A long day along the Arno

Today was a very long day. I'm actually slightly spent; thus I'll keep this short and keep you fans waiting with bated breath for more pictures.

Anyway, today's shake-down:

This morning at 8am our Art Restoration class traveled to a private Villa in Tuscany to restore an 126-year-old fresco. That sounds old writing it out, but we've restored other frescos and objects much, much older (read: 7th century, 16th-17th century). We used tempera and gouache on the dry fresco to repair the damage and imitate the original scene yet make it perfectly imperfect (the spirit of restoration, truly).

For some reason I decided painting the blank door would be a grand idea. Whoops. I cannot believe my teacher and the villa's owner, who by the way used to be the Director of the Palazzo Pitti, would let me near a fresco nearly six times my age. Anyway, afterwards, they treated us to a home-cooked, country-style Italian lunch replete with wine and olive oil straight from their vineyard and grove.

Later that evening, I also went on a boat tour of the Arno River with my school. We rode in one of the last ten existing work boats of Firenze. Apparently, prior to WWII these boats were plentiful and were used to ship sand and marble into the city for construction. Moreso, it was used for travelling from neighboring cities since the narrow, hilly streets of Firenze were havens for pick-pocketers and petty crime thefts. The boat we were on actually sunk many years earlier and had been underwater for two years. Fortunately, they recovered and restored it--and it now proudly serves as a tourist commodity! **I highly recommend the Arno Boat tour if you are ever in the area. It serves multi purposes: learn the Florentine boating history, enjoy the romantic and serene atmosphere, and have the perfect backdrop for a phenomenal facebook profile photo.

Enjoy the eye candy...should be good after a long, long, long day.

PS. The day was much longer since it included a lengthy visit to the doctor's. I have been wheezing and coughing much lately and thought it might be an upper respiratory infection. Medical school makes me paranoid. Truth.com. Anyway, turns out it was my asthma acting up. Probably from all the plaster I've been snorting.

--PICS!--

Fresco Restoration

Our lanky teacher evaluating the frescoes

Before (note: no trees, but only blobs of color)

After: more trees, more leaves, some background definition. It took a while to match the colors!

Villa-style Tuscan Lunch

Stovetop espresso after gelato

Arno Boat Tour