Mushroom Building

It's tucked away. Indeed, "tucked away" hardly seems sufficient. The building seems to have been squeezed or poured onto its site. You'll be able to tell what it is, in a recent incarnation, from one of the photos. And you may recognize Dianne doing her Amelia Earhart thing in another. So where is it (that we know, more or less), and what was it (that we don't know). Bill

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RST Top 40. #35: The Gino Severini Mural at the Palazzo dei Congressi (EUR)

One day a few years ago we went out to EUR and to the Palazzo dei Congressi (the translation, Palace of the Congresses, sounds dumb), eager to see Massimiliano Fuksas's massive, avant-garde new hall (we thought), "Cloud." Once inside, we looked everywhere but the basement, even going up some stairways that were obviously not intended for the general public and poking around on the floors above. We were disappointed in not finding "Cloud" (we learned later that it did not yet exist), but more than pleased at what we did find: an enormous, didactic mural by Gino Severini, completed in 1953 (the same year the building itself opened) for the International Exhibition of the Federation of Agricultural Enterprises. We have included a view from the side (above left), sufficiently unrevealing that it shouldn't spoil your encounter with it. The mural employs a seasonal motif that Severini had first explored in the painting "L'Estate" (1951) [below right], part of the collection at the Museo Carlo Bilotti (a newer museum in the Villa Borghese - we recommend it).

Note Severini's murals, as well as the other EUR sites mentioned in this post, are on the EUR walk in our latest book, Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler.   See the end of this post for more information on the book.
 

Severini was no spring chicken when he did this mural (at 70, more like a winter chicken). He was born in Cortona, Italy and moved to Rome in 1899, at 16. As a young artist he was influenced by Futurism (he was a signer of the important 1910 Futurist Manifesto) and by Cubism, and, living in Paris, a good friend of Modigliani. The photo at left captures him on the scaffold, paintbrush in hand, working on the mural with artist Stefania Lotti. It was painted on Masonite (disclosure: my father was for a time Manager of Industrial Sales for the Masonite Corporation), often incorrectly referred to on Italian websites as Maronite.

Enjoy the mural. But don't miss having a good look at the splendid building in which it is housed. The Palazzo dei Congressi was one of many buildings planned for E42 (Exposition 1942), planned for the 20th anniversary of the March on Rome--the establishing moment of Italian Fascism. It has strong classical lines, as did many buildings of the Fascist era, but it also speaks to a modernist sensibility that was part of 20th-century culture all over the world, and which was deeply influential for many of the architects working under Fascism. Construction began in 1938, but the war intervened and delayed completion.

The building's architect was Adalberto Libera. In the late 1920s, Libera was one of the founders of the Italian Movement for Rational Architecture, based in Rome. He was influenced by both Futurism and Rationalism and maintained close ties with the Mussolini government--close enough, anyway, to get commissions and keep working. He also designed the superb post office on via Marmorata and was one of five architects who worked on designs for the Olympic Village (1960; a 5-minute walk from Parco della Musica in north Rome).

The Palazzo dei Congressi has many features, but none so obvious or original as that big cube in the middle, which houses the Salone dei Ricevimenti (Hall of Receptions, or Welcoming Hall). The cube is 38 meters on each side, big enough, as it is often said, to hold the Pantheon (though getting it there and inside would be daunting). The rounded top may have been necessary to bring the cube to Pantheon dimensions, but whatever its purpose, it's the Palazzo's signature feature.

To get there, take the Metro B line to the Fermi exit. When you walk out of the subway you'll be about 5 blocks south/southwest of the Palazzo. So walk north/northeast through EUR until you find the building.

Bill

 Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler features tours of the "garden" suburb of Garbatella; the 20th-century suburb of EUR, designed by the Fascists; the 21st-century music and art center of Flaminio, along with Mussolini's Foro Italico, also the site of the 1960 summer Olympics; and a stairways walk in Trastevere.

This 4-walk book is available in all print and eBook formats The eBook is $1.99 through amazon.com and all other eBook sellers.  See the various formats at smashwords.com. 

Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler now is also available in print, at amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, independent bookstores, and other retailers; retail price $5.99.

RST Top 40. #36: Il Goccetto

#36 is really an authentic wine bar... and we've picked Il Goccetto as a stand in for the few wine bars we think rate as having some sense of authenticity. Because we've blogged about Il Goccetto before (early in October plus it's in Rome the Second Time), what follows is a repeat of the earlier blog (and a few suggestions for other wine bars at the end). And we'll give the address this time (in case you're chalking up your Top 40 list): via dei Banchi Vecchi, 14; open lunch time and after 7:30 p.m. - not on Sundays (or lunch Mondays) - not far from Campo de' Fiori.

There are wine bars and there are wine bars. As noted in Rome the Second Time, we've been entranced by Il Goccetto ("the little drop") since we first discovered it for ourselves,--no mean feat, since it had no sign (it now has a tiny one above the door), no outdoor space (unless you count the steps and sidewalk), and a small, dark interior not easily visible from the street. (And, we're sorry our friends who call it "smokey bar" haven't been back since the Rome smoking ban.)



But it turns out we aren't the only ones in thrall to this unassuming wine bar not far from the overrun Campo de' Fiori. Princeton professor Leonard Barkin spent a year in the late 1980s in Rome, virtually alone at first, then gradually adding groups of friends, almost all centered around the appreciation of fine wine. And, he turns out to be the most expert of them all (at least according to his retelling of that year in his book: Satyr Square: A Year, a Life in Rome [2006]). Yet he also ends his year at, of all places, the unassuming Il Goccetto.


We couldn't be more different from Barkin. The last thing we are is oenophiles (wine experts - I had to look it up to spell it), and, we're never alone looking for friends in the wine and food business. Nor do we live to cook and eat, the way Barkin seems to. Through most of his book, I couldn't imagine Barkin and us sharing anything in Rome (except maybe his fling with Charles Bukowski's books and his taking different walking routes from Piazza dei Satiri to the Vatican library--those I liked).


But at the very end of Satyr Square, he seems to set his high-falutin' oenophile friends aside and discovers Rome, and himself, at Il Goccetto. Here is his description:

• None of my now vast circle of wine acquaintances in Rome has ever mentioned Il Goccetto. I came upon it by mere chance....These are not the posh surroundings of Jeffrey's tastings or the slightly faded grandeur that surrounds Sandro's, but something a little more raffish, in a neighborhood where captains of industry and leatherworkers are shoulder to shoulder. In place of Clara, in place of Jeffrey, in place of Sandro, there is Sergetto--gentle, frisky, direct, occasionally fantastical. No formal tastings here, no professorial master of the revels who has come from across the sea to instruct us, just an ongoing seminar about Sangiovese and Nebbiolo, pecorino and mozzarella, as well as the dreadful inhumanity of those who support the Lazio soccer team against Roma.

You had me, Leonard, at (or finally at) "Il Goccetto." Dianne
Other wine bars of note: Al vino al vino (via dei Serpenti, 19 - up from the Coliseum), Taberna Recina (via Elvia Recina, 26 - a few blocks from San Giovanni in Laterano), and Trimani Il Wine Bar (via Cernaia, 37b - not too far from Termini), and uve e forme (via Padova, 6/8 - in the Piazza Bologna area).

RST Top 40. #37: Parco della Musica

This gorgeous new (2006) complex of music space has been highly successful. The performances are many and varied - suiting every taste and pocketbook: classical to folk to dance to new music, Euro 150 to free.

Many of the US's top artists perform here. See the English website http://www.inromenow.com/ for events. It's easier to navigate than PDM's (as it's called, or sometimes it's called just the Auditorium).

Whether or not you're going to a performance, the complex is worth a visit. It's in the Flaminio district, a short tram ride from Piazza del Popolo. Renzo Piano, one of Italy's best known international architects, hit his stride with these buildings. Piano also designed the New York Times building in New York City that opened earlier this year and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art's large addition, that opened last year. But we think Parco della Musica is another degree better than his commissions in the US. (It's in Rome the Second Time as a music venue, Chapter 7; and also a highlight of the Flaminio walk in our latest book: Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler. More on the book at the end of this post.)

You can also get food and drink here (and in the adjacent Flaminio neighborhood - in Rome the Second Time, Chapter 8; and in the Flaminio walk of Modern Rome).

Take a look at the basketball stadium, Palazzetto dello Sport, as you walk from the tram to PDM. The Palazzetto was designed for the Rome 1960 Olympics by one of that era's most well-known Italian international architects, Pier Luigi Nervi, a master with concrete - we were taken to the Palazzetto as college students by our Stanford art prof who was trying to get us to appreciate modern architecture (wow, he got what he wanted from us!).  The Palazzetto also is featured in Modern Rome.

Dianne

As noted above, these sites are feaured in the Flaminio walk of our new print AND eBook,  Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler.  Modern Rome features tours of the "garden" suburb of Garbatella; the 20th-century suburb of EUR, designed by the Fascists; the 21st-century music and art center of Flaminio, along with Mussolini's Foro Italico, also the site of the 1960 summer Olympics; and a stairways walk in Trastevere.

This 4-walk book is available in all print and eBook formats The eBook is $1.99 through amazon.com and all other eBook sellers.  See the various formats at smashwords.com. 

Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler now is also available in print, at amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, independent bookstores, and other retailers; retail price $5.99.

Now and Then: The Romanian Academy

With its funky art shows accompanied by wine, the Romanian Academy is one of our favorite social venues. The building itself is an impressive neo-classical structure. Here we offer two views of the building, one contemporary, the other from 1968, when Piazza Thorvaldsen, on which the building fronts, was the scene of a historically significant, violent confrontation between police and students. Bill