...following the white rabbit...

When you do your research in art history it is very easy for you to loose all the passion you have for art. Art for an art historian has to become an extremely rational issue. You deal with commissioners, social background of the artistic production, exchange between different centres, iconography, style, school and so on. And then you forget why actually a work of art attired you attention. You don't see the work of art anymore but you see all that surrounds it.

On one hand I like it because I become more and more conscious of what I'm seeing. On the other hand sometimes I want to forget that art is actually my profession. In those moments I just go to see an exhibition (likely of contemporary art). Looking at the works of art I have never seen before I move my imagination just to remember myself that in the end to believe in art you have to have the courage of a child who sees a white rabbit and decides to follow it. 

Piazza Santa Croce, Firenze 2012.

Sculpture and space

I wanted to write this post already some time ago but I've never had a quiet moment to sit myself with a cup of tea and tell you something about the photo that you'll find below. 

It's not a great picture but I like it because it shows one of my favorites squares in Florence, Piazza Santa Trinita. 

It's one of the places in Florence where the space is invaded by the sculpture. 

On the square there is the Santa Trinita church on the left, the Palazzo Spini Feroni and the Palazzo Bartolini Salimbeni on the right, the Column of Justice in the middle of the square. Palazzo Spini Feroni was built in the 14th century, Palazzo Bartolini Salimbeni in the '20s of 16th cenutry by Baccio d'Agnolo. The column of Justice was donated to Cosimo I de Medici by the pope Pius IV in 1560 and the facade of the church was redesigned 30 years later. In this case the chronological order is quite important. The point is that the statues on the facade were the last element added to the square. If you look closely you see that they unify all space. Saint Alexius from the facade is looking up at the Justice. His glance directed out of the facade makes the space of his niche 'weaker', he seams less attached to the wall. He is also giving meaning to the space, to the distance that separates him from the column and from the figure of Justice. It creates a sort of meaningful tension between them.

It's not the only place in Florence where the statues virtually occupy the space of the city. Saint Thomas is slides out from the niche on the facade of Orsanmichele, Perseus is jealously observed by David and Hercules (there is a great essay on that by John Shearman in his Only Connect if you want to read more...) and probably many others that I still haven't discovered. 

So walk carefully through the city, the statues are watching you!

Piazza Santa Trinita, Firenze, 2011.

The fever of mosaics

Living in Italy as an art historian is extremely difficult. You see to much, you have still so much to visit, to study, to read. You can never cope with the quantity of historical and visual material that attacks you every day. 

The biggest problem is that when you leave Italy and you go somewhere else you find any other place boring: there are no exhibitions of Italian Masters, there are no medieval churches at every corner, and there are no historical cities every 20 km. What you can do with you free time in this kind of places?

So, as I do not know how long my Italian stop will last, I try to visit as much as possible till I am here. When I do not work and when I can put a part my books for a day or two I take a train and I go to see something that I have been only reading about before. 

It was like this with Ravenna. In April last year I went there to see THE mosaics.

I studied them during art history course so I though: OK, it will be nice, but I know what I should expect. 

No bigger mistake! 

Ravenna is a true treasure. Anything you read about the mosaics there can give you even a minimal idea of what you can see when you visit San Vitale, Mausoleo di Galla Placidia, Sant'Apollinare in Classe, Sant'Apollinare Nuovo or the Arian Baptistry. Colours, patterns, light surround you, flood you with their power. 

Maybe it is because of the mosaics that I remember Ravenna as a city full of light. 

Unfortunately I could not take pictures everywhere. In some churches it was to dark to take photos without a tripod and I was not allowed to use one. 

But I did some pictures that I can share with you. 

In Ravenna I had with me my 35mm camera with a black and white film. You will not see the colours of the mosaics but, thanks to the lack of colour on the photos, it is possible to notice other characteristic of mosaics: patterns. Mosaics are like carpets, they extend themselves over every surface: arches, walls, vaults. They spill over without showing any structural difference between elements that they decorate. 

Beside figural representation they are full of floral and geometric ornaments that are repeated and repeated over and over. 

When you look at them longer you risk a vertigo. 

I found this decorative patterns so fascinating also because the pattern attracted also Renaissance public and artists. It is enough to mention the revival of the Cosmatesque floors or the relations between painting and the production of textiles and textiles patterns reproduced on Renaissance paintings. 

Decorative fever, the fever of mosaics:

Mosaics in the Church of San Vitale, Ravenna 2011.

Stuttgart

During the summer I went to Stuttgart to visit my dear friend Rabea.
Me and Rabea we met in Florence during an internship. It was this kind of friendship that started after the very first talk... I remember that we went for a coffee on one of the very first days at work, we started to chat and it was it, we were there... I just thought: I like her.
Thanks to Rabea I have understood how much Polish and German cultures are similar. I remember when she invited me once for breakfast... I entered her kitchen, I saw all these cheeses, ham, eggs, bread and BUTTER and I thought - HOME! Just tell me, how long could manage to eat brioches and cookies for breakfast every morning?
So during next 4 months we were a strange German-Polish couple between our Italian friends. We were perfectly understanding our jokes (since I live abroad I have understood that sense of humor is totally cultural thing), we had our similar, strange food attitudes and so on.
Unfortunately Rabi left Florence and turned back to Germany. And so I am having my brioches and my cookies for breakfast once again...
I went to visit her in August. I have spent a wonderful weekend between Stuttgart, Tuebingen and Heidelberg.
In Stuttgart I visited the Kunstmuseum with its significant collection of Otto Dix's paintings.
I really liked the square in front of the building also because it is dominated by a Calder's sculpture.

Kunstmuseum, Stuttgart 2011.

Art and the city, Stuttgart 2011.

Street art

Many times walks in Oltrarno can surprise...

Street Art, Firenze 2011.

from the series "how the art used to be exhibited"

When I was in the PGC my dear Carley made her seminar on the significance of the way that sculpture is exhibited and perceived by the public, on its impact on the sense of the work.
With the mass tourism and a huge popularity of the most important museums the question "how the art used to exhibited" can be a nice guide for the biggest world collections: altar in front of Mona Lisa in Louvre (and two paintings of Titian next to it, that are totally "invisible" for the public), " Nike of Samothrace" on the top of Daru staircase in the same museum, guides for the National Gallery with signs how to find the "Sunflowers" by Van Gogh end so on...

The point is that almost every art (especially sculpture) is site specific, made for a specific space and with an aim. Art in the museum lives his life after life.

Agata Chrzanowska, Looking at the Art, Paris, Centre Pompidou 2009.