Happy Halloween

“The scythe fell and lay in the grass like a lost smile.” 

From The Halloween Tree

Ray Bradbury

The Basilica di Santa Croce, Florence (Dante is actually buried in Ravenna)

"When Truth shall strike their eyes through many a tear,

And make them own the Prophet in his tomb "

from The Prophecy of Dante

Lord Byron

Florence 2019

“Rejoice, Florence, seeing you are so great that over sea and land you flap your wings, and your name is widely known in Hell!”

 Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy 

The Statue of Neptune, Florence

"In 1559, Cosimo I de' Medici launched a competition to design a fountain at a time when a new aqueduct was also being built, the first to bring running water to the city.^[2] The plan was for a statue of Neptune as the primary element, in a chariot drawn by sea-horses, symbolizing Florence's command of the Mediterranean. Initially, Baccio Bandinelli was the sculptor chosen but he died before work began. Sculptor Ammannati was hired to take over and completed the work with assistants and collaborators. The face of Neptune is said to resemble that of the Grand Duke Cosimo.^[3]

The 4.2 meter tall Neptune figure, made of Apuan marble, was completed in 1565 in time for the wedding of Francesco de' Medici I to grand duchess Johanna of Austria.^[4] Florentines were not impressed and called the statue "Il Biancone" ("the white giant").^[5][6] The work on the basin and other aspects of the fountain required nearly ten years. Ammannati and his collaborators added around the perimeter of the basin in a mannerist style, reclining, bronze river gods, laughing satyrs and marble sea-horses emerging from the water. The pedestal on which the statue stands is in the center of the octagonal fountain. It is decorated with the mythical figures of Scylla and Charybdis. The final work was completed in December 1574. The statue on display today is a copy made in the 1800s when the original was moved to the National Museum.^[7][5]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fountain_of_Neptune,_Florence

In Florence our hotel opened the breakfast buffet at 7:00. We found by being up when it opened, we could have a nice meal and then hit the mean streets of Florence. This way we could avoid the crowds for a few hours. A lot of the museums opened a 8:15 so that helped. The fountain, a copy but impressive for all that, was turned on about 8:00. 

I really loved the coloured marble we saw in some statues and church architecture. 

“In that book which is my memory,
On the first page of the chapter that is the day when I first met you,
Appear the words, ‘Here begins a new life’.”

from Vita Nuova

Dante Alighieri

Murano Italy (Art Glass)

My wife and I just got back from a trip to Florence and Venice to be met by a big snow storm. While visiting Venice we took the water bus to Murano the island of the glass blowers. We collect art glass but we did not buy any there. The number of stores was overwhelming and the quality varied wildly.  According to signs in some shop windows lots is imported rather than produced locally. One rule of thumb we adopted was to avoid shops with glass clowns in the window. Murano is lovely, a sort of mini Venice and well worth a visit even if you are not shopping for glass. Instead we visited the glass museum. 

https://museovetro.visitmuve.it/en/home/

Then we ate probably the best meal of the trip while sitting next to the canal people/dog watching and visited a church that boasts, as well as the normal saintly bits, dragon bones. My wife and I love to visit old churches when we travel and this was a beautiful example with a two story Byzantine exterior.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/dragon-bones-of-santa-maria-e-san-donato

As on our previous trip we bought our glass at the shop of Vittorio Costantini in Venice. His wife Graziella is also on hand to chat with visitors and display the pieces they have for sale. (his personal collection, also on view is incredible). They are two of the nicest people you could meet and his lamp work sculptures of birds, fish, insects and other denizens of the microcosmos he finds so fascinating, are outstanding. 

http://www.vittoriocostantini.com/en/home-2/

Murano Museum 

Florence 2019 (There and back again)

"He saw clearly how plain and simple – how narrow, even – it all was; but clearly, too, how much it all meant to him, and the special value of some such anchorage in one’s existence. He did not at all want to abandon the new life and its splendid spaces, to turn his back on sun and air and all they offered him and creep home and stay there; the upper world was all too strong, it called to him still, even down there, and he knew he must return to the larger stage. But it was good to think he had this to come back to, this place which was all his own, these things which were so glad to see him again and could always be counted upon for the same simple welcome."

from The Wind in the Willow

by Kenneth Grahame 

Venice 2016

And Polo said: 'Every time I describe a city I am saying 

something about Venice.” 

from Invisible Cites 

By Italio Calvino