tarquinia.

Necropoli di Tarquinia

Beneath the mounds of earth are Etruscan tombs with surprisingly preserved frescoes. Slightly creepy (especially when the viewing lights go out on you), but mostly pretty sweet.

santo stefano di sessanio.

It's amazing how even the smallest of labyrinths is still a labyrinth, including this beautiful medieval town of Santo Stefano di Sessanio (located in the Abruzzan Apennines).

rocca calascio.

I had the pleasure of being given the grand tour of Abruzzo, or at least the few kilometers surrounding Chieti, thanks to Chris' gracious hospitality. The footage shall follow.

church upon Rocca Calascio

and the one time patrons of above church

porta octavius.

Rome, Italy, Europe - the datum of beauty. And yet, with every shot I take, the pictures are overwhelmingly cliché. So, while I struggle to photograph something "original," I'll turn those clichés into greyscale clichés.

Porta Octavius

palladian countryside.

The following is actually about love, or more specifically, Cupid (or Eros), but I felt it fitting for the subject of the photo.

Sonnet I

Ancient, winged god, thou who didst first draw breath
With sun and stars together at one birth,
Thou who to all things givest life and death,
Flying by devious pathways through the earth,
My heart which languish thee in bitter pain,
Seeking for thorny and malignant grief
A thousand remedies, but all in vain,
In thee, O Time, alone findeth relief
Thought thou uprootest, with forgetfulness
Healest our wounds, and lastly dost dispel
The mists which have these royal cloisters sealed;
Truth in her pure, unveilèd loveliness
Thou hast uplifted even from the well
Where she lay hid, and to all eyes revealed.

Torquato Tasso, 1544-1595
(Palladio and Tasso were contemporaries)

edificio arsenale.

pretty.

la biennale di venezia.

... architecture is not building. Buildings are objects and the act of construction leads to such objects, but architecture is how we think and talk about buildings, how we represent them, and how we build them. More generally, architecture is a way of representing, shaping and offering critical alternatives to the built environment. In a tangible sense, architecture is that which allows us to be at home in the world. In our society, buildings are too often the residue of the desire to make another world - a better world, open to possibilities beyond the everyday.

Aaron Betsky, Out There: Architecture Beyond Building, 11th Director

Danish Pavilion

Swiss Pavllion

Hong Kong Exhibit

Arsenale Building

venice.

Who knew, but people actually *do* live in Venice. Or else the laundry is staged.

an ode to scarpa.

Carlo Scarpa is quite easily my architectural hero. My photographic ode to the master shall follow.

Castelvecchio - art display

Castelvecchio - stairs

Castelvecchio - stone detailing

italy.

Now that I've been in Italy for nearly 3 weeks, I should probably start posting about it. To whet the appetite, here's what I live a block from:

The Pantheon.

That's right bitches.

merith's claude.

The Ortaköy Camii seen from a Bosphorus cruise.

And this reminds me of a Claude Lorrain, if he were to paint mosques and cruise boats rather than classical roman buildings and tall ships...

sultanahmet camii.

Sultanahmet Camii and lone worshiper.

I thought this was a fitting quote:

Before the art of illumination there was blackness and afterward there will also be blackness. Through our colors, paints, art and love, we remember that Allah had commanded us to "See"! To know is to remember that you've seen. To see is to know without remembering. Thus, painting is remembering the blackness. The great masters, who shared a love of painting and perceived that color and sight arose from darkness, longed to return to Allah's blackness by means of color. Artists without memory neither remember Allah nor his blackness. All great masters, in their work, seek that profound void within color and outside time.

Orhan Pamuk, My Name Is Red, p.76

ps.

I heart the Aya Sofia. (Gia's photo)

aya sofia.

Aya Sofia from our rooftop terrace.

omg omg omg - I finally saw inside the Aya Sofia... and there was a lot of scaffolding. Among other things.

rug.

When in Turkey... buy a rug. ?? Well, at least I did, like many other tourists. Whoops!

çay.

Something else ubiquitously found throughout Turkey - çay (pronounced like Indian "chai"). Traditionally it is served in a voluptous little glass, although British tourists have (sadly) influenced them enough to serve it in tea cups to whiteys like myself. However, like the British, it is one strong cup of tea.

ephesus.

I made it to Ephesus... with some difficulty. To make a long story short, it didn't take me 3 hours to realize no one in Izmir spoke English, yet it took me at least that to leave the damn town.

But now you want to see the ancient ruins. WRONG. Boring. Sorry, not going to do it. Snoozefest for the most part photographically - so if you want to see them, go here.

Tombstones - Isa Bey Camii.

However, here is a beautifully sad, or sadly beautiful photo of unearthed tombstones within the courtyard of Isa Bey Camii, Selçuk.

And another.

beach time.

Olympus side of the beach.

When not wandering about ancient ruins or fiery grounds, I've been enjoying some much needed beach time. The water is unbelievably warm and confirms the reasoning behind the title of "Turquoise Coast." And befitting of my lounge-lizard nature, while sunning, my book of choice has been "My Name Is Red" by Orhan Pamuk, which may be quoted in later posts...

olympus.

ancient Lycian city of Olympus.

Imagine wandering about in the lush landscape of southern Mediterranean Coast of Turkey... and finding this. Okay, so there might have been signs pointing to it...

evil eye.

Whoops! I'm getting all mixed up with photos. This is the ubiquitous evil eye - found even in church frescoes from the Byzantine era. Apparently it predates Christianity...

chimaera.

20 second shot of the Chimaera.

This was incredible and definitely the stuff of myths and legends. Fire literally magically appears from out of the ground, and sometimes unexpectedly (burnt toes anyone?).