BAPTISED BY PIGEON

It is Monday, July 12. Our instructor today was Valdemar de Boer. He spoke to us about the life of the artist and commissioners of the Renaissance. We revisited the St. Francis fresco cycle in the Sassetti chapel, in Santa Trinita and then the Capella dei Magi in Palazzo Medici Riccardi. He pointed out the personal and propaganda references painted in the St. Francis frescoes. Francesco Sassetti patron of the chapel wanted to show that St. Francis had blessed his family with a miracle of redeeming their dead son with the birth of their second son, just as St. Francis had redeemed the child that fell from the window to his death after his bow had fallen out the same window.
The other scenes done in frescoes are Saint Francis giving away his worldly possessions, The Pope blessing his order,

You are only allowed ten minutes in the Capella dei Magi. Here again the Medici family translated the story of the Magi going to adorn the new born Christ with portraits of themselves. The little king, middle king and older king are in each of the side wall frescoes. It is believed that it is Lorenzo Midici in each painting. The altarpiece is a very famous masterpiece. The altar was concencrated by the Pope. It is a very small chapel but every centimeter is decorated. One needs to revisit the chapel more than once to really begin to see things.

Then it was time to go for lunch and I have been slaving on my essay all day. It is very hot out but I am in the air conditioning of the hotel room. Today was laundry day. Simple, I took it to the institute this a.m. and went and picked it up about 5:00. While waiting for the bus an Italian pigeon pooped on me from the sky. Splat on my arm. Yuk, I started jumping up and down and screeching getting laughs from the crowd. Luckily I had a napkin and bottled water with me. Yes you never travel here without bottled water.

Had pizza and beer for super but it was not that good - too soggy. Everything is clammy and soggy in this heat, even the pizza. It may be an all 'nighter' for my essay is too long and full of crap and I need to revise. Hope to do pictures and my power point tomorrow. I am really starting to feel the time slip by.

Internet troubles - I am not done all of this post as you can tell. I may have publish it and fix it later.
I am posting this on July 18