Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Non-potable.
My sore throat was unbearable, the dust of the Italian countryside did not seem to have any healing properties. I drank from a fountain. Afterwards I saw a sign that said "Non-potable, DO NOT DRINK!" Excellent work.
Nine Generations.
For nine generations a family in Civita has pressed olives for oil. The current owner is an enthusiastic showman. He swings his arms about gesturing us to enter his small shop where a fire burns in the side of his fire place. The room is dim and the walls are stone, the very stone of the mountain upon which Civita sits. We eat olive oil, salt, garlic on bread that has been toasted upon an open fire. Here, the simplicity adds something to the overall taste. Down the street the road ends at the edge of a cliff. Here there sits an old woman with a lame foot. She offers to let us take pictures from her back yard for one Euro.
The Walk Back.
The walk back from the Rome Center has become a tiring routine. The Ponte Sisto is always covered with a carpet of people; vendors, the homeless, tourists. The speed of movement is approximately one mile per hour, probably less. The other side is an asteroid field of people walking in every direction.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
On the Collecting of Beauty (Creative Writing Assignment #21)
I.
Rome is the most beautiful of cities.
There live the most beautiful people.
There is found the most beautiful artwork.
I am leaving for Rome now.
II.
The plane doors open,
Italy exhales deeply.
Moist, muggy
air
hits my face.
It oppresses me.
III.
The buildings have been
lacerated by graffiti,
Excruciatingly bright neon scrawl,
only as high as the tallest Roman.
I am looking for beauty.
IV.
A gypsy woman,
her skull burdened by
a thousand
sores.
I have not yet found beauty.
V.
In a city, beauty dwells on the streets.
The museum is not the city.
The church is not the city.
I have searched the Corso,
the backstreets,
the bridges,
the parks.
Is Rome the most beautiful of cities?
Perhaps I am not a city person.
VI.
I have caught glimpses of it.
Three obelisks seen from one point,
space is drawn together toward me.
Green light.
The image is gone.
VII.
Say he came from a hill town,
from a thatched hut.
Long ago he saw an icon decorated with gold,
it flashed in the dim church.
He marveled to see the image of a man in lifeless metal.
All other pictures for him
have been drawn in the cold soil.
He comes to Rome.
A pilgrimage.
He sees a palazzo,
he sees a piazza,
he sees the statues,
so much greater than that
small icon.
He is finally warm,
this must be the city of God.
The most beautiful city in the world.
VIII.
I glimpse it again.
A wizen man waters the flowers upon his deck.
Vibrant, exuberant flowers that cannot help
but sweetly dangle themselves before the street below.
“Hurry, hurry, we must not be late!”
The vision is gone.
IX.
A memory:
We are in the airport,
above our heads hang dirty, loose wires,
bloated worms laying eggs in an infection.
To our side are gold display cases,
designer purses that seem as if
nothing should ever contaminate their perfection.
Beauty here,
Ugliness here.
Am I beginning to understand the secret?
X.
He watches the carriage of the Pope
riding past him through the sodden streets.
Purple, gold embroidered curtains sway in crystal windows.
Mud splashes onto his cloak.
Which does he see
the Pope or the mud?
XI.
Two weeks in Rome.
Have I discovered the cause of my blindness?
XII.
There is beauty in all cities.
But the people of cities position it
in different ways.
Like two keepers of
a Zen garden,
we rake our beauty
in contrary patterns.
Where I am from,
we spread it evenly,
so that we completely cover the dirt below.
The Romans collect it in great piles.
They do not look to the dirt.
They look to the magnificence
of the piles.
Rome is the most beautiful of cities.
There live the most beautiful people.
There is found the most beautiful artwork.
I am leaving for Rome now.
II.
The plane doors open,
Italy exhales deeply.
Moist, muggy
air
hits my face.
It oppresses me.
III.
The buildings have been
lacerated by graffiti,
Excruciatingly bright neon scrawl,
only as high as the tallest Roman.
I am looking for beauty.
IV.
A gypsy woman,
her skull burdened by
a thousand
sores.
I have not yet found beauty.
V.
In a city, beauty dwells on the streets.
The museum is not the city.
The church is not the city.
I have searched the Corso,
the backstreets,
the bridges,
the parks.
Is Rome the most beautiful of cities?
Perhaps I am not a city person.
VI.
I have caught glimpses of it.
Three obelisks seen from one point,
space is drawn together toward me.
Green light.
The image is gone.
VII.
Say he came from a hill town,
from a thatched hut.
Long ago he saw an icon decorated with gold,
it flashed in the dim church.
He marveled to see the image of a man in lifeless metal.
All other pictures for him
have been drawn in the cold soil.
He comes to Rome.
A pilgrimage.
He sees a palazzo,
he sees a piazza,
he sees the statues,
so much greater than that
small icon.
He is finally warm,
this must be the city of God.
The most beautiful city in the world.
VIII.
I glimpse it again.
A wizen man waters the flowers upon his deck.
Vibrant, exuberant flowers that cannot help
but sweetly dangle themselves before the street below.
“Hurry, hurry, we must not be late!”
The vision is gone.
IX.
A memory:
We are in the airport,
above our heads hang dirty, loose wires,
bloated worms laying eggs in an infection.
To our side are gold display cases,
designer purses that seem as if
nothing should ever contaminate their perfection.
Beauty here,
Ugliness here.
Am I beginning to understand the secret?
X.
He watches the carriage of the Pope
riding past him through the sodden streets.
Purple, gold embroidered curtains sway in crystal windows.
Mud splashes onto his cloak.
Which does he see
the Pope or the mud?
XI.
Two weeks in Rome.
Have I discovered the cause of my blindness?
XII.
There is beauty in all cities.
But the people of cities position it
in different ways.
Like two keepers of
a Zen garden,
we rake our beauty
in contrary patterns.
Where I am from,
we spread it evenly,
so that we completely cover the dirt below.
The Romans collect it in great piles.
They do not look to the dirt.
They look to the magnificence
of the piles.
Wrestling Down Beauty (Creative Writing Assignment #5)
Like our other senses, our perception of beauty is dynamic. It sways this way and that in the breeze of our current environment. To a prisoner confined to a dank dungeon cell, the crudest image of a beached sailboat might be enough to summon an intense aesthetic experience. While to the denizen of the Louvre, even a masterpiece of painting might only be able to garner a momentary glance. Who has not entered an art museum bearing bountiful enthusiasm, studied the first few rooms carefully, trying to inhale through the eye every image, every angle, but plowed through the last rooms with only a superficial and weary glance to everything that is neither exploding from its frame, depicting the undepictable, or surrounded by a furious crowd of photobandits? Seeing one beautiful image demands that we experience something of even greater beauty, something that will cause all our thoughts to be for a second completely terminated. The bar is always being raised.
This makes identifying the most beautiful works of art in Rome particularly difficult. By the time that I had trudged to the Vatican, I had visually devoured nearly two thousand years of genius. My stomach for art was understandingly displeased. In fact I had nearly lost my appetite. It would take a visionary like Bernini to give me the kind of aesthetic meal that I had grown to crave. The bar is raised again. Yet if I must create a list of the most beautiful art works in Rome, I will at least do it in retrospect. I challenge anyone to return to the David, stand in front of that lone figure, who is capable of handing you his mental state in a glance, and say that Bernini dwells on a higher level of artistic heaven. Here then, in retrospect, I present to you the artworks in Rome that I have at one point found most beautiful.
You step forward believing that you are entering a caliginous, cavernous space. A dream of pagan gloom received by dark Caligula. You are inhaled through the door. Engulfed with the other tourists. Then you see it, the shaft of light that creates a glowing ellipse and casts everything else around it in shadows. Your eyes follow this road, this portal, upwards through the lofty places where the smoke from sacrifices once swirled. Your body cannot follow your eyes as they exit the oculus and escape the Pantheon for the cityscape of Rome and the furiously blue sky above.
His name was unfamiliar. Later I would wonder at how many other artists might be lost to me, the victims of the whims of history and fashion. I had no expectations when I entered the room. For a time I thought little because I forgot that the material that I was absently staring at was marble. That the flowing clothe was made of a stone formed from the shells of microscopic ocean creatures. Never had I known that in this crude material I could see cultivated a soft thigh, a mane of dense hair, coarse bark, a supple gown that is carried in the breeze. The figures seemed to have grown by some mysterious chain of chemical reactions. Any process besides the series of minuscule explosions that constitute the work of the chisel and hammer.
In the mountains, this is where the duomo must have been born. Here it seems as if the soaring green marble facade might have sprouted from between boulders. Here where you are always either ascending or descending. This is the only appropriate place for a duomo, where it can soar into the air and compete with the surrounding peaks. The Duomo of Siena, like the statues of Bernini, give the feel of a natural process. When one looks at the ornate textures, the intricate carvings that like fractals should be infinite in their detail, one feels the sense that these have grown out of the marble, that even now forces inside the building a stretching new grooves into the living surface.
As my toiletries, sufficient for five weeks, begin to feel sadly empty, I try to reflect upon what I have seen. Try to journey back and recognize the moment upon which the rest of my aesthetic experience could be balanced. Was it the ancient pantheon, father of domes, forger of that famous blade of ethereal light? The overwhelming and inhuman majesty of the Sistine Chapel, a place where time runs differently, where an hour seems to pass in a minute? No, for me, the beauty of Rome’s artwork finds its locus at a group of far more inconspicuous figures which stand as vigilant sentinels on the Pilgrim’s roads of the city. They have seen nearly all of the city’s history from the secret eye that some say exists on their pyramidion. They have fallen to ruin, they have been resurrected in the glory of scaffolding, hemp rope, and sweaty bodies in labor. They are so simple that I can imagine a world in which I might have formed the idea of them in my mind. But they symbolize for me what the Romans do best. They are stolen, they are made better, they are mixed with all the rest of the chaos to create something that structures a city. Something that supports the dizzying image that is at once Rome and the World. They are a blank slate that has been interpreted by generation after generation of Romans. They are the obelisks.
This makes identifying the most beautiful works of art in Rome particularly difficult. By the time that I had trudged to the Vatican, I had visually devoured nearly two thousand years of genius. My stomach for art was understandingly displeased. In fact I had nearly lost my appetite. It would take a visionary like Bernini to give me the kind of aesthetic meal that I had grown to crave. The bar is raised again. Yet if I must create a list of the most beautiful art works in Rome, I will at least do it in retrospect. I challenge anyone to return to the David, stand in front of that lone figure, who is capable of handing you his mental state in a glance, and say that Bernini dwells on a higher level of artistic heaven. Here then, in retrospect, I present to you the artworks in Rome that I have at one point found most beautiful.
You step forward believing that you are entering a caliginous, cavernous space. A dream of pagan gloom received by dark Caligula. You are inhaled through the door. Engulfed with the other tourists. Then you see it, the shaft of light that creates a glowing ellipse and casts everything else around it in shadows. Your eyes follow this road, this portal, upwards through the lofty places where the smoke from sacrifices once swirled. Your body cannot follow your eyes as they exit the oculus and escape the Pantheon for the cityscape of Rome and the furiously blue sky above.
His name was unfamiliar. Later I would wonder at how many other artists might be lost to me, the victims of the whims of history and fashion. I had no expectations when I entered the room. For a time I thought little because I forgot that the material that I was absently staring at was marble. That the flowing clothe was made of a stone formed from the shells of microscopic ocean creatures. Never had I known that in this crude material I could see cultivated a soft thigh, a mane of dense hair, coarse bark, a supple gown that is carried in the breeze. The figures seemed to have grown by some mysterious chain of chemical reactions. Any process besides the series of minuscule explosions that constitute the work of the chisel and hammer.
In the mountains, this is where the duomo must have been born. Here it seems as if the soaring green marble facade might have sprouted from between boulders. Here where you are always either ascending or descending. This is the only appropriate place for a duomo, where it can soar into the air and compete with the surrounding peaks. The Duomo of Siena, like the statues of Bernini, give the feel of a natural process. When one looks at the ornate textures, the intricate carvings that like fractals should be infinite in their detail, one feels the sense that these have grown out of the marble, that even now forces inside the building a stretching new grooves into the living surface.
As my toiletries, sufficient for five weeks, begin to feel sadly empty, I try to reflect upon what I have seen. Try to journey back and recognize the moment upon which the rest of my aesthetic experience could be balanced. Was it the ancient pantheon, father of domes, forger of that famous blade of ethereal light? The overwhelming and inhuman majesty of the Sistine Chapel, a place where time runs differently, where an hour seems to pass in a minute? No, for me, the beauty of Rome’s artwork finds its locus at a group of far more inconspicuous figures which stand as vigilant sentinels on the Pilgrim’s roads of the city. They have seen nearly all of the city’s history from the secret eye that some say exists on their pyramidion. They have fallen to ruin, they have been resurrected in the glory of scaffolding, hemp rope, and sweaty bodies in labor. They are so simple that I can imagine a world in which I might have formed the idea of them in my mind. But they symbolize for me what the Romans do best. They are stolen, they are made better, they are mixed with all the rest of the chaos to create something that structures a city. Something that supports the dizzying image that is at once Rome and the World. They are a blank slate that has been interpreted by generation after generation of Romans. They are the obelisks.
Ambushed in Il Gesù (Creative Writing Assignment #11)
From a distance and through the pulsing rain, Il Gesù presents itself as a sober, colorless church that crouches among the smaller commercial buildings of the Via del Plebiscito. There seems to be no intention in its grey, expressionless façade, which blends into the leaden sky behind it. As the viewer draws closer, jumping over puddles, details begin to materialize out of the slick, wet marble. Ascending the stairs at the entrance, the viewer lifts his head and notices that two stone figures have appeared on either side of the doors, as if they had just stepped out from the shadows of their niches. As his view travels down the flowing robes of these holy men, he is suddenly confronted with the first of many unexpected images, for under the boot of the stern figure is the body of a naked woman. Her anguished face projects out of the church at the viewer. Her breasts are squeezed against the stone ledge, so that they also protrude toward the steps. It is this woman’s face that looks at him, not the stern face of the Jesuit holy man. It is with her that the viewer is meant to identify. So here at the beginning of the journey, the viewer is at once being tempted and chastised for in one moment we may see an object of lust and the wretchedness that it will cause. This is foreshadowing for all the sensations that Il Gesù will impose upon those who enter.
Inside, trying to squeegee off the rain, one might not immediately look up. But Il Gesù is prepared to wait. For none can resist the eventual urge to follow the red pillars to the cosmic battle that rages above. Here one can see figures radiating outward from the name of Jesus, an asymmetrical sun drooping with the putrid weight of its radian of sinners. This mass of flesh tumbles downward, further into the church and toward the void where the dome soars upward from the ceiling. As his eye traces their fluttering bodies, the viewer hears the low growl of thunder outside. Somewhere in the depths of the church a hungry, antediluvian beast awaits these sinners. Staring at the trajectory of these doomed souls the viewer suddenly realizes that their course downward along the churches ceiling directly mirrors his own. Again, he sees that Il Gesù has made a judgment about him and it intentions to speak to him of this through form and surprise.
Further into the church, the viewer passes chapels that stand as islands of sanctuary amid the visual assault that constitutes the decoration of the church. But just as Eden has been blocked against the entrance of fallen men, so too have these shelters been barred with rough wooden railings. Il Gesù intentionally allows the viewer to glimpse these grottos hidden from the pandemonium, only to raise a stiff arm in denial. So he stares eagerly from behind the gate. As he stares through the dim, musty air he begins to focus upon the shadowed forms. A delicate woman bearing a cross looks down before her into the shadows that lay like bodies under a new fallen snow of coal. This is comforting, except for the sliver of malice that is barely discernable in her face. Following her eyes he perceives with a sense of betrayal for being tricked again, that she is kicking at two disheveled figures. The skin on their arms is like the exoskeleton of a molting dragonfly; it hangs loose with the fine wrinkles that one can only find in a material that is micrometers thin. One of these crouching figures shields himself with his arm while the other tumbles backward, as a serpent coils itself around his writhing body. The viewer again stands closest to these two figures. Who else can he identify himself with but them. Now the viewer has begun to feel uncomfortable, as he knows that Il Gesù has meant for him to. The condemning foot of Il Gesù is casting a shadow over him, and he has begun to cower. But he goes on forward.
The church seems to extend itself as the viewer walks, the bright altar receding, tunneling into Rome. To one side in a chapel he sees a painted statue of Christ on the cross. Fully illuminated with artificial light he can see the vulgar, scarlet blood painted onto Christ’s hands. His look of complete anguish. After Il Gesù has pointed the finger of sin at the viewer, it highlights exactly what this has cost IHS.
In the end of this long preparation, Il Gesù leads the viewer to the altar. He has since become a sinner, kicked and stepped upon, blamed for the flesh ripping torture of the world’s most famous death. He is led to the point of light that has shone as a confident beacon all throughout his journey. It is blindingly golden, and it seems as if this gold itself casts away the darkness that would otherwise conceal the awkward painting that hangs above. The viewer examines the figures, and for sometime he believes himself to be starring at a vision of the birth of Jesus. But if he is clever he will see the final machination. The painting represents the circumcision of Christ. This is stranger than anything before, but it ties together everything that he has already seen. Here Jesus undergoes the traditional male sacrifice. He is not being kicked or stepped on but he is sacrificing the symbol of his reproductive power to the God of Israel. The viewer stands for a while, this is what the patriarchal Il Gesù has been driving towards, submission to God and therefore submission to Il Gesù. Now the viewer may flee the angry titan, or he may bow in submission. But the foot can be seen falling forward, the IHS bounded by radiating spears of gold. Now it is the viewer’s turn to show his intention.
Inside, trying to squeegee off the rain, one might not immediately look up. But Il Gesù is prepared to wait. For none can resist the eventual urge to follow the red pillars to the cosmic battle that rages above. Here one can see figures radiating outward from the name of Jesus, an asymmetrical sun drooping with the putrid weight of its radian of sinners. This mass of flesh tumbles downward, further into the church and toward the void where the dome soars upward from the ceiling. As his eye traces their fluttering bodies, the viewer hears the low growl of thunder outside. Somewhere in the depths of the church a hungry, antediluvian beast awaits these sinners. Staring at the trajectory of these doomed souls the viewer suddenly realizes that their course downward along the churches ceiling directly mirrors his own. Again, he sees that Il Gesù has made a judgment about him and it intentions to speak to him of this through form and surprise.
Further into the church, the viewer passes chapels that stand as islands of sanctuary amid the visual assault that constitutes the decoration of the church. But just as Eden has been blocked against the entrance of fallen men, so too have these shelters been barred with rough wooden railings. Il Gesù intentionally allows the viewer to glimpse these grottos hidden from the pandemonium, only to raise a stiff arm in denial. So he stares eagerly from behind the gate. As he stares through the dim, musty air he begins to focus upon the shadowed forms. A delicate woman bearing a cross looks down before her into the shadows that lay like bodies under a new fallen snow of coal. This is comforting, except for the sliver of malice that is barely discernable in her face. Following her eyes he perceives with a sense of betrayal for being tricked again, that she is kicking at two disheveled figures. The skin on their arms is like the exoskeleton of a molting dragonfly; it hangs loose with the fine wrinkles that one can only find in a material that is micrometers thin. One of these crouching figures shields himself with his arm while the other tumbles backward, as a serpent coils itself around his writhing body. The viewer again stands closest to these two figures. Who else can he identify himself with but them. Now the viewer has begun to feel uncomfortable, as he knows that Il Gesù has meant for him to. The condemning foot of Il Gesù is casting a shadow over him, and he has begun to cower. But he goes on forward.
The church seems to extend itself as the viewer walks, the bright altar receding, tunneling into Rome. To one side in a chapel he sees a painted statue of Christ on the cross. Fully illuminated with artificial light he can see the vulgar, scarlet blood painted onto Christ’s hands. His look of complete anguish. After Il Gesù has pointed the finger of sin at the viewer, it highlights exactly what this has cost IHS.
In the end of this long preparation, Il Gesù leads the viewer to the altar. He has since become a sinner, kicked and stepped upon, blamed for the flesh ripping torture of the world’s most famous death. He is led to the point of light that has shone as a confident beacon all throughout his journey. It is blindingly golden, and it seems as if this gold itself casts away the darkness that would otherwise conceal the awkward painting that hangs above. The viewer examines the figures, and for sometime he believes himself to be starring at a vision of the birth of Jesus. But if he is clever he will see the final machination. The painting represents the circumcision of Christ. This is stranger than anything before, but it ties together everything that he has already seen. Here Jesus undergoes the traditional male sacrifice. He is not being kicked or stepped on but he is sacrificing the symbol of his reproductive power to the God of Israel. The viewer stands for a while, this is what the patriarchal Il Gesù has been driving towards, submission to God and therefore submission to Il Gesù. Now the viewer may flee the angry titan, or he may bow in submission. But the foot can be seen falling forward, the IHS bounded by radiating spears of gold. Now it is the viewer’s turn to show his intention.
"And in a church..." (Creative Writing Assignment #15)
When I enter a church in Rome I have certain expectations about what I am about to see. When there is something other than the usual penitent saints, unnatural flying cherub heads, crucified Christs, and chaste virgins, I am surprised, and more often than not, confused. So you can guess what my reaction might have been when I turned a corner in the Church of San Francesco a Ripa and was assaulted by the sight of a gaping, moaning mouth. And this mouth did not belong to a homely martyr, finally vocalizing the pain that the love of God so long kept imprisoned. No, decidedly not. This mouth belonged to a woman lying not upon a cross, nor upon the blood soaked steps of a pagan temple, but upon a resplendent sofa.
My eyes stared at that singular, dark orifice, the upper lip slightly drawn back to show the irregular winding of ivory teeth. The face of the woman is bathed in light, and the contrast between shining marble and shadows held my attention for some time to this inexplicable expression of emotion. The next feature I looked to was the eyes. This was an obvious step; I was after all intensely interested in deciphering the strange frisson that the woman was currently experiencing. I have found that in statues as well as live humans the eyes are good place to look to identify emotion.
I started when I found them to be not only discomforting, but even more provocative than the mouth. They are open, but only slightly so. They resembled the condition of eyes that are at ease when sight is no longer a necessity, when some other sense has usurped the concentration of the mind. The pupils inside are also absent. The marble is smooth where these symbols of consciousness, attention, and regularity would have dwelt. I have seen enough Bernini statues to know that he tends to carve pupils into his figures. This can only mean then that the woman’s eyes have rolled back in their sockets. In pleasure, in pain, or in that strange country that is a mixture of these both of these. The entire face is disconcerting and I have already begun to feel a sense of guilt at seeing this depiction of such a personal moment.
Traveling away from the light I survey the entire body. A neck limply bent, the beginning of a flowing garment, and then I come upon the next shock. It is the hand of the woman, or rather the position of the woman’s hand. It clutches at her breast as if to alleviate the unbearable lightness that she must be feeling in her chest. Now I truly do wish to turn away. But I do not, for now I am a servant to the mystery that the statue is revealing. I look again at the hand, its fingers splayed to gain the entire diameter of the breast. Her wrist is bent in surprise. It also redirects my attention toward her body, in case it had begun to drift elsewhere. And in case you wondered, her hand is sadly on the wrong side to be clutching at her heart.
So I continue down this futile voyage of discomfort, passing down through the luscious folds of the woman’s gown. When I reach her legs I no longer have any expectations. I see that they are slightly parted, enough so that the folds of her blankets are visible between them. She is apparently unable to hold her head up but she is capable of keeping her body slightly turned such that her knees are almost a foot apart. Beyond this, the sculpture sits in shadow.
What does the light illuminate? Our three favorite pieces of course; the face that I would tell you was glazed with a gentle dew of sweat, except I know it is only smooth marble, the grasping hand that bites like a cobra into the woman’s breast, and the conspicuously parted knees that look so intentional and yet remain profoundly unpleasant. As if to add to this surreal image, above the woman fly a flock of that deranged creation of the baroque, the flying cherub heads. They watch her, their small wings barely able to support the girth of their melon-sized craniums.
I eventually leave the church, turning finally away from this sculpture that is so appropriately titled, “The Ecstasy of Beata Ludovica Albertoni”. While a description of this marble paradox might suggest that it is unique, I later discover to my surprise that this is not to be the case. In fact, Beata has an older sister named St. Theresa.
When I enter the church that holds “The Ecstasy of St. Theresa”, Santa Maria della Vittoria, I feel as if I have entered a beehive. The coffered, honeycombed ceiling glows with sweet gold. The church is crowded with objects and adornment, stores for the coming winter. My mind tries to imagine how Beata might fit into this more glamorous and cluttered atmosphere. Better than she did in the austere Church of San Francesco a Ripa. The obvious attention that has been paid to the appearance of the church makes the expression of emotion seem more appropriate. I can better imagine the dramatic, sexual, Beata here than I can in San Francesco a Ripa.
Theresa also sits in a chapel off to the left side as one walks in. This time as I walk forward, my mind swiftly constructs possible arrangements. Will the light again strike from behind her, illuminating the contours of here slightly bulbous nose, revealing the absence of a pupil? Will she recline in a too secular, too sexual bed? Will my first impression again be a moaning mouth? But when I turn the corner to the chapel, it is not St. Theresa that first holds my attention. It is a captivated young boy, supposedly an angel, who kneels upon the mound of fabric that is St. Theresa. His head is slightly cocked so that the light that shines from above can bleach his chubby face. In his hand, he holds an arrow that he gently points toward St. Theresa’s reclining body. Looking at the face that seems to take so much pleasure from staring at Theresa, I try to restrain myself from identifying him with Eros. Again it feels as if we are being tempted to begin down a path of interpretation different than the one that we might voice in a church.
St. Theresa herself no longer rests on a bed. She instead sprawls upon a cloud, her weight causing her to sink into the light woolpack. One foot rests upon a puff, but the other dangles over what I imagine to be a patchwork of farmland and forests. Does her altitude reflect what she is feeling? Lofty, spiritual exultation? I only hope so. This time the light falls from a window above, hitting St. Theresa’s almost directly. Because of this, I see with a strange sense of disappointment that the black, gaping mouth has been dulled. The light is brighter and instead of highlighting only the most suggestive parts of the statue, it is indiscriminate. It is for this reason that St. Theresa seems buried in her garments, why I had to search for her head among the maze of folds.
Again retreating from the light, my gaze cascades down the ridged garment like a stream winding its way down the channels in the side of a mountain slope. I pass by the location where a hand might have asserted itself, but surprisingly does not. It also is concealed in a sea of fabric. There is nothing of significance past the face until I see the foot. The excessive, masculine foot that emerges from the edge of the robe and falls downward. The size makes me imagine that this statue might have originally been intended to sit somewhere higher up. But there is something of more significance than just the size of the foot. The largest toe is slightly splayed. It is subtle, but once the attention catches it, this detail delivers a pulse of comprehension. This tiny detail sent my mind back to where it had been when I had viewed Beata. I imagine the ecstasy that slips downward through the body, contracting each muscle as it passes, and ending the lowly toes.
But besides this detail, I find the sculpture to be uninteresting. This surprises me since I had thought that I had been hoping for a piece like this. Something that would seem appropriate for a church. But the light is too bright and undirected, the golden ornamentation too distracting, the face is lost in folds. Only the toe interests me. As I turn to leave, I note old, bearded men looking on from the wings. They are pointing and it seems to me that they are discussing the considering the piece just as I have been. I can imagine one of them whispering, “do you really think that is what it is?” Whoever placed St. Theresa must have had a sense of humor.
So I go to Beata and I am embarrased by what I think exists in the sculpture. Then I see St. Theresa and I am bored precisely because the sculpture does not as well convey what I had before felt so uncomfortable with. This is a strange chain of interactions.
My eyes stared at that singular, dark orifice, the upper lip slightly drawn back to show the irregular winding of ivory teeth. The face of the woman is bathed in light, and the contrast between shining marble and shadows held my attention for some time to this inexplicable expression of emotion. The next feature I looked to was the eyes. This was an obvious step; I was after all intensely interested in deciphering the strange frisson that the woman was currently experiencing. I have found that in statues as well as live humans the eyes are good place to look to identify emotion.
I started when I found them to be not only discomforting, but even more provocative than the mouth. They are open, but only slightly so. They resembled the condition of eyes that are at ease when sight is no longer a necessity, when some other sense has usurped the concentration of the mind. The pupils inside are also absent. The marble is smooth where these symbols of consciousness, attention, and regularity would have dwelt. I have seen enough Bernini statues to know that he tends to carve pupils into his figures. This can only mean then that the woman’s eyes have rolled back in their sockets. In pleasure, in pain, or in that strange country that is a mixture of these both of these. The entire face is disconcerting and I have already begun to feel a sense of guilt at seeing this depiction of such a personal moment.
Traveling away from the light I survey the entire body. A neck limply bent, the beginning of a flowing garment, and then I come upon the next shock. It is the hand of the woman, or rather the position of the woman’s hand. It clutches at her breast as if to alleviate the unbearable lightness that she must be feeling in her chest. Now I truly do wish to turn away. But I do not, for now I am a servant to the mystery that the statue is revealing. I look again at the hand, its fingers splayed to gain the entire diameter of the breast. Her wrist is bent in surprise. It also redirects my attention toward her body, in case it had begun to drift elsewhere. And in case you wondered, her hand is sadly on the wrong side to be clutching at her heart.
So I continue down this futile voyage of discomfort, passing down through the luscious folds of the woman’s gown. When I reach her legs I no longer have any expectations. I see that they are slightly parted, enough so that the folds of her blankets are visible between them. She is apparently unable to hold her head up but she is capable of keeping her body slightly turned such that her knees are almost a foot apart. Beyond this, the sculpture sits in shadow.
What does the light illuminate? Our three favorite pieces of course; the face that I would tell you was glazed with a gentle dew of sweat, except I know it is only smooth marble, the grasping hand that bites like a cobra into the woman’s breast, and the conspicuously parted knees that look so intentional and yet remain profoundly unpleasant. As if to add to this surreal image, above the woman fly a flock of that deranged creation of the baroque, the flying cherub heads. They watch her, their small wings barely able to support the girth of their melon-sized craniums.
I eventually leave the church, turning finally away from this sculpture that is so appropriately titled, “The Ecstasy of Beata Ludovica Albertoni”. While a description of this marble paradox might suggest that it is unique, I later discover to my surprise that this is not to be the case. In fact, Beata has an older sister named St. Theresa.
When I enter the church that holds “The Ecstasy of St. Theresa”, Santa Maria della Vittoria, I feel as if I have entered a beehive. The coffered, honeycombed ceiling glows with sweet gold. The church is crowded with objects and adornment, stores for the coming winter. My mind tries to imagine how Beata might fit into this more glamorous and cluttered atmosphere. Better than she did in the austere Church of San Francesco a Ripa. The obvious attention that has been paid to the appearance of the church makes the expression of emotion seem more appropriate. I can better imagine the dramatic, sexual, Beata here than I can in San Francesco a Ripa.
Theresa also sits in a chapel off to the left side as one walks in. This time as I walk forward, my mind swiftly constructs possible arrangements. Will the light again strike from behind her, illuminating the contours of here slightly bulbous nose, revealing the absence of a pupil? Will she recline in a too secular, too sexual bed? Will my first impression again be a moaning mouth? But when I turn the corner to the chapel, it is not St. Theresa that first holds my attention. It is a captivated young boy, supposedly an angel, who kneels upon the mound of fabric that is St. Theresa. His head is slightly cocked so that the light that shines from above can bleach his chubby face. In his hand, he holds an arrow that he gently points toward St. Theresa’s reclining body. Looking at the face that seems to take so much pleasure from staring at Theresa, I try to restrain myself from identifying him with Eros. Again it feels as if we are being tempted to begin down a path of interpretation different than the one that we might voice in a church.
St. Theresa herself no longer rests on a bed. She instead sprawls upon a cloud, her weight causing her to sink into the light woolpack. One foot rests upon a puff, but the other dangles over what I imagine to be a patchwork of farmland and forests. Does her altitude reflect what she is feeling? Lofty, spiritual exultation? I only hope so. This time the light falls from a window above, hitting St. Theresa’s almost directly. Because of this, I see with a strange sense of disappointment that the black, gaping mouth has been dulled. The light is brighter and instead of highlighting only the most suggestive parts of the statue, it is indiscriminate. It is for this reason that St. Theresa seems buried in her garments, why I had to search for her head among the maze of folds.
Again retreating from the light, my gaze cascades down the ridged garment like a stream winding its way down the channels in the side of a mountain slope. I pass by the location where a hand might have asserted itself, but surprisingly does not. It also is concealed in a sea of fabric. There is nothing of significance past the face until I see the foot. The excessive, masculine foot that emerges from the edge of the robe and falls downward. The size makes me imagine that this statue might have originally been intended to sit somewhere higher up. But there is something of more significance than just the size of the foot. The largest toe is slightly splayed. It is subtle, but once the attention catches it, this detail delivers a pulse of comprehension. This tiny detail sent my mind back to where it had been when I had viewed Beata. I imagine the ecstasy that slips downward through the body, contracting each muscle as it passes, and ending the lowly toes.
But besides this detail, I find the sculpture to be uninteresting. This surprises me since I had thought that I had been hoping for a piece like this. Something that would seem appropriate for a church. But the light is too bright and undirected, the golden ornamentation too distracting, the face is lost in folds. Only the toe interests me. As I turn to leave, I note old, bearded men looking on from the wings. They are pointing and it seems to me that they are discussing the considering the piece just as I have been. I can imagine one of them whispering, “do you really think that is what it is?” Whoever placed St. Theresa must have had a sense of humor.
So I go to Beata and I am embarrased by what I think exists in the sculpture. Then I see St. Theresa and I am bored precisely because the sculpture does not as well convey what I had before felt so uncomfortable with. This is a strange chain of interactions.
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