Day 14

[unforth]

Today started out well enough, but my morning ended with an exercise of frustration great enough that I've been a bit of a grump ever since, even though I've been trying to buck up. Mom is definitely sick with something, she's all stuffy and keeps getting the chills, and so I headed out without her this morning, with the expectation that we'd go out together after I'd done some solo sight seeing.

My destination was the Museo d'Arte Orientale, which is housed in the third floor of the Ca' Pesaro, a museum dedicated to Modern Art. As I had already paid admission to both institutions, I gave the modern art a look through before heading up to the main show. The collection was pretty average and not very large. It started right around the turn of the 20th century, and in the earlier works were some things that were of interest to me, including a kinda hot Birth of Venus (next to a lovely sculpture of a Bather), a few nice city scapes and landscapes done in that precise way exemplified by Guardi, a couple of interesting portraits, some of the strange romantically heartwrenching Italian genre scenes of poor people looking pathetic that tug the heart strings but are actually kinda disgusting imo, a neat, large painting of a group of woman and men sewing a sail in a bright hallway, and one that particularly caught my eye: a large painting of a typically rosey cheeked woman in a kitchen, painted by Carl Larsson, who was one of my mothers favorite artists while I was growing up (she's less in to him now) - we had prints by him all over the apartment, but I'd never seen one of his works in person before. It was lovely, but it definitely felt like the fantasy of a lovely Scandinavian home, instead of it's reality. Among the later work, none of it appealed to me at all, with one exception: in a room with a classic 18th century late Baroque ceiling fresco, there was a mobile by Calder hanging in mid air. It was an awesome juxtaposition that I thought really took advantage of the setting to do something neat (Ca' Pesaro is one of Venice's old patrician palaces). Oh, and there was also a 1902 or 3 painting of three woman, of different generations, that I thought was quite nice.

On the second floor, there was an exhibit of modern sculpture that I decided to skip. When I turned up to the third floor, I was greeted immediately by what I'd come there from: the remnants of 33k+ pieces collected by an Italian around 1900, and eventually acquired in part by the city as a result of confiscation from an Austrian after WW1. My book had been warned that the collection was large and poorly labeled, and probably only for those really interested - and given that more than 75% of the collection was Japanese Edo period, that was definitely me. My book was right - both of these facts were true. In short, it was pretty much the most amazing collection of Japanese arms, armor, katana accoutrement, lacquerware, pottery, and other random things that I've ever seen. There were, like, 300 netsuke there. They had six full sets of very fine armor, including ones where I could really see the fine brocade of their underclothes. They had case after case absolutely FILLED with katana, and shorter blades. The entire staircase up the exhibit was lined with spears and other long-hafted weapons. It was way too much to take it all in. Instead, I was left with a few fleeting memories of individual items: a tsuba depicting a demon opening the sky to peer down at two smaller, scared looking demons; lots of finely lacquered koi fish and storms; an armor mask with a mustache; a saddle with cranes taking off (did I mention that there were more than a dozen saddles??); too many netsuke to register; a collection of beautiful lacquered combs and hair ornaments; three amazing kimono, all hand embroidered - one on the inside!; three very fine samisen, and a selection of other instruments, some of which were of types I'd never seen before, like pipes and small samisen and flute things; a large lacquer platter depicting baboons washing and hanging kimono to dry; lacquerware cases with drawers and matching bottles; wonderful Indian paper puppets, and a display of Middle Eastern metal ware that would have gotten it's own room shoved and packed into a small display case in a the corner of a room; two small cannons decorated in an Islamic style; three entire cases of beautiful mitokorimono (katana accoutrements), mostly black shakudo but some in other colors, with dragons and peonies and koi and storks and waterfalls and landscapes and demons and everything in between - one was a capper for the end of a sword handle that the koi tail bent over the edge. Photography wasn't allowed (though I did sneak a couple), and there was so much there that I decided to skip the rooms that didn't contain things I was really interested, so no pottery for me, but I resolved that I would buy the most complete book that they had of the collection, regardless of it's language, because I knew that with so much there, and so much in such a small area, that I had hardly taken any of it (the more so cause I was getting a little light-headed in the hungry kind of way). Still, I guess some part of me suspected what was to come, because I did linger over a few display cases, just gazing and absorbing. And sure enough, when I went downstairs, my decision to get the best regardless of language became irrelevant, as there was NOTHING in ANY language except two entirely inadequate postcards (one with a few details of the kimono, and the other with some of the finest of their decorated silver arrow heads). I was so upset that I actually lodged a complaint. And as I walked back to the hotel room, I felt really keenly like I'd been given a glimpse of wonder that had then been forever stolen away, and the specific memories I tried so hard to lodge in my brain slowly faded in to a general sense of wonder, amazement, awe, and utter and complete frustration. I even kinda wished I'd never seen it at all, and I felt a bit like I'd been told "here's a really hot guy you can kiss!", kissed him, and then punched in the mouth and told to never show my face again.

I felt a bit better after I got something to eat. :)

When I got back to the room, my frustration had calmed but not at all faded. They have no online record of their collection, and a book that was published in 1998 is entirely out of print and only in Italian - I can't say I've got much hope of finding it. I'm still pretty pissed about it, and I just wish I'd snuck a few more pictures.

From there, mom and I went out to visit the Palazzo Ducale. As we were walking past the Campanile, we noticed that there wasn't a line, so after a brief debate, we decided to cough up the ridiculous 8 euro and ascend the clock tower. It wasn't quite worth it, but it was close. The view was pretty phenomenal - it helped that it was a nice clear day - and we could see for miles in every direction, including all of the city. It was cool - though entirely inaccurate - to note that Galileo had once done the exact same thing. (entirely inaccurate because the Campanile that Galileo stood in collapsed completely in 1902, and the current Campanile is a careful and exact reproduction, but still a reproduction) - still, the bells that were in that tower were the same ones he would have heard and stood behind, so there is a bit of a link to the past there.

Mom was feeling pretty lousy already at this point, so we decided to tackle the Palazzo Ducale with a wheel chair, which went better than it could have - we only missed out on a couple of areas, neither of which sounded all that great (we skipped the opening exhibit, which mostly showed items pre-conservation efforts, and the prisons, which might have been neat, but life goes on). The collection of art and artifacts at the Palazzo was singularly unimpressive, but that wasn't what it's really all about anyway (nor was it about the hokey pokey) - the real winner is the ceiling paintings in almost every room, with the most spectacular being those in the main chambers where the government used to meet. There were a number of really astonishing ones, including a couple of battles that contained what looked like an entire towns worth of painted men; lots of pieces depicting the heroes of the city, or mythological scenes, and lots with religious contexts - numerous pieces depicted important doge's receiving their mandates directly from the heavens. However, the crown jewel of it all was the enormous Tintoretto - the labeling said that it was one of the largest paintings on canvas in the world - of the Last Judgement. It blew Michelangelo's version out of the water imo - actually, the whole room had the Sistine Chapel beat in my mind, though some of that is my own bias for darker colors and the smell of richly oiled wood, I'll own - but all in all the room were REALLY amazingly beautiful. My frustration of the morning was mitigated, as they did have a book, and it emphasizes the sections I would have wanted it to emphasize (as photography was once again not permitted).

From there, mom found the energy (oh, somehow!) to go for gelato with me (such a sacrifice, I know!), I managed to find a place I'd passed that I thought had looked promising and was rewarded by it being the best gelato I've yet had on this trip, and one of the best vanilla's I've ever had, anywhere.

Oddly, this didn't do as much to improve my mood as it probably should have, and left me oddly still hungry to boot, a feeling that I actually still have more than two hours later; I've been writing reviews on TripAdvisor and screwing around on the internet in an effort to make it til 6, when I could justify going and getting dinner. And now that is in 5 minutes, so I can stop!

But all in all...the frustrating start of things definitely has left a sour taste in my mouth. If I ever wished that I had photographic memory it was this morning (and if I ever wished I didn't, it was while looking at a Hieronymous Bosch-inspired view of Hell that was in the Palazzo Ducale collection...)...you win some, you lose some, I guess. :)