Bella Venezia ~ Wandering around Venice

It is the city of mirrors,

the city of mirages,

at once liquid,

at once air and stone.

~Erica Jan

How can an artist not be inspired by the beauty of Venice?! This oil painting was for my solo show in December. I mean, who doesn't love a gondolier?

Venezia

The night we arrived in Venice we took a water taxi to our little apartment. There was an incredible downpour with lightening over the water. It was exhilarating and yet a bit scary! I kept wondering about the likelihood of being struck! 

The first time I heard Vivaldi played live was in Venice ... 

When we entered the apartment we rented we were even more in a state of exhilaration. This next photo is out the window of my bedroom. 

It was like a dream! A beautiful 2 bedroom apartment with beamed ceilings, antique furniture, beautiful new bathrooms and the best view EVER!

My boyfriend laughed when I sent him this photo. He has an appreciation for my wardrobe changes. In this case, I'd moved on from my plaid cotton shirts I'd been wearing in Scotland to more fitting Italian attire. I don't think it's neccisarily true but I feel a little more in keeping with Italian fashion when I wear black. 

On our first full day in Venice we were blessed with beautiful blue skies. It was a glorious September day. I'd been there in December of 1996 and it was so cold that the fountains were frozen along with part of the canal. I still loved it. I wondered what I'd feel about it now, but as soon as I started to wander down the tiny narrow streets and over the bridges, I knew I felt the same love for this wonderful city.

This was the summer of the 2017 Biennale and art was everywhere! I happened on a lovely Palazzo and discovered a new artist. Well, she's not new but she was new to me. The sound of classical music (no I'm not making this up) came in through the opened windows along with a light breeze that moved the art with its every breath. It was stunning.

Art Installation by Beverly Barkat

Libreria Aqua Alta 

This bookstore was incredible and filled to the brim. The place apparently floods like crazy so they have to keep things off the floor when the water comes in. As you can see there is a very large gondola in the middle of the store that is used for displaying "molti Libri."

The view from the back patio of the bookstore.

One more of the bookstore for my friend Evelyn, who has a thing for books and kitties!

 Gallerie dell'Accademia

Venice

I don't think we made it here in 1996 and it was high on my list for this trip. In part because of Giorgione painting The Tempest which I couldn't get a good shot of for you. There were too many people around it! It lived up to the hype. It was enchanting. You can Google it. ;)

Here is a tiny sampling of the incredible collection.

Polittico Lion con l'Annunciazione

Lorenzo Veneziano

Don't forget to look up!

Look at all those faces in the ceiling. There were hundreds! Thousands!

This room, below, was incredible. One of the large paintings installed was by Titian but I couldn't get a good shot of it.

Antonio Vivarini e Giovanni d'Alemagna's La Madonna col babino 1446

Madonna in trono che adora il Bambino dormiente

Giovanni Bellini 1516 (?)

(detail)

Below, an enormous painting of Saint Mark's Square by Gentile Bellini, 1496, called Procession in Piazza San Marco. It's Tempera and oil on canvas. He must have had to run back across the room over and over to see what the whole thing looked like. He was 67 at the time.

It's hard to take in these monumental paintings sometimes. They are so massive and there is so much going on that they can be overwhelming.

The Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine (around 1575)
Paolo Caliari detto Paolo Veronese

When you zoom in and notice the details ... the clutching of pearls and intricate brocade it's absolutely incredible. I guess it's not surprising since it's Veronese but you really have to take the time with some of these pieces.

And look at these faces! The expression of the angel on the right side is so beautifully felt.

This panel, below, was on the wall as I was leaving. It's so high you can't photograph it well but it was so wonderful in its color and movement. Plus, I have a thing for gold!

Leaving the Gallerie dell'Accademia

Oh! And, here's the blouse I got in Glasgow. It's all about the sleeves.

That first day, walking around Venice, was magical. I took a day to myself and just wandered around and got reacquainted with this incredible and unique place on our planet. It feels like it's its own world, quite apart from any other. Even with all the tourists (like me!) it's completely magnificent.

At the bridge I stood 

lately in the brown night.

From afar came a song:

as a golden drop 

it welled over the quivering surface.

Gondolas, light, and music

drunken it swam out into the twilight.

My soul, a stringed instrument,

sang to itself, invisibly touched,

a secret gondola song,

quivering with iridescent happiness.

~Did anyone listen to it?

~Friedrich Nietzsche 

Venice, 2017

6 x 12" 

oil on wood panel

(sold)

Francis of Assisi and Wayne Dyer

Miracles come in moments.

Be ready and willing.

~Wayne Dyer

Last Sunday, I opened Facebook and saw a photo of my friend Julie with Wayne Dyer. She said how he had told her that she had a beautiful smile. (She does.) And, as I scrolled down on my phone, more posts about Wayne Dyer, and then I realized he had passed. 

I'd heard him speak in San Diego a few years ago, and although I never met him, I kind of feel like I knew him. I'm sure all those PBS specials had something to do with it.  I know he has "graduated" and everything, but I still wept, like I was loosing an old friend. I'm not sure how many times I've quoted him on my blog but I know I did a whole post of his quotes! (here)

San Rufino Cathedral, Assisi

He talked and wrote a lot about Saint Francis and in fact I remember taping one of his talks many years ago and him saying the Prayer of Saint Francis, and I sat rewinding it and writing it down. (It must have been before Google!)

I know Dyer had a strong connection to Francis so it seemed appropriate to post photos from my various trips to Assisi. I didn't grow up Catholic so I didn't grow up with any real knowledge of the Saint except for garden statues and something about him protecting animals.

Then, in my 30s, I had a series of synchronicities that led me to want to know more about Francis of Assisi. Wayne Dyer played a part in the beginning of that journey, with his talks, and I'm so grateful.

Assisi, steps from the Basilica of San Francesco

My uncle used to wear a wooden "T" or tau cross and he told me it was the cross of Saint Francis. He and my aunt had been to Assisi and had loved it, and then my parents went there and brought back a little silver Saint Francis metal for me.

One morning, probably 9 years ago, while house and dog sitting in Ojai, I was sleeping on my sister's bed. I had opened the sliding glass door to let the dog out and while lying there, I played with the silver little charm of the Saint around my neck. I thought of Francis and how he was so often shown with birds ...  and then I thought how funny it would be if a bird flew in the open door.

View of Assisi from the Hotel Palotta

I fell back asleep for a while and when I woke up, started cleaning up the kitchen and straightening the house, then began packing up my things to head back to Los Angeles.

But then I heard something. 

I couldn't quite figure out where it was coming from. It was a rustling sound. Finally, I looked behind a dining room chair to find a little bird with grey wings and yellow chest, trying to find his way out! I picked him up in a little hand towel and brought him outside onto the picnic table. We both sat there for a long time. I am not sure who was more stunned.

View of the Basilica of Saint Claire from the Rocca Maggiore 

I knew I needed to be on my way to L.A. shortly, but was worried to leave him, since my sister had a cat at the time. I explain that I need to leave (yes, I was talking to the little bird) and that I would hide him up in the bushes, while I loaded the car. If he was still there when I returned, I would take him to a bird rescue. 

Sure enough, after I loaded the car I went back to the hiding spot and he was gone.

Medieval streets of Assisi

After going home to L.A. I ordered a biography of Saint Francis. It was fascinating (if dense) and covered a lot about the middle ages and his life in what is now Italy ... how his father was a fairly wealthy textile merchant, and how he had wanted to be a knight, in his youth. 

While reading his biography one night, I heard a crazy noise coming from outside my front door. I live on the second floor and there is a stairway and landing. When I opened the front door, I found a pigeon had come in and wasn't able to find his way back out! I ran in and grabbed a hand towel, threw it over the bird. 

I carried him out in front of my building, and standing there in my blue and white floral pajamas, opened the towel and watched him as he flew away, out of my hands and into the night sky.  I have lived in the same building for 18 years and a bird had never come into the landing area before ... or since.

Olive grove near San Damiano

I wept through the end of the biography, as a knight on horseback carried the frail and dying Francis, back to Assisi, where he died, just outside the Porziuncola  that he built. I could in vision it all as I read the story, as if it were a memory. If there was ever a doubt I would be traveling to Assisi, it had vanished. I went just before my 40th birthday.

A couple of months after my first visit to Assisi, I was sick in the hospital and I would walk the streets of Assisi, in my mind, and look up and see a little niche in the side of an old stone house, where Francis looked down and watched over the passers by. It was all so vivid in my mind and I felt like I could remember every detail. I've returned twice since then, and love it beyond what I can express in words.

Though the "Prayer of Saint Francis" was not actually penned by Francis, (it showed up anonymously for the first time in a small French Catholic publication in 1912) I think it speaks so much of the spirit of him. Below, a version by the beautiful Sarah McLachlan.

More beautiful Assisi ...

Santa Maria Sopra Minerva on Piazza Commune 

The road to Eremo Carceri 

Remain humble and grateful for all your accomplishment,

and know that a force greater than your ego

is always at work in your life.

~Dr, Wayne W. Dyer

Assisi Street

View from Basilica of Saint Claire up to the Rocca Maggiore fortress

The Rocca Maggiore (first documented back to 1173)

Stop acting as if life is a rehearsal.

Live this day as if it were your last.

The past is over and gone.

The future is now guaranteed.

~Wayne Dyer

Saint Claire at San Damiano

Wayne Dyer, on visiting the Porziuncola chapel in Lower Assisi, from his blog

"I was escorted into the tiny chapel which once was the spiritual meditative home of Saint Francis. I sat down to meditate in this sacred place, and immediately felt bliss and unconditional love entering my energy field. I returned a second day to visit again and confirm how powerful the experience had been and to be certain that it wasn’t just my expectations at work in that chapel. The room radiated unconditional love. It was in the air, so to speak. This little chapel, inside the outer chamber surrounding it, seemed a metaphor for ourselves.  Our body is the outer protective chamber. But deep inside that chamber is a place of perfect harmony and peace, a place to visit often and feel the radiance that abides there.

Here in Lower Assisi is a place where Saint Francis made conscious contact with God, and a place where millions of people have come with love and gratitude to be in the imprint of his energy field. This kind of energy leaves its mark. It remains there to be felt and experienced. Loving radiant energy joyously impacts the energy field of all who enter. In places where spiritual consciousness and unconditional love are practiced, an invisible energy field of grace, beauty, and tenderness remains in the environment."

Wayne Dyer's article "Saint Francis Show's us how to be happy" on Facebook, here.

Sweet fresco on the street, of Francis, Claire and Mother Mary

The Rocca Maggiore at sunset

Outside the Basilica of San Francesco

Upon awakening,
let the words Thank You flow from your lips, 
for this will remind you to begin your day 
with gratitude and compassion.
~Dr. Wayne W. Dyer

Blessings and light

Staglieno Monumental Cemetery and Goodbye to 2013

Staglieno Cimitero Monumentale

Genova, Italia

Faith

by Santo Varni

(9m high)

Vincenzo picked me up that day, from near the Aquarium, and we drove over the hills to the Monumental Cemetery of Staglieno. On the way, we were realizing that it was getting late in the day, and they might close, before we got there! In fact, when we arrived, the gentlemen said they were closing, but then Vincenzo explained that his friend was there from America, and that she really wanted to see it … Well, that changed things. 

It's funny, there is a reputation for the Genovese not being very excited about tourists, but every time someone found out I was visiting, they were very proud and excited to show off their amazing heritage and culture. Really, I had an amazing experience there, even when I wasn't with Vincenzo.

A little mood music ...

Anyway, the man at the gate said we could go in for a half hour. This was kind of crazy because the Cemetery is enormous, but we were grateful. I could have spent hours on end, exploring, taking photos and just taking in the incredible sculptures and mausoleums.  

The original part of the cemetery was designed by Carlo Barabino (1768-1835) around 1835. Barabino was responsible for the neoclassical influence, unfortunately he died the same year that the project was approved, because of an outbreak of cholera. His assistant, Giovanni Basttista Resasco, took over when Barabino passed away.

The cemetery officially opened in January 1851. Most of the large crypts and mausoleums were done from then, until second world war. You can see that most are very dusty and need a little care and restoration, but the government doesn't have the funds, and many of the ancestors have died out, or moved from the area. There are some volunteers, but it's an enormous job.

According to Wikipedia, the size of the cemetery is now 250 acres, with sculptures ranging from neo-classicism and realism, to Art Deco, Nouveau and Symbolism. Some websites say it's the largest outdoor monumental cemetery, in Europe.

Grave of Caterina Campodonico
Carved by Lorenzo Orengo

This is a popular grave, because Caterina was a nut seller, who saved every bit of money she could, in order to have this tomb in Staglieno. You can see, she was sculpted with a long string of walnuts.

Mark Twain visited Staglieno, while he was in Genoa, and wrote: 

"... We shall continue to remember it after we shall have forgotten the palaces. It is a vast marble collonaded corridor extending around a great unoccupied square of ground; its broad floor is marble, and on every slab is an inscription—for every slab covers a corpse. On either side, as one walks down the middle of the passage, are monuments, tombs, and sculptured figures that are exquisitely wrought and are full of grace and beauty. They are new and snowy; every outline is perfect, every feature guiltless of mutilation, flaw, or blemish; and therefore, to us these far-reaching ranks of bewitching forms are a hundred fold more lovely than the damaged and dingy statuary they have saved from the wreck of ancient art and set up in the galleries of Paris for the worship of the world."

In the process of letting go

you will lose many things from the past,

but you will find yourself.

It will be a permanent Self,

rooted in awareness and creativity.

Once you have captured this,

you have captured the world.

~Deepak Chopra

Holding on is believing

that there's only a past;

letting go

is knowing that there's a future.

~Daphne Rose Kingma

Right in the difficult

we must have our joys,

our happiness,

our dreams:

there against the depth of this background,

they stand out,

there for the first time we see

how beautiful they are.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

We need to learn to love the flawed,

imperfect things that we create,

and to forgive ourselves for creating them.

Regret doesn't remind us that we did badly,

it reminds us that we know we could do better.

~Kathryn Schultz

Death and the Maiden
(At this point it was getting dark, so it was getting rather eerie in the cemetery.)

Without freedom from the past, 

there is no freedom at all …

~Krishnamurti

I use memories

but I will not allow memories to use me.

~Deepak Chopra

I do not understand the mystery of grace-

only that it meets us where we are

but does not leave us where it found us.

~Anne Lamott

While we were in there only a short time, and saw but a small portion of it, I was so grateful we made it there. 

However, that short time was longer than the 1/2 hour that the gentlemen had given us, and we got locked in the cemetery! The huge gates were padlocked! My heart started to race a little, until we found the man with the key!

I hope some day to return, and spend few hours there (at least!) exploring all the areas I didn't get a chance to see, but as I said, I am so grateful that man let us in, and that we got a chance to walk around and see what we did. 

We also started singing, in low voices, at one point. Beyonce, was somehow stuck in Vincenzo's head. "To the left, to the left … everything you own, in the box to the left." Kind of appropriate for a cemetery, eh?

For the Staglieno website, click here.

For more of the history of Staglieno, here is the translated link (not the best translation but at least you can get more info) click here.

For more Links, and the American Friends of Italian Monumental Sculpture site, click here.

There are a lot video slideshows on youtube, of Staglieno, if you want to see more of the sculptures, in areas I didn't make it to. Here is one of them, that I ran across.

Staglieno Cemetery

Piazzale Resasco

16100 Genova

Italy

Open daily from 7:30am to 5:00pm.

Hope you all have an amazing and safe New Years Eve!

May your coming year be filled with magic

and dreams and good madness.

I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone

who thinks you're wonderful, 

and don't forget to make some art-

write or draw or build or sings

or live as only you can.

And I hope, somewhere in the next year,

you surprise yourself.

~Neil Gaiman

Big blessings and much light!!!