the entire last week! oops

last tuesday, my mixed media class had the opportunity to go to the church of san pietro in vincoli where michelangelo's moses statue is located. san pietro in vincoli literally translates to "saint peter in chains," which have been housed there since around 449 AD - the chains that bound him when imprisoned in jerusalem.

3-photo stitch of the paintings and altar

peter's chains

on wednesday, we started a really intense packaging seminar put on by primo angeli. hes a famous designer that has mostly done business through his san francisco business, but hes designed and branded for companies, such as: ben & jerrys, coca cola, guinness beer, intel, nestle, xerox, general mills, hyatt hotels, at&t, banana republic, levi strauss, and the 1996 olympics. pic of him below.

he pretty much kicked our butts, but in a good way. we had to redesign an entire brand (as a group) in under 2 days, he was pushing us of course. it was sooo stressful because we began with a presentation of the current brand we were going to rework (buitoni pasta). then the next day, when we presented our final project he loved it. which was so relieving due to the amount of stress we had.

for art history on thursday, we revisited the pantheon. since i dont think i said much about it earlier, the pantheon is a building in rome, commissioned by marcus agrippa as a temple to all the gods of ancient rome. it was rebuilt by hadrian in 126 AD. it contains a central opening (oculus) to the sky. i hope it snows just ONE day here so i can run and take pictures of the snow falling inside. the pantheon even holds the "bones and ashes" - "ossa et cineres" - of the famous artist, raphael.

light shown by the oculus

we visited the temple of hadrian and the column of marcus aurelius on the way to the church of sant'ignazio. this church was dedicated to the founder of the jesuit order and was built in baroque style in the mid 1600s. the "dome" is technically missing from the church, but the tromp l'oeil (trick of the eye) paintings give the effect of a large, overhead dome. the paintings were done by andrea pozzo, and he worked to "open up, even dissolve the actual surface of the nave's barrel vault illusionistically." a marble disk set into the middle of the nave floor marks the ideal spot from which observers might fully experience the illusion.

the view of the dome from the ideal location

from a not-so-ideal location where you can see more of how your eyes have been tricked

gorgeous :)

thennnn we went to the church of santa maria sopra minerva, which is the only gothic church in rome and is considered one of the most important churches of the roman catholic dominican order in rome, italy. this is also where the father of modern astronomy, galileo galilei, recanted his scientific theses in 1633.

okay enough with history, look what we finally captured!! this happens quite frequently, but never get our cameras in time. and we come home to bird poop on our floors - so we know they are in there when were gone!

on sunday, ryan and i decided to take a trip to florence, italy for the night. we visited the uffizi gallery to see michelangelo's david, but failed miserably since that's located at the accademia. whoops. since ryan's  cousin is studying there so we had our own little tour guide while we were there. she showed us a little bit of florence and took us through the ponte vecchio bridge. 

the ponte veccio bridge ("old bridge") is a medieval bridge over the arno river. butchers initially occupied the shops, but medici prohibited them from selling there (i think because it smelled bad?), and gold merchants immediately took over and monopolized the shops.

next was piazzale michelangelo, which is a famous square with a magnificent panoramic view of florence.

the basilica di santa maria del popolo is also located up on the hill. annddd just looking it up now, i realized theres a bernini statue and rafael paintings within the church - we had no idea at the time.

the next morning we visited the basilica of santa maria novella, which is the first great basilica in florence (and also originally built gothic). When it was later finished, the architect attempted to bring in humanist ideals that would be in harmony with the existing medieval parts. this is where galileo galilei was first attacked (leading to his indictment).

finally, we visited the duomo (the basilica di santa maria del fiore) - which began in 1296 in the gothic style and was completely in 1436 (brunellesci engineered the dome). the church is covered in marble panels in shades of green and pink and white. the basilica is one of italy's largest churches and was the largest dome in the world (until the modern era), but remains the largest brick dome ever constructed.

outside of the duomo

the dome!!

on top of the cupola

welllll thats all i have for now. weve had a crazzzyyy week of homework but were off to sorrento, pompeii, naples for a field trip and then a group of us is off to munich for OKTOBERFESTTTT for the weekend. ill update when we get back as long as im not swamped in homework!!