si si si

i'm back from venice and i'm positively exhausted... i have absolutely no energy whatsoever... emilio took us on a whirlwind tour of the veneto this weekend - to places like brion cemetery, castelvecchio [i love scarpa], villa rotunda, san marco in venice, the biennale [which rocked my socks off] and to the dali exhibit in venice [to name a few of the things that we did...]. i must say that i was absolutely awe-struck by the bienalle [described by peter bednar as 'the best architectural experience of [his] life...'] and all of the amazing models, proposals, etc. to be found there. i know that the whole time i was walking around the event, i probably looked like a kid in a candy store. it was wonderful. yeah. i know i've said that a lot, but it's completely true. i saw models by zaha hadid, the grimshaw firm, vito acconci, asymptote, decoi... i can't even remember them all, but i definitely bought the catalogue [tee hee]...

i think that my favorite moment on the trip was getting to go see brion... i will definitely post pictures of brion as soon as i get back because it was just absolutely breathtakingly lovely. the man who gave us the tour - giuseppe marcolin - is the son of giuseppe brion's [for whom the cemetery is named] oldest sister [who is burried in the cemetery] and was the assistant to carlo scarpa during the design of the brion-vega cemetery. sigh. he was such a sweet man and he gave us so much wonderful information about the place... i'm really really glad that my italian is getting better because i could understand his explanations and i could ask him questions [yea!!!]it's really a whole lot smaller than i had imagined, but so much more beautiful that i could have ever hoped for. down to every last possible detail, the site is exquisite. one day, one glorious day, i hope to be able to design with even a hint of the passion and grace that carlo scarpa was able to design with. the whole site - every intervention - just seemed like it truly belonged right there and that nothing could be added or removed from it. wow.

i will write much more about the trip in a bit... i have to go to class and design things... hopefully beautiful things, but let's not get our hopes up too high...

i'll catch you kiddies later... ciao ciao