For 42 years, I admonished my college students to keep a daily journal, especially when they travelled. Putting my preaching into practice during the summer of 1993, I kept a daily journal recording immersion into art history, a sojourn like no other. My Rome, Italy, and Greece adventures were, and continue to be, an intellectual love affair like no other. The death of Pope Francis and the election of Pope Leo XIV prompted me to relive the memorable moments of my scholarly pilgrimage. I went back to my journal and selected the following entries. Nestled between the Palatine and Capitoline Hills, my Rome summer domicile was Casa Kolbe, a 1625 monastery in the heart of ancient Rome and minutes away from the Forum, Circus Maximus, and Janus’ arch.
June 6. 1993: The Romans are an intriguing people. They do not talk; rather, they sing. While the French and Spaniards speak in musically pleasant tones, the Romans speak (with emotive gesticulation) in operatic rhythms. Traffic: I feel at home, for after all I lived in Beirut, Lebanon, whose traffic is similar. The streets are jam-packed, and the bumper-to-bumper traffic buzzes like a mechanized beehive; mastering the art of crossing a street is an initiation rite to becoming a Roman. The smell of diesel exhaust, horse manure, and dust is tempered with the occasional fragrance of flowers and jasmine. Vendors: barter for the fun of it and capture a willing language teacher, and if the gift of gab fails, resort to that Mediterranean medium of hand gestures. Ice Cream: consume the gelato carefully, especially the pistachio, it is very expensive and very addictive. “Vespa-ed Vestal Virgins” are modern-day Roman women who ride their Vespa scooters dressed to the nines, weaving and snaking their way through heavy traffic. So earnest yet so graceful do they appear as they negotiate the tight spaces between cars, buses and tramways. Hair flowing in the wind, upright postures, skirts gracefully pulled up to mid-thigh to expose seductive thighs, these modern-day beauties and their nubile forms are subjects for a modern-day Bernini.
Roma, Oh Roma, your ochre colors are magical, and your charm is unique. I feel as though I am a child in a pasticceria and it’s all good, and the choices are difficult – but choices must be made. Roma is not a city, she is a universe that transcends time and place, and all roads lead to Rome. Pilgrims, tourists, artists, students, pickpockets, vendors, Vespa motorcycles, diesel buses, carabinieri, occasional drunks, and con artists come out of their cubbies to pursue their dreams and activities. I’m a student, a pilgrim, and a worshipper. Ah Roma! You’ve bewitched my every fiber, and I’ve become a slave to your wily charms, and to think that I have a short while to delight in your richness. How rapidly time flies by.
Thursday, June 17, 1993: A crowded bus ride and a brisk walk through the Borghese Gardens launched me into another day of Roman delights. The day’s treat was to view Bernini’s magnificent sculptures and other artwork on exhibit at the Borghese Gallery. In the center of the large ante chamber stands Bernini’s majestic work, The Rape of Proserpina. The larger-than-life sculpture is indeed breathtaking; its lifelike qualities can be seen best in the realistic indentation on Proserpina’s thigh and back made lifelike by Pluto’s ravaging hands. The contrast between Pluto’s powerful, masculine and grabby hands and Proserpina’s gentle, feminine and frightened demeanor lends this masterpiece an exceptional quality. Detached from the world around them, Pluto and Proserpina portray a set of contrasts: conquest and resistance, determination and fear, the physical vs. the spiritual, aggression vs. fright, and the earthy vs. the pure are but subtle themes embellished by Bernini. The sinewy torso of the David and his slingshot in a contrapposto stride exudes a vibrant energy. Apollo and Daphne complement Bernini’s The Rape of Proserpina. The delicate depiction of Daphne as she is gradually transformed into a tree (as she dodges Apollo’s lecherous advances) is, without a doubt, a most ingenious creation.
Awed by their lifelike presentation, I stood gazing at these masterpieces. That day we mortals were silenced by the stone. It was the marble’s turn to speak, and Oh what visual messages did they transmit to the mortal mind? The smooth muscle and flesh tones spoke loudly in an aesthetic cacophony of smooth sinewy flesh. It was truly a seven-course meal that left my aesthetic curiosity unquenched. Yes, the stone spoke loudly and clearly, and we mortals were but speechless babes worshipping like pagans at their feet. The day was the marble’s day, and the message was loud and clear: “I am here to please, to delight, to tease, to satiate the visual urge and to travel though time as a way of affirming the essence of life.” For Beauty is truth, Truth is beauty has never meant as much as it did that day. What hands? what discerning genius? what emotions? What an outburst of inspiration and creativity did this man called Bernini possess?
June 20, 1993: This a.m. I went to the Pantheon and partook in the morning Sunday mass on Giorno dell’Ascensione. Right there in that awesome edifice built by the noble Agrippa, I marveled at the entire structure. In the center of the Piazza Pantheon is the typical Roman fountain graced with a Bernini sculpture and an obelisk. The exterior is very rough and plain; its exterior marble and copper dome, stolen for use in Christian monuments, bespeak of Rome’s stoicism and pragmatism. On the inside, a giant 28ft. oculus peers into the cylindrical interior to bring in the sun’s rays to illuminate the interior space to help draw the contrast between the beautiful, marbled floor and the ornate lateral chancels on the one hand, and the plain receding square coffers of the domed ceiling on the other. Raphael’s tomb graces one such chancel, and what an experience it was to worship and hear the “Dominus Vobiscum” incantation right there in that pagan and Christian atmosphere. Agrippa and Pagan Rome, Raphael and the Renaissance, and King Immanuel and a united modern Italy lie in their sepulchers to claim a 2500-year continuity of Italian culture, history and monuments .
After visiting five cathedrals today, I ‘m declaring a brief moratorium. I am dazzled by all the beauty and richness of the Baroque expression. Richly ornate structures with concave and convex shapes, gilded garlands, luscious ceiling frescoes, pilaster columns of every shape, color, and size, the trompe l’oeil effect, and ascending cherubs and putti and numerous biblical personae into imaginary heavens!! Mon Dieu. And Caravaggio’s The Calling of St. Matthew will always be emblazoned in my cerebral cortex.
June 23. 1993: After that day’s visit to Santa Maria Della Vittoria, I set a moratorium on church visitation (but then that’s what I said the previous day). After a while the eyes get dazzled with all the beauty of Baroque extravaganza – and that’s not a pejorative statement. While visiting this church, I feasted my eyes on yet another Bernini masterpiece; I viewed The Ecstasy of St. Teresa on display in the Cornaro chapel. And what ecstasy it was to behold this magnificent piece of marble. I do not fully believe that Bernini intended the ecstasy to be spiritual, for the look on the woman’s face bespeaks of another ecstasy, and the joy and rapture she exhibits (from her forehead to her toes) connotes the release of intensive human ecstasy at its peak moment.
Not only did Bernini know how to chisel the power of expression through a difficult medium such as marble, but he also fully understood the importance of light as an interpretive device to enhance the realistic qualities of his creation. Located (at Bernini’s request) directly above this masterpiece in the ceiling is a skylight that provides diffused lighting. It is as though the artist is pulling a slight hand to help make his subject appear to be lightly suspended in midair. And don’t rapture and ecstasy leave one suspended in air?
June 25. 1993: (After yet another visit to St. Peter’s Basilica and a first visit to St. Peter’s Dome, the writer decided to write a journal entry in the form of an Apostrophe to the men who built this monument. )
Dear Honorable Signore Bramante, Michelangelo, sculptor, Bernini, and Nervi, Gentlemen, Signore, one and all:
What a treat you provided, yet one more time, on the afternoon of June 25, 1993. Mine eyes, gentlemen, have truly seen the Glory of your combined efforts in building St. Peter’s Basilica, Copula, and Piazza. And you, Nervi, what a great modern rendition you’ve created adjacent to this magnet that draws people from all corners of the world.
I set out that June afternoon with a Louisiana pilgrim to visit your magnificent creation; we were soon joined by a Muscovite and a young English couple, pilgrims like my colleague and me, and together we sought protection from the sweltering sun under the large pincer-shaped portico. Having seen the interior for the umpteenth time, we set out to climb the 380+ stairs that took us to the copula of your joint masterpiece. There’s no doubt, gentlemen, that we followed in your footsteps, you as creators and geniuses, and we but as humble admirers. The view of the nave and transept from the dome’s interior circular parapet was absolutely breathtaking. Master Bernini, you with the hands that make marble speak, what inspired you to create such a canopy for the altar? What genius inspired you to create the 95 ft. serpentine-shaped columns? Pray, tell, what muse inspired you to conceive such elegance and grandeur? Did you feel compelled to complement Master Michelangelo’s dome? And the strategically positioned mosaics (in pastels, ochers, and golds) dazzle the eyes and create an atmosphere of reverence and awe.
Proceeding up the by-now narrow stairway, we eagerly trudged to the very top. Ah! the view. Beautifully manicured gardens enjoyed on previous visits at ground level looked even better, for from this vantage point the parts blended with the whole; but then all mountain top experiences do that. Yes, mine eyes, Gentlemen, had seen the glory that day. I arrived as a pilgrim, and I departed as a believer. I arrived as a child and departed a wizened older person. I arrived hungry and departed yet more hungry, for the feast was so abundant, so rich, that I must allow time and distance to help me synthesize, categorize, reclassify, reread and reinterpret all I have seen. In my adopted country I hope to share this journey with my students. To chart a course for their futures, the students must look to the past. I hope to emulate the zeal of Neri and Avila in sharing this bountiful journey with my students.
July 8, 1993 Impressions of Rome: When I ‘ll hear Respighi’s Fountains of Rome and The Pines of Rome in the future, I’ll think of the hundreds of fountains and thousands of canopied pine trees of Roma. When I’ll think of architecture, I’ll think of Roman architecture, triumphal arches, Trajan’s Column, the Fora, Pagan and Christian Basilicas, cathedrals and baptisteries. And when I’ll think of marble, I’ll think of life, beauty, creativity, permanence. And when I’ll think of civilizations, I’ll think of progress and decadence, decency and corruption, order and chaotic lawlessness, national character that include shared beliefs in the affirmation of human dignity, the rise of civilizations and their demise. And when I’ll think of creativity, I’ll think of the creative impulse that lies in the individual and collective hearts, minds, and souls. I’ll think of Beauty, of Truth, of permanence, and, above all, I’ll think of man’s spirit, an indominable spirit that strives to attain everlasting verity. And for this reason, I feel that my pilgrimage in search of truth and beauty has set my spirit free, albeit for a summer’s sojourn and intellectual love affair with history, culture, and art.
Tiamo Italia, arrivederci Roma.
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