Out / About in Roma, #I
During this fall time in Italy, we've spent great times in Rome. When we first landed, we rented an apartment for just two days in the Parioli district, new to us and apparently to most tourists. We saw few fellow turisti around. The apartment was spacious and pleasant and rather wacky. Five different artists each had been asked to paint a room. The dining room motif included abstract fried eggs painted on the ceiling and one room was wild with Alice in Wonderland scenes. It's called, aptly enough, Art Apartment. artapartrome@hotmail.com It was fun and the day was warm enough to have breakfast on the balcony. Just down the street, a long flight of stairs led down to the piazza with several good cafés and small shops.
What drew us to that out-of-the-way area of leafy streets and handsome, grand houses? A little architectural tour of non-ancient Rome! First we walked to MAXXI (Museum of Art of the 21st Century), designed by the architect Zaha Hadid. ( http://designmuseum.org/design/zaha-hadid )
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Far from the Roman Forum! I've already argued with an Italian architect friend about it. He thinks the building overpowers the art–and I think it's a splendid and exciting showcase. There's not a large permanent collection yet but special exhibits travel through. We loved the exquisite exhibitiom on how Italian architect Carlo Scarpa used lettering as part of his practice. I'd never considered before the lettering on buildings as part of the intrinsic design. Scarpa seems to me a paradigm architect. He designed buildings and also extended his work in areas of interior design, crafts, and surroundings. His approach: holistic, not just the building itself. He's a fascinating study. Here's an intro: http://architect.architecture.sk/carlo-scarpa-architect/carlo-scarpa-architect.php
Zaha Hadid, born in Iraq, shocked the ground with her bold design. Oddly, the structure is attached to a row of white military barracks. How that decision was made is a mystery, and, to my eye, a mistake from the outside, but once in front of her structure, you forget the weird appendage. The arches above are from the old building and work beautifully from the inside perspective. Across the courtyard, another row of these white barracks have transformed into a dramatic café–the best thing that could happen to a military barrack. Naturally enough in Italia, the food is wonderful and aesthetically presented as well.
You need to get around the obstacles to see what's there. The temporary-looking fencing makes me thing that another solution to the parking might be in the works. There's an outdoor space for changing exhibits. I took this to be an urban version of our Tuscan fields of poppies in spring:
Meanwhile, another outdoor exhibit involving painted paths was in preparation:
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We continued to Parco della Musica, a megawork by Renzo Piano. How nice that someone named "Piano" designed a music center! We were not able to hear a concert in his stupendous auditoriums but will return for that soon; their schedule looks fantastic. Piano's exterior shapes resemble the domes of Rome, or, to an American eye, hangers for blimps! He has used the narrow bricks that you see in ancient Roman buildings and vast expanses of travertine walkways that extend inside some of the complex. The soaring auditoriums, said to be finely calibrated acoustically, are made of American cherry wood and have the warm glow of a musical instrument.
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If you're interested, you can see many images of the interior online. http://www.galinsky.com/buildings/parcodellamusica/index.htm The restaurant Red is part of the complex, as is a spacious bookstore. Lovers of design enjoy Italian bookstores even if they can't read Italian. There is still a strong tradition of the beautiful book.
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Our allotted time was cut short by a very late flight arrival and we also lingered long in both of these spaces. This left us no time for the other adventurous building in this area, MACRO, the Museo di Arte Contemporanea di Roma, www.macro.roma.museum , designed to incorporate a former beer brewery, by Odile Decq: http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/building_types_study/museums/2011/Macro-Museum.asp I also will go back to see Villa Torlonia, Mussolini's home from 1925-43, an interesting villa aside from him. Always there are reasons to return to Rome and now to this area north of the Borghese gardens.
As twilight darkened, we walked to our third main objective, the neighborhood designed by the quirky Florentine architect Gino Coppedè. His 31,000 square meter Quartiere, at via Tagliamento and via Dora, reflects a wild pastichio of styles–baroque, venetian, gothic, renaissance, Liberty (Art Nouveau)–somehow flamboyantly resolved and very Italian. Mythological beasts, iron spiders, fountains, niches, balconies, tiles–a plethora of fanciful detail. I would like to be sitting in the lighted room on the left with the slender columns.
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Living there, I would always feel as though the opera were about to begin. The fountain of frogs is charming; so is the medieval-style chandelier hanging in the entry arch. Coppedè worked on this project from 1910-27. What fun he must have had. You can imagine him waking up and deciding, "I think I'll add an Assyrian touch today. . ." As you see, I was losing the light. I found a good video on you tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mogFdpknFbE
The first balmy night, rather blasted by the long-delayed flight over, we had dinner at Ambasciata d'Abruzzo, a traditional trattoria with outdoor tables. We'd missed the whole day we'd planned to use well by our flight having to return to New York after two hours out over the ocean. . . Scary. Then the wait for reboarding, etc. etc. We were very happy to be dining on Roman artichokes and pasta with truffles. (Kiss the ground!) The second night , after our architectural tour, we ate at Al Ceppo, worth the taxi if you're staying in the historic center. We were seated in a refined room with commanding portraits of women, whose company I enjoyed very much. I refrained, in such a setting, from photographing the grilled skewer of octopus, the swordfish on a baby spinach salad, the veal chop, the little veal meatballs, the wild green salad with fresh anchovies, and the caramelized figs with orange-scented gelato and toasted almonds. We had a mile hike back to our wild apartment but we simply floated home after such a stimulating day.
TO BE CONTINUED……..A second apartment in Roma. . .
