Each time I drive to the sea on the SS 223, the main road connecting Siena with Grosseto, I find myself charmed and enticed by the numerous small towns that exist in what most visitors call “rural Tuscany.” This area of Tuscany is referred to as La Maremma. Once a malaria swamp, Grand Duke Ferdinando [...]
Sicily remains as confounding and amazing as I found it during my first visit fifteen years ago. Each annual return brings surprises and experiences beyond imagination — none so more so than the discovery of a painting by a Dutch artist, Vrancke van der Stockt in, of all places, the Basilica of San Giorgio, the [...]
With a birthplace like Milan and a lifespan converging with Leonardo da Vinci, it seems unlikely the two artists did not meet; however, Bramantino’s shows no influence by the well-known Leonardo. Numerous art historians dispute Bartolomelo Suardi’s family background and early years due to lack of verifiable documentation and substantial evidence to provide a reasonably [...]
He was born in the small Tuscan village of Borgo San Sepolcro, Town of the Tomb. Tomb? Upon their return from the Holy Land, two monks, Arcanus and Giles, placed a stone they pilfered from the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, giving rise to both a monastery and the town’s name. Piero’s early training focused on [...]
As the first born child of Jacopo Robusti, one of the late Renaissance’s most prolific and unpredictable artists, Marietta Robusti was destined to learn from her immensely talented father. Jacopo was called Il Furioso, and equally Tintoretto (his father was a fabric dyer, “tintore”); thus she became known as La Tintoretta, a diminutive of her [...]
His contemporaries called him Fra Giovanni; after his death, angels joined his name. Guido di Pietro was born in a small village in the Mugello area of Tuscany. As an adult, he joined a confraternity associated with the Carmine order where assumed the name of Fra Giovanni, Brother John. He lived a devout an inconspicuous [...]
In 1993, a car bomb exploded in Via dei Georgofili and damaged parts of the palace, killing five people. The most severe damage was to the Niobe room, (this room was relevant because it had many works of art that displayed those that are handicapped) and classical sculptures and neoclassical interior of which have been [...]
An accomplished culinary teacher and writer, Pat Gambarelli s private Italian cooking classes became an instant hit with women who wanted to learn both classic cooking techniques and modern preparations. Before long, bachelors living on their own, young executives, and men from all walks of life and professions attended the classes. Pasta for Men Only [...]
It was in 1950 that then director of NBC’s opera programming, Peter Herman Adler, commissioned composer Gian-Carlo Menotti (1911 – 2007)to compose the first ever opera for the American television audience. This was no easy task and it is one of the many credits due to the exceptional talent of Menotti that he made the […] [...]
