Art Exhibition

 Just to show you that there is an art appreciation side to me and not just clothes shopping and bike cruising, last night, after a cocktail in the piazza, I saw that the door to the ancient church was open, with a sign  saying it was an exhibition by Bezzina called 'Fragilita', and showed many versions of the process leading up to the main installations.

It was a bit esoteric, abstract with long explanations for each piece and what he was trying to achieve. I can roll with that.  So here are a few of his pieces (actually one) 

because of more interest to me was the incredible building it was housed in - it had been a church, so, predating the duomo that I took you through on the first day - and including the ground floor of the cloister attached to the church.

The many shots of the floor that I'm showing you here are tombstones in the marble floor  - cardinals and priests I guess. The altars and frescoes were incidental to the exhibition but I was pretty excited. because they were so gorgeous. It was almost completely dark in there, apart from the light on the pieces of art (which I pretended I was taking particular interest in...).

 My abstract and deep question then, is if you live in Europe surrounded by this beauty, do you just stop noticing it? Or do you keep having to pinch yourself to make sure it is all real?

And then a wee story overheard sitting in a cafe yesterday morning. An elderly English gent and another elderly English couple - obviously living here in Pietrasanta, and just discussing the frustrations of working with Italian administration and in particular the banking system. The gent by himself asked the other two which bank they were with and then relayed this incident - he and his wife had gone to the bank recently and when they arrived, the police were there, and people standing around. Said he to her - I wonder if there has been a hold up in the bank (the police told them that they couldn't go in, they needed to wait) so they waited. And after waiting a good 20 minutes, the staff all appeared, they had all gone to the cafe for a coffee and had just locked the bank until they got back. And the police? Just wanting to do their personal banking...