February 25th, 2011

-Itty bitty awkward hand made sheep from Naples

-Mount Vesuvius

A few bulletin points on Rome so far:

-I saw Giovanni Lanfranco’s dome of Sant’Andrea della Valle and his dome of the Cappella of San Gennaro in the Cathedral of Naples in the same week.

-I have seen around 20 paintings by Caravaggio.

-"Why have you put a horse in the middle, and Saint Paul on the ground?" "Because!" "Is the horse God?" "No, but he stands in God's light!"
-an official of Santa Maria del Popolo talking to Caravaggio

Like many others, I am enamored by Caravaggio, and took a class specifically on the Baroque for that reason. I found his work accessible compared to other painters of the 16th or 17th century, as it combines realism of the human state with theatrics and dramatic lighting. Caravaggio was working in the time of the Counter-Reformation, where his schtick was extreme naturalism with tenebrism to help get people back in the Roman Catholic church. Alhtough he was commissioned by cardinals and churches, Caravaggio would constantly break decorum and was known to use prostitutes as models for the Virgin Mary. Depictions of saints and Christ felt foreign to me in the past, for I have had no education on Catholicism or saints, but Caravaggio’s depictions have allowed me to get beyond the religious to a more humanitarian meaning; whether or not those were his intentions, I am not sure.
The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula is one of the last paintings ever made by Caravaggio, and is now in the Intesa Sanpaolo Bank in Naples. Saint Ursula, accompanied by eleven thousand virgins, was captured by the Huns. The eleven thousand virgins were slaughtered, but the king of the Huns was overcome by Ursula's modesty and beauty and asked if she would marry him. Ursula replied that she would not, upon which the king shot an arrow directly at her chest.
The painting, done in 1610, brings the action of that arrow directly into the space of the viewer. We see the moment when the king let’s go of his bow and Ursula looks down in mild shock and confusion at the stick poking out of her chest. To the right a few men stare in shock, one of them, the upturned face behind Ursula, apparently Caravaggio himself. The image is climactic and overwhelming.

To be honest, an hour after I saw this painting, I began crying on the bus home over it.

-I was in the Pantheon one morning for four hours drawing. It was a little tedious and pouring rain, but being the first to arrive that day to see a white pigeon (or maybe it was the holy spirit) flying around the opening of the dome, with rain falling through, was you know, one of those moments.

-Naples pizza is the best pizza I have ever had.

-Bernini’s statues are alive.

-Porta Portese is an overwhelming flea market that pulls over 3,000 venders together every Sunday into chaos and treasure hunting bliss. I kid you not, miles and miles of crap, but little rows of antique rosaries and Italian porn.

-Kinder surprise eggs!

-Frigidarium gelato! (Alex is obsessed.)

-I am off tomorrow to Berlin for 10 days for spring break! Eee!