been pretty busy.

I hope everyone is staying warm and well. Only a couple more weeks to Spring!

A jewelry technique that has fascinated me since high school is something called granulation. The ancient Etruscans were the masters of granulation and it wasn’t until the early 20th century that the lost process of granulation was fully rediscovered. I was thrilled to see a piece in the Naples Archeology Museum a few weeks ago.

So naturally one place I have been looking forward to visiting here in Rome is the National Etruscan Museum. I’ve seen less than a handful of ancient granulation pieces in person until now and I was hoping to get my fill here in Rome. It’s only a short distance from Temple Rome and with Spring Break upon us, it was time to finally check this off my list.

We hopped on the tram a couple blocks away and rode to the door.

The museum is located in Villa Guilia, which used to be a papal residence. There is a lovely inner courtyard and covered walkway decorated with frescoes. Gwen enjoyed looking at them and taking reference photos.

The Etruscans worked in a lot of pottery. The majority of the museum is full of pottery and bronze metalwork: Pitchers, bowls, amphorae, equestrian themed funeral goods. Many pieces are very reminiscent of the ancient Greek pottery in patterning and colors. Most of what is known about the Etruscans was deduced from their elaborate tombs complete with Terra cotta sarcophagi adorned with sculptures of the people they contained.

But there is one Room on the third floor that was full of jewelry. This is where I spent most of my visit. Incredible pieces of filigree and granulation work found me having to remind myself to shut my mouth that kept gaping open in amazement. I went slowly through the entire room gazing on every piece thinking that I really needed a catalog of this exhibit.

Granulation is an incredibly tedious process of chemically soldering tiny, high karat gold grains in elaborate patterns on jewelry. The work was exquisite. And not just exquisite, but mind bogglingly detailed, especially considering its age. The Etruscans starting using granulation around the 8th century BC.

The collection at the Etruscan museum also includes micro-mosaic jewelry from the Byzantine time frame. This jewelry, made with tiny pieces of glass in many colors looks like a detailed miniature painting until viewed from a few inches away.

It wasn’t possible to take a huge amount of decent pictures as I would have liked. Instead I asked about a book or catalog at the bookstore. No luck, but the guards were happy to tell me the name of the publisher who has a book on the whole collection that I could order online. It’s on its way.

If you are interested in knowing more about the fascinating process of granulation, here’s an article from Antique Jewelry University.

We checked out of the hotel and were stuck in traffic for a while headed to the city of Valetta. Rose brought us to look a few minutes over the harbor at Valletta before walking us to the Archeology Museum. Here we finally got to see the original artifacts that had been found in the temples we had visited.

There we saw The Sleeping Lady, the carved stones, the pottery and some jewelry. Even modular heads that were meant to be changed from statues, for what reason, no one knows.

And there were models and plans for each of the temples, including the Hypogeum at Hal Saflieni. We had been hearing about this collection for the last few days and it didn’t disappoint. In fact we bought five books as we left.

As we left the Archeology Museum, I couldn’t help but notice that we walked by the church of St Barbara. I’ve never seen one before and I had to take a photo.

Our last stop in Malta was the Ghar Dalam cave.

This cave is the location of layers of prehistoric artifacts including bones from African species from when Malta was connected to Italy and Africa. Many of these fossils are displayed in a 19th century style museum onsite.

After Ghar Dalam, we bid goodbye to our wonderful guide Rose at the airport. A few hours later, we were back in our Roma apartment with minds full of wonder. With midterms this week, I couldn’t even begin to summarize such an amazing weekend, but I hope I have done so now.

This three day adventure was too much to squeeze into one post, so this is the fourth of four. Here are links to the others.
Part I
Part II
Part III

We started at the Visitor Center for the Hagar Qim temple complex. It was another informative exhibit with models that showed where the light shines in the lower temple, Mnajdra at both equinoxes and solstices.

Then we headed outside to the temples themselves. They have been covered by large plastic tents to help preserve the site, but which lose the context of the temples’ true surroundings, which in this location is a huge hill overlooking the sea and a small rock island just offshore.

The diffuse light in the tents is lovely on the warm colored stone. I took a couple of portraits of both Pat and Gwen in Mnajdra. When else do you get a chance to take a portrait of someone in a 5000 year old temple?

We were again extremely fortunate. Most of the time we had both temples to ourselves.
Mnajdra is about a 10 minute walk down a paved path from Hagar Qim and only 3 other people were there the entire time we spent there. Most visitors don’t want to brave the long walk in the sun.

Rose, our guide, told us of being in Mnajdra temple with other guides and archeologists as solstice dawned she placed her hands on the rocks where the sunbeam touches as it moves into the space. It was enough to give goosebumps. Even after almost 30 minutes, it was hard to leave such a wondrous place, built so long ago by people we know almost nothing about. We trudged back up the hill, spent a few more minutes at Hagar Qim and then we were in the car for lunch at Marsaxlokk, a bustling fishing village that we had visited with Jack two years ago. I did a few minutes quick shopping, snapped a few photos and then we were whisked off to our appointment at the Hypogeum.

The Hypogeum of Hal Saflieni is an underground temple of about the same era as the other temples and made in several stages. Like the other temples, it is designated a World Heritage site by Unesco. The Hypogeum was carved out of the rock, but in such a way to look like it was assembled. It’s quite complex and winding. Only 80 people per day are permitted to see it, at a rate of 10 per hour. To help with preservation, the lights are calibrated so that only the area where the tour is standing is lit. The environment is very closely controlled. Tickets are rarely available on the day of the tour and we reserved ours back in November. Rose was glad that we had because the Hypogeum is the most amazing of the sites on Malta and the most difficult to see without planning ahead.

And of course, no pictures were permitted, in fact no bags at all were allowed. There was an audio guide and we were accompanied by a guard who directed us where to go along with the audio tour. It was truly an experience to stand in these rooms that had been carved from solid rock with only antlers and rocks. Gently curved walls and faux beams exuded an elegance that surprised me with its sophistication. Several theories were presented as who these people were and why they built this amazing structure, but the facts were few. The bones of about 7,000 people were found there. Several beautiful sculptural pieces including The Sleeping Lady were found there as well. The accoustic properties of one chamber create a resonance frequency for the room when spoken or sung into at certain frequencies. All of these mysteries may never be solved. I came away from our time underground with a deep sense of wonder at these ancient ancestors.

Still reeling from the Hypogeum, Rose suggested we take in the nearby Tarxien Temple complex instead of waiting until tomorrow as scheduled. It closed at 4pm and it was only a little after 2 and it would be one less thing on Monday when we had to be at the airport about noon. We agreed and were not disappointed.

Tarxien Temples are not far from the Hypogeum and there are theories that they are linked since the temples in Malta seem to be located in pairs. This was also a large complex, but the local area encroaches right up to it. In fact, there is a cemetery you can see right over the boundary wall from one of the walkways. It was discovered while the Hypogeum was still under excavation. On this site were found many pieces of the temple with carved patterns and animals. Many of the original pieces of work had been replaced with duplicates. The originals are on view at the Archeology museum in Valletta.

After Tarxien closed and we had to leave, Rose took us to the Dingli Cart Ruts next. Here the stone hillside is criss-crossed with mysterious ruts that look like wheel ruts, but Malta hadn’t developed the wheel when these were made. A Roman Quarry on the hillside gives clues that rocks may have been cut there and transported, but how? A theory about using roller stones in tracks has been presented. Another mystery. There was also a cave on the hillside that served as shelter for humans even into the recent past. This is one of the highest spots on the island and commands another impressive view in all directions.

From the cart ruts it was only a few minutes to the Dingli cliffs. Here the high point of Malta overlooks the sea. A tiny church there, St Mary Magdalene, is only open once a month. It’s doors were open when we arrived and after snapping a few photos of the amazing ocean view we went inside. (These views just don’t get old.) It was a small, peaceful place with seats only for 18 on folding chairs, but featured a lovely altar.

We purchased some local goods, prickly pear liquor made from the prickly pear cactus, honey and fresh tangerines.

We had some crepes for dinner by the hotel and packed to leave after the next morning’s tour. Pat and I spent a bit of time in the Bugibba temple at the hotel, puzzling out the placement of the stones that we didn’t understand when we first arrived. I also took a few nighttime portraits. We stood in the temple and watched the moon, thinking about the people who once stood in the same place thousands of years before.

This three day adventure was too much to squeeze into one post, so this is the third of four. Here are links to the others.
Part I
Part II
Part IV

On Saturday, we headed to Gozo.
Gozo is part of the country of Malta, but a separate island. We had to take a ferry. We were picked up at the hotel by our guide, Rose and her driver. We were given lots of information about Malta as we made our way to the first temple complex, the oldest one in Malta- Ggantija.

When we arrived there was no one there but us. Rose was very knowledgable, both about Malta in general, but she is also very interested in the temples herself. We got about 15 minutes in the temples alone before a busload of German tourists arrived. It was a a truly awe inspiring experience to hear the theories of how the temples were built and how the stones were moved. Ggantija is on a beautiful hilltop with an amazing view. It was named Ggantija because the first people to discover it guessed it must have been made by giants since the rocks that form it are so huge.

From there we made a short drive to Ninu’s cave. This was a real surprise. Yes, it was on our itinerary, but I had no idea what it was. Apparantly a man was working on his house and found a cave when he was digging for a well. And not just any cave, it had stalagtites and stalagmites, it was lovely. Not too large but amazing. What was truly surprising was that his descendants still live above this cave and just charge people a few Euro to come in and see the cave. His great granddaughter lives there now and had just finished washing the tile floors when we showed up. That was OK, she let us through anyway, we went down to the cave, looked around, came up and thanked her.

Then we headed to Dwejra Bay to see the Inland Sea & Azure Window. I was totally blown away by the beauty of this place. A huge rock formation frames the sea and the coast. Rose said it was nominated as one of the new seven wonders of the world. I took a 360 degree video of it which can be found on my flickr feed.

From there we headed towards the Gozo Museum of Archeology. It’s a little place, housed in a former private residence. There were plenty of amphorae, which Gwen has been learning to identify in her archeology class as well as artifacts taken from the Ggantija site. The scale model was especially helpful.

Then we took a walk around the Citadel of the small walled city where the Museum was located, taking lots of pictures of the amazing views.

Then it was time for a late lunch and back to the Ferry. Our restaurant was overlooking Xlendi Bay, another picturesque view. (Sensing a pattern here?)
A ferry ride back to Malta, we were dropped at the hotel and crashed.

This three day adventure was too much to squeeze into one post, so this is the second of four. Here are links to the others.
Part I
Part III
Part IV

It’s time to put together the Malta update before the details shrink away into Spring Break next week. Anyway, I think my mind has absorbed about as much Italian as I can cram into it for tonight. I’ve made it through two midterm critiques and one oral exam for Italian with the written one scheduled for tomorrow.

Why Malta
We were in Malta back in June 2011 on the cruise with Jack and had a small taste of this interesting country as we drove around taking advantage of many photo opportunities. I had read about the temples and the Hypogeum, but none of them were handicapped accessible, so we made other choices for the day.

Then I took art history in the Fall and one of the first photos in my textbook was an aerial view of Hagar Qim, (pronounced Hadjar Eem) one of the oldest temples on earth. I was suddenly regretful that I had been on Malta and not be able to see it. Pat was equally interested in these ancient temples.

Because we are based in Rome for study abroad, many students take advantage of the smaller distances to travel to other places in Europe, like Greece, Paris, Croatia, Morocco and Spain, etc. When Pat and I sat down to think about where we would like to go the choice was easy, Malta.

Early research into the trip mentioned that one of the temples was now part of the grounds of The Dolmen Hotel. We checked the prices and since we were looking at off season- February, a sea view room for three was very reasonable. And how cool to stay in a hotel where there’s a 5,000 year old temple around the corner from the swimming pool?

I will say however, if you decided to stay there, don’t go for their “board” or meal arrangement. It’s overpriced compared to the variety you can find just walking out the front door and down the street. Also, I am always amazed at the exorbitant fees that high end hotels charge for internet and how chains like Red Roof Inn offer it for free. Go figure. The Dolmen is a perfect example since they wanted 3.50 Euro for an hour of internet access. Pat had fortunately found an special deal by booking online. The desk gave us a hard time about it, but took off the charge in the end.

So we took about a one hour flight from Rome, arrived, checked in and went to see the Temple. It was hard to understand the arrangment, part of it looked like it had been a pool or pond at one point from the light blue waterproof paint that was now peeling off.

But the standing doorway and a curved section certainly still spoke of something. We took plenty of pictures, especially after dark. We walked the beach, had dinner at a local Indian restaurant and went to bed early to meet our guide the next morning for our day in Gozo.

This three day adventure was too much to squeeze into one post, so this is the first of four. Here are links to the others.
Part II
Part III
Part IV

This week’s update is a little short and a little late. We were away for the weekend in Malta, exploring prehistoric temples and this week is midterms, so my time is limited. I had a few paragraphs put together before we went to Malta, so I can update that far. My photos on flickr account are up to date.

Last week we were back to exploring Rome. The drawing class had Patty and I at the church of San Ignazio on a chilly morning, viewing the lovely trump l’oeil ceiling by Andrea Pozzo including the fake dome and drawing the altar of San Ignazio. Then we were off to draw in Piazza Navona where it was a little warmer in the sun. My photography class met at Campo de Fiori to start on street photography of people, then headed to Trastevere to shoot more found objects and people. The most delightful surprise was finding a musical instrument maker and his cat hidden down a little street. I put a bookmark in my iphone maps so I can find my way back there.

Gwen’s archeology class met on site in Testaccio to look at pottery shards. There’s enough there to keep archeologists busy for many, many years. In her fresco class, she dismantled the fresco painting from last week to make room for more next week, after midterms.

My Italian design class made a site visit to the Micol Fontana Foundation and viewed dresses and designs that were worn by Eva Gardner, Grace Kelly, Margaret Truman, Jackie Kennedy and anyone who was anyone from the 40s to the 80s. All of Audrey Hepburn’s clothes for “Roman Holiday” were made by the Fontana’s and Eva Gardner had put in her movie contracts that she was only to wear dresses made by Sorrelle Fontana.

I’m spending a lot of time studying Italian. It’s pretty hard for my almost half a century old brain to absorb a new language, but I’m giving it my best shot. I had a test last week and two midterms this week.

So Friday we headed to Fiumicino airport and boarded a plane for Malta. More about that in a separate post.

Of course you have probably already heard the big news out of Rome this past week, the announcement of the resignation of the Pope on Monday. Suddenly now there are news vans with satellite feeds camped by Castel Sant Angelo with the dome of the Vatican as the backdrop for their live broadcasts. It’s quite an interesting turn of events to happen while we are here and nothing any of us could have anticipated. I plan to hang out in the crowds by St Peters at some point during the process to observe and take photos.

This week had a little less wandering around the city since both my studio classes were meeting at the school instead of on site somewhere. We had a figure model for Sketchbook class and we did a classroom critique of our photos in Digital Imaging.

My design class didn’t meet on Thursday because we were spending three days together for the class trip to Milan. So I was on early train out of Rome Friday morning. This is the second train ride I’ve taken through Italy and I have to say that the train is a pleasant way to travel here. Tables, comfortable seats, charging plugs, big open windows to watch the scenery and speeds up to 300kmh all make for a quick comfortable ride.

We arrived in Milan about noon, bought Metro tickets and headed straight for our hotel. We had lunch in a place called Bar Magenta, a Liberta` style building, then began our walks to see more architecture and visit some design studios. Jack would have loved it here. Milan is full of interesting architecture, lots of it in Liberty, Italy’s version of Art Noveau.

Saturday was spent at more studios and showrooms. I really enjoyed seeing the innovative and beautiful designs everywhere and took plenty of notes and pictures.

We then fought our way through the Carnivale crowds in front of La Scala through the glass covered mall to come out in front of the Duomo, the third largest church in Europe. It was very difficult to take pictures inside, not only was it huge, but it was very dark and the artificial lighting did not do it justice.

There were thousands of people everywhere celebrating, street musicians performing, children in costume throwing confetti and their parents patiently standing by.

I did a little bit of shopping, picking up a couple of inexpensive but well designed items in Alessi. I tried on two pairs of boots at one store, but they just didn’t fit well. I suppose I should have tried the Ferragamo showroom instead, they were much more reasonably priced than I expected for an extremely well made product. Another highlight was the Venini glass showroom with their jawdropping glass work.

As an artist and designer, Milan offered me so much more to absorb than I expected. From the management, research and decision processes of the design studios, to the work itself, simple, beautiful and accessible, I know without a doubt that my work will be affected by this experience.

Our last day in Milan was spent at the Triennalle, a museum of design, looking at three major exhibits, one on Graphics, another about Dracula and the third about Sex, which I felt was really more of fine art than design, but interesting nonetheless. I also got a wonderful book on 20th Century design in their very well stocked bookshop.

I arrived back in Rome in the evening shortly after Gwen and Pat returned from their adventure in Camp De Fiori to hear a concert and speeches in commemoration of martyr Giordano Bruno. He was a Domenican Friar who was burned at the stake for his beliefs in other stars and the possibility of life on other planets, among other things.

Pat and Gwen also made it to a different art store to try to procure some fresco brushes for Gwen’s class. This week she did her first fresco painting, a small flower and she will be expanding more on that as her course progresses.

Gwen’s taking an archeology course and a fresco course at John Cabot University in Rome. Tonight I went with her to the studio to take photos in process. I posted my images on Flickr (Click on the image to see the rest on my photo stream.) It was really fun to watch. I tried it a little bit, but I think Gwen has more mortar in her blood than I do. Thanks for that, Granpop! And yes, Granpop, she keeps her tools very clean.