Archive for April, 2012

30
Apr

circolo degli artisti

By Becky Ashby-Colón 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

This past Sunday, Michael Ashkin’s studio art class participated in a group show organized in part by Shara Wasserman, in conjunction with Temple Tyler and RISD art students at the Circolo Degli Artisti. Participating students included: Rebecca Ashby-Colon (yours truly), Cynthia Baker, Zahra Chevannes, Erin Ferro-Murray, Emily Greenberg, Jeremy Handrup, Charlotte Krause, Samuel Pelts, Michael Picos, Emma Pryzbylinski, Dan Rosen, Anne Wu, and Xu Yang. The work presented various in medium and size, and generally acted as a follow-up to our most recent critique and precursor to our final critique.

We arrived at Circolo on Sunday at noon to install our works, and found that despite our best efforts to set up quickly and leave to get ready at home, there was only one ladder, which was circulating between the two other schools as well. We did eventually get our turns with the ladder as well, but not before a lot of grumbling was heard throughout the room. The major catch of the space was that we were not allowed to attach anything to the wall, whether it be with nails, tacks, or tape. Thus, every piece had to be secured with either chains or fishing line, tied to a pipe running the perimeter of the ceiling. A few paper cuts and several muffled obsenities later, I finished hanging my (very crooked) drawings, and headed home. Many of my classmates were still in the process of installing their works when I left, so when I returned at 7:00pm, the space had been totally transformed. Spotlights were on each student’s work, and blue lights filled the rest of the room with a funky vibe, bouncing off the red walls. The garden outside, where some of the RISD work was displayed, was warm and bright with fairy lights. Thankfully, it was a warm evening without rain, and we enjoyed the rest of the work with our complimentary drinks. Thank you to everyone (students and professors) who made the trek to Circolo to support us!

 

Installation by Charlotte Krause (Princeton).

Collage by Emma Pryzbylinski (BFA '13).

Installation by Cynthia Baker (BFA '13).

Installation by Michael Picos (BFA '13).

Drawing by Anne Wu (BFA '13).

Sculptures by Zahra Chevannes (BFA/BA '14).

Drawings by Rebecca Ashby-Colón (BFA '13).

Installation by Erin Ferro-Murray (BFA '13).

Video installation by Jeremy Handrup (BFA '13).

Installation by Dan Rosen (BFA '13).

Video and painting installation by Xu Yang (BFA/BA '14).

Installation by Samuel Pelts (BFA/BA '14).

Digital prints by Emily Greenberg (BFA/BA '14).

Michelle Kim (URS '13) and Urban Planning professor Nancy Brooks enjoy the show!

30
Apr

a summery spring break

By Becky Ashby-Colón 0 Comments
Categories: Daily Life and Uncategorized

Spring is here! The birds are chirping! The flowers are blooming! … And we’re in school. La primavera a Roma is almost too beautiful and distracting to get any work done, but somehow we must ignore the sunny cobblestoned streets and tempting gelato beckoning us, and buckle down for the next few weeks. Luckily, our week of spring break came at the opportune time for us to blow off some steam and relax.

Five of my friends (Cynthia Baker, Jeremy Handrup, Dan Rosen, and Erin Ferro-Murray, all BFA ’13) and I started off the week right in Berlin, staying in the beautiful neighborhood of Prenzlauer Berg.

Dan Rosen (BFA '13), Cynthia Baker (BFA '13), and her brother Brian Baker pose outside our Berlin apartment. Photo by Jeremy Handrup.

During our stay there, we visited the Holocaust Memorial, the two major contemporary art museums: Kunstwerk and Hamburger-Banhof, the Reichstag, the Kathe Kollwitz Museum, and Museum Island, just to name a few. We were joined by Charlotte Krause (Princeton, BARCH), now in her natural German habitat, and were miraculously admitted to famed European nightclub Berghain (Four floors of muscley German men, dry ice, strobe lights, and thumping bass. If you go, don’t say I didn’t warn you). In the Mitte and Alexanderplatz areas, we gallery-hopped and shopped. In Kreuzberg, we ate lots of Turkish food (think falafel and halumi pita sandwiches, smothered in garlic and yogurt sauce, topped off with shredded lettuce and cabbage and tomatoes. My mouth is watering again) and Vietnamese food (huge steaming bowls of pho! With tofu!! And spring rolls!!!).

Cynthia at Hamburger Banhof, in the Ryoji Ikeda installation. Photo by Jeremy Handrup.

On Sunday, we hung out in the famous Mauer Park flea market, conveniently located around the corner from our rented apartment. Porta Portese had some things to learn from this flea market, let me tell you! Stretching out the length of the park, it was chock full of street food stands, clothing vendors, knick knack tables, homemade jarred goods, handmade jewelry, tables of cameras (be still my heart. I did eventually give in, and bought a gently used Minolta 35-mm), and other such necessary items. It was so lovely to wander around without agenda, experiencing both street and nightlife as well as cultural institutions. On our last night in Berlin, Anne Wu and Michael Picos (also BFA ’13) joined us from their stay in Vienna, and we shared a delicious dinner at White Trash Fast Food (think gourmet-but-simple artisan burgers and tofu burgers, melty spicy crunchy nachos, traditional schniztel and brats, and a generous selection of German beers on tap, in a multi-tiered restaurant connected to a tattoo shop, with live music nearly every night. Seriously recommended, but make a reservation!) located on Schonhauser Allee in the Mitte area.

A colorful bit of the East Side Gallery, a painted section of the Berlin Wall. Photo by Jeremy Handrup.

Wednesday morning, we all split up to fly to our next destinations. For Dan, it was back to Rome where his mother was visiting; for Erin, Jeremy, and Cynthia, it was to Paris, where they stayed with friends from Cornell and in an apartment in Montmartre, respectively; and for me, it was to Prague. I took a train from Berlin to Prague (with old compartments, just like Harry Potter!), stopping through Dresden and passing some wonderful scenery along the way. Prague was unlike any city I’ve visited before; eastern Europe really is different from Rome, Paris, or London. It seemed to be a true example of a city as palimpsest, with its rich history of governmental, military, and cultural upheavals. On my first day in Prague, I got hopelessly lost for a few hours when I decided it would be a good idea to walk the 3 kilometers from the suburb of Holosevice (Praha 7) to Stare Mesto (Old Town in Praha 1, the historic center) instead of taking the tram, without a map or a working cell phone, and apparently across a highway that sprung up out of nowhere. After a little while of running back and forth like a chicken without its head, I breathlessly reached Old Town and rewarded myself by stuffing my face with street food of the traditional Czech variation: since I belong to a clan of herbivorous dinosaurs, I skipped the sausage and went instead for the fried smoked gouda cheese on hearty rye bread, and finished with a doughy, spiral pastry covered in cinammon, sugar, and almonds (I later figured out that the consonant heavy, nearly vowel-less sign “Trdlenik” on the pastry stand meant “turtleneck,” because of the cynlindrical shape of the pastries. I also then high-fived myself). During my stay, I visited the Alphonse Mucha Museum, walked around the historic center and across the Charles Bridge, and all the way up a narrow street on a hill, passing green orchards and a convent, and reaching a great brewery at the top of the city with an incredible view.

Old Town Square in Prague's Stare Mesto, or Old Town. The monument in the middle is dedicated to Jan Masaryk, the Czech Foreign Minister from 1940 to 1948.

It was with a 50% heavy and 50% relieved heart that I returned to Rome the following Sunday, sad to leave my travels behind but exhausted and happy to be back in a familiar city where, at this point, I can communicate effectively. Everyone has been eager to share their spring break stories this week. Other locales visited by students include: Athens, Mykonos, Marrakesh, Morocco, London, Ireland, Scotland, Norway, Sevilla, Barcelona, Vienna, Munich, and the Swiss Alps for a lil’ skiing. If other students wish to share their experiences in these places or others, feel free to leave a comment with your stories (and pictures)!

18
Apr

a walk with Lorenzo Romito

By aw429@cornell.edu 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

Now nearly a month away from leaving Italy and returning to the familiarities of American life, these next few weeks seem as if they belong to neither country—caught somewhere in a perpetual state of waiting. It’s strange to think about what has become comfortable for us here that will only be evident when we enter the front doors of our homes in the States and elsewhere. I anticipate the first time I’ll see a slice of American pizza and wonder why it’s in the shape of a triangle instead of a neat rectangular slice. Things like “excuse me” will sound strange on my tongue and I’m sure I will mistakenly greet people with “ciao.” I will wake up and realize that I am no longer in my Dandolo apartment in which I’ve carved a home for the past four months. The cobblestoned streets of Rome will seem so far away, as if this had all happened years and years ago.

Though what I’ve seen of Rome is merely a fraction of its entirety, I have been lucky enough to make the trip out to San Lorenzo every week for my internship with the artist, Paolo W. Tamburella. The bus rides are almost always cramped and uncomfortably warm, but they circle around the city in a way that is unrushed, allowing you to see the places you’ve never even set foot in. I’ve mentally marked streets that I hope to return to—maybe in the next couple of weeks, maybe in the next several years. I’m not sure when I started making these tabs, or when I began to see the city as not just a place that is lived in, but sought after. Perhaps one of these first realizations occurred during a lecture at the Palazzo way back in February.

On February 27th, Lorenzo Romito gave a talk to the Cornell in Rome community called, “‘The Beyondcity,’ Towards a New Common Sphere.” Romito is the founder of Stalker, an interdisciplinary collective that originated from the Italian student movements of the 1990s. An architect himself, Romito discussed the various intentions of the group, highlighting past projects and expressing its current interests. Unconventional to say the least, Stalker can be described as quite radical in its ideology. Romito himself was charismatic and excitable, explaining to us in detail projects that ranged from setting up camp in the outskirts of Rome and holding community-wide organic jam-making events. They traced the peripheries of the city, trying to map Rome’s most overlooked corners by gathering stories and memories. After the lecture, we were told that Romito would take us on one of these walks the following day. Unsure of what to expect, I left the Palazzo with a shrug, ever more perplexed by a city that still seemed hidden beneath a veil.

We began at Termini train station, a spot I had grown accustomed to passing on my way to work. A hub for immigration, Termini and its surrounding neighborhoods are filled with ethnic restaurants and supermarkets. From there, we hopped on a bus that took us to the ancient Roman aqueducts. Between the modern railway lines and the ancient Acqua Felice, we walked along an unpaved dirt road as cars hurried past. One of our first stops was Il Circolo degli Artisti in San Giovanni, a venue that showcases live music and art. Tucked away along a one-way street, Circolo’s facade resembled more of gated construction site than a thriving club.

Cornell students and professors gather across the street from Il Circolo degli Artisti.

As we continued along via Casilina Vecchia, we noticed that the boundaries between the roads, the aqueducts, and people’s homes began to blur. And beyond the roads and the aqueducts, neighborhoods rolled out onward. From one side, we could just make out the tops of small buildings. From the other, we saw the front doors of houses constructed right along Acqua Felice. Rome seemed almost unrecognizable, as if it were still in the process of being built. In some ways, these industrial areas gave the city a different sort of life, one that shook with a newer sense of urgency. Although the aqueducts no longer carried water throughout the city as they did during the Roman Empire, they now stood as monuments to a history that continued to expand.

Our new vantage point revealed a less familiar Roman skyline.

Katerina Athanasiou (URS '13) and Cynthia Baker (BFA '13) discussing life in one of Acqua Felice's countless archways. Photo taken by Jeffrey Kim.

We continued to trek along the aqueduct until we found ourselves walking right into a small neighborhood enclave. Structured almost like a maze, the neighborhood consisted of walls and fences that closed off one home from another in nearly claustrophobic proximity. The barking of guard dogs reminded us that the ground we stood on was more private than it was public. I felt odd in this neighborhood, surreal almost. Though we were all outside the perimeters of their private lots, I still felt as if I were a child, mistakenly wandering into a strange neighbor’s backyard. Before long, we took note of the guard dogs’ warnings and turned to walk back to the main road. As we sauntered back to the center of Rome, we carried with us only a faded mental picture of all the places we witnessed, the places that may one day spring up in a momentary daydream.

02
Apr

gnocchi nite (a very delayed post)

By Becky Ashby-Colón 0 Comments
Categories: Daily Life, Events and Uncategorized

Let me first explain how excited I get about food. SO. EXCITED. My apartment-mates and I cook dinner together nearly every night. One particular housemate is a cooking genius (shout-out to Cynthia Baker!), and we always try to use different ingredients and creative recipes. At school in Ithaca, I live in a cooperative house in which all 30 members cook dinner five nights a week in shifts (and in bulk. You can only imagine). My very rudimentary culinary skills (and food appreciation) have absolutely benefitted from these different forms of food immersion. Now that we have that out of the way, let me explain how excited I was to learn that Anna Rita would be hosting two Italian cooking nights this semester. SO. EXCITED. The first of these mythical nights is devoted to gnocchi, a typical Italian pasta made up of potato, flour, and eggs.

After boiling, peeling, and pressing many kilos of potatoes, we separated them into piles of about 4-5 kilos each, dropped in the eggs and flour, rolled up our sleeves, and began the long kneading process. Next to me, Cynthia was working at a furious pace with her dough, which was slowly but surely mixing into a smooth consistency; Natalie Kwee, on my other side, was busy extricating her fingers from the sticky paste on her table, hurriedly adding flour. My own ball had the unfortunate texture of glue, coating the wooden cutting board as well as my own hands. It took me longer than the rest, but at last I was able to work the dough into some kind of usable form (with flour. Lots and lots of flour).

Rebecca Ashby-Colon (BFA '13, me), Cynthia Baker (BFA '13), and Natalie Kwee (BARCH '13) try their hands at making gnocchi dough! Photo by Jeffrey Kim.

When Anna Rita declared each student’s dough acceptable, we cut them into long strips and rolled them out lengthwise, as if we were in kindergarten again rolling clay caterpillars. Next, each caterpillar was sliced diagonally into smaller pieces, forming little rhombus-shaped macaroni. Using one or two fingers (I found my index and middle worked best), we rolled each rhombus onto itself from the middle outwards, creating the signature little shells of gnocchi. Some of the more adventurous students took it upon themselves to meticulously carve in the striped pattern using forks. In the end, we had quite a motley crew of gnocchi–plump, thin, patterned, and plain. My own were no match for Nat’s perfect examples; she was one of those gnocchi-striping fiends.

Kevin Yen (URS '13), Emma Pryzbylinski (BFA '13), and Elease Samms (BARCH '13) cut and shape their gnocchi. Photo by Jeffrey Kim.

While we gnocchi slaves rested our weary fingers, Anna Rita began to boil the pasta and dress it with the many different sauces she had already made (a true Italian mamma!). The first sauce was a kind of ragu, a thick red sauce chock full of meat and carrots. The second seemed to contain artichokes and porcini mushrooms; the third, rich red peppers. The fourth was my favorite: a simple, light butter and sage sauce that perfectly complemented the heavy, starchy gnocchi. I’m not sure if the final sauce was another meat variation or if it was leftover from the first round, but at that point everyone was so far into a food coma that we didn’t question it.

Our finished gnocchi, ready to boil! Photo by Jeffrey Kim.

The night was such a pleasant (and singular!) experience. Thank you to Anna Rita for organizing the event, cooking all the delicious sauces, and feeding everyone! To top everything off, three olive oil cakes (prepared in part by students as well!) were brought out at the end of the evening. At that point it just felt like overkill, but I went for some cake anyway. Obviously.

Hosted by Edublogs Campus