l'estate di roma: churches galore

thursday, june 10

we started the day off at santa prassede, a medieval church containing one of the most extensive mosaic cycles still in tact in rome and one of the first showing the manipulation of images and figures common in antiquity for christian ends. it's a truly glorious church but placed very inconspicuously in an unassuming alley...such a commonality in rome! churches with beautiful mosiacs, frescoes, statues, oil paintings, architecture in the most (seemingly) random places...hmph. still loving it.

detail from the chapel of st. zeno in santa prassede

after santa prassede, we went to santa maria maggiore. before going into this AMAZING church, i recalled the name from my art history class in high school but i didn't remember specific details or what made it art historically significant...after being inside for less than a minute, it all came back to me. santa maria maggiore is arguably the most beautiful structure in the world...i know i say this all the time but wah i wish i could use words to describe this place! the exquisite details EVERYWHERE, all the way from the marble floor design up to the intricately designed, beautiful coffered ceiling, everything in this place is breathtakingly beautiful. it would take a couple days to really SEE and experience all of the details in santa maria maggiore and i would really like to go back there while i'm in rome. being jewish limits my ability to make deep spiritual connections in all of these churches, but i definitely experienced the closest thing i'll get to a "spiritual" experience while standing in santa maria maggiore. what a gem. i think my favorite part about santa maria maggiore (kind of like my favorite aspect of san clemente) is how many centuries of art and artists and art historical movements are represented there. it's just such a special and well preserved space that represents so many important and beautiful and different and widespread time periods, that are somehow united in this architectural space that is just breathtaking. hmmm just google image it and i'm sure you'll be blown away. my pictures don't give it justice (especially because my camera was acting up that day) but it's va bene (my new favorite expression!). what an experience...

so after santa maria maggiore, we went to another beautiful church called santa prudenziana, one of the least visited churches in rome (unfortunately!). it is also representative of many periods of art history and has an incredible history that is studied very closely by scholars all year round. in one of the side chapels of the church are FORTY different kinds of marble used for various purposes all over...WHATTTTTTT?? nothing like that exists anywhere else in the world...jaw-dropping. there's a man that works there year-round and he was so helpful to our class and called me a "scholar", which although grossly overstated my rudimentary understanding of art history, was very flattering :)

so after the church tour, brianna and i grabbed lunch at this great panetteria (bread shop) and ate (in the hot sun) outside of it on the side of the street near the churches. it was DELICIOUS and definitely an experience worth repeating!

after lunch, brianna and i ran to class and hung out at the school for the rest of the afternoon until we walked together to a dinner with the program participants and their italian families in trastervere (area across the tiber river). ilaria, martina and stefano all came which was AMAZING! i love them so so so much :) it was even better because it was stefano's birthday so it actually meant that much more because he came to have dinner for, yours truly. we sat and talked after dinner for some time and i then went to see the colosseum at night with brianna and some other girls from the program...BEST IDEA EVER. it is absolutely BEAUTIFUL at night and although we were acting crazy and i know people were judging us, we had an absolute blast and i'm so glad i got to experience it.