18/7 - Milan (Part 2)
The next step was the Scala Opera House.
Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, directed by Christopher Hogwood, was playing on 17th and 19th July. Unfortunately, I was only free on 18th July, which had Gaetano Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, and I was too tired to see something I'd never heard of. The whole of July only had these 2 operas playing, from the 3rd to the 21st, and there were performances everyday - but Sunday (damn Italians).
I think I'd been to an Opera House before in Vienna, but it was 8 years ago. Basically it was like being on the Muppet Show. There were boxes from the floor to the ciling, and the whole back wall of the chamber was filled with boxes. Unfortunately there wasn't a rehearsal; they were otherwise preparing for a show. The stage was huge and deep. Probably for the elephants.
There was a woman wearing a top where, at the back, the material split from her neck down and revealed her spine. And a white strap was visible midway down her back. Tsk tsk!
Ah Beng Tap
There was a museum with funky instruments, like a "hurdy-gurdy". There was also a painting of a woman called Giuditta Pasta. Uhh. (Of course, photography was banned)
A description of Cosi Fan Tutte went: "Finally, the geometrical grid seems to dissolve in the cariety and buoyancy of Mozart's music, in a puff of Mediterranean air that brings with it hopes of temptations" - I love the people who write these things.
On Don Giovanni: "With him the reassuring realm of comic opera opens to a different horizon, that of metaphysics." - Ditto
The longest, even if not the best, was about Le nozze di Figaro.
"The unity of time and place is respected in Le nozze di Figaro (1786), the events of which unfold during what Beaumarchais called “a mad day”. Revealed in that delimited space, with extraordinary variety and flexuosity, are the multifarious humanity and universality of the characters in this comic opera. Its forms, moreover, are interlocked in a development that has all the naturalness of life, where the Countess’s forgiveness attained after a thousand disguises, practical jokes and deceptions, becomes an absolute moral reference."
They had scale reconstructions of opea sets. Nice.
Lohengrin
The museum also had opera posters dating back to the 20s and 30s.
The woman at the counter in the Opera House bookshop said tickets were available in the metro, so I went to the Duomo metro, didn't find any tickets and once and for dismissed the thought of catching an opera not least it was to be in a foreign language (I'd fallen asleep during La Boheme), with a programme in Italian; I also didn't want to change into my crumpled pants and battered shoes. Then I realised she probably meant the other metro.
I still had some time, so I looked at my guidebook. Ambrosiana was supposed to be the better galleria, but it closed at 5:30pm and it was 4pm by the time I exited the opera house. The other galleria Di Brera, OTOH, closed at 7:30. I didn't want to be locked out again, and besides, the latter was cheaper, so I went there.
Weird magazines at a newsstand: "Hea" (? - Hen?), "Hentai cool girl free magazine", "Dojinshi", "Manga", "J-girls",k "Brazillian babes" and "Young 18" (which included free bikinis and was presumably for girls; maybe they were free-sized).
At the Galleria Di Brera, there was a reduction for EU citizens. I tried my luck and when I was asked for my document, I produced my student card. It worked, and I paid €2,50 instead of €5. Bloody hell - they keep all the good stuff for EU citizens. I should apply for Polish Citizenship.
Of course, once again photography and video were disallowed. Phones were also disallowed, supposedly in the interests of preservation; I should've run around waving my phone and yelling: "Haha! The radiation from my phone is degrading the works of art!". Lying bastards.
The works were also all undated, except for date of acquisition. Bah. Naturally, there was also nothing in English. Damn, I missed Berlin museums.
Giovanni Battista Cima di Conegliano - S. Pietro Martine e i ss
Nicola e Benedetta (guy with knife on head like partway sunk in)
(I assume this refers to a work in the galleria)
There was a painting of a saint with red-brownsplotches all over him ("Ss giobbe e gottub")
probably former <-- more of my scribbling I don't understand I was tired and wanted to sit on a chair and sleep. Even if photography was not nominally disallowed I also would've had no energy unless I saw something with the galvanising potential of David's Les Sabines, not least since taking acceptable photographs in art gallery conditions needs effort (and nothing even approached his standard, so). Lorenzo Lotto's Pieta is the first Pieta I've seen where angels help support the body. Giovanni Antonio Bazzi's Cristo Deriso was interesting. He was crying and there was little blood, unlike in Faces of Death VI. His deriders were very dark, almost blending into the background. At a first glance, you'd only see him. detto il sodoma - I wrote the name of this work but none of the notes above seem to fit it. Throughout Italy, people were selling T-shirts and other merchandise featuring the Sistine Madonna, but it's currently in Dresden. Hah!
GB Benvenuti's In Crocifissione had 1 angel holding up one cup to catch blood coming from his left palm and another holding 2 cups to catch blood from his right palm and right chest. Yucks.
Luca Signorelli's La Madonna Del Latte - I'd seen the Virgin Mary breastfeeding before, but this was the first time I'd seen her whole breast and nipple through a slit in an ancient inner garment meant for breastfeeding purposes. How seditious. It must be burnt to avoid offence.
Guido Remi's I Santi Pietro e Paolo - Usuaully in representations the two just stand apart. Here they were talking to each other. Peter was probably saying: "What have you done? I may have the keys to heaven but you've the keys to their minds through the success of your version of the faith."
Very weird. San Luca in atto di dipingere la Madonna col Bambino (Scuola di anversa, del 16th century) showed an old woman painting the Virgin and Infant from life.
Sebastian Ricci's (?) Martinio di S. Erasmo was gruesome. A machine was being used to drive a stake through his stomach and his intestines could be seen coming out.
Francesco Hayez's Il Bacio was very nice - 2 young lovers in the throes of a passionate embrace. I'd never seen this as a subject before.
Mantegna's Lamentation over the Dead Christ - Christ looked like a vampire had drained all of his blood - the body was that pallid. It was also an interesting move to use this perspective, with the feet at the bottom of the painting and yet somehow in the viewer's face.
Statue in Brera courtyeard
Seen on Penthouse cover: "25 orgasms inducing songs" ???. It sounds like an article you'd find in Cosmo. Then again, Playboy *did* have "The conflict between faith and reason".
Weird street (Via Fiori Chiari). Perhaps the bumps were to prevent cars from entering.
Booths in the Milan subway offered 4 passport pictures for €3. Wah. So cheap.
I had dinner in a self-service cafeteria (they called it a restaurant). It wasn't too bad - €0,80 for water, €0,60 for 2 rolls, €7,50 for Octopus and €6 for Turkey - €14,90 in all; 1/2 - 2/3 the price of a real restaurant. It still tasted okay considering it was pre-cooked.
lavoro
salute
amore (I have no idea what this means)
There were ads showing women's grimacing faces as they shaved their legs (but then, the looks could've been of ecstasy and not only agony). Then they showed a happy woman using another shaver - Philips's new product "Satinelle Ice" - a shaver for female legs. They also sponsored horoscopes to brand their product, which was quite annoying.
One of the Milan train stations
The 2 PRCs in my hostel room got conned by one string man, who tied strings around their wrists, took a picture and asked for €2 (€1 each). Eventually they bargained it down to €1. Nice to see that competition is Milan is driving costs down for consumers, as opposed to places like Paris where they demand €10.
Besides banning photography and video to earn more money through the sale of postcards and other souvenirs, here're more ways scummy museums can rip off visitors. As a bonus, they can claim they're doing these things for conservation.
- Humidity damages artworks, so visitors have to wear masks with filters which remove the humidity from their breath. These masks, of course, can be rented from the museum for a nominal fee
- Light reflecting off glases causes paintings to dull. So they have to be removed or clip-on lenses affixed to them
- Light in general damages works, so works are stores in dark rooms. Visitors can rent low light goggles if they want to see anything
- Wheelchairs can knock into works, so the services of a specially trained guide have to be rented