Thursday, April 12, 2007

For Art's Sake!



Apologies, keen wedding blog consumers, for the recent lack of posting. As you can imagine, as the day draws near, the planning gets ever more frantic and time-consuming. And, as this blog matures, it's requiring more and more thought as to what to post, and as you'll see, this particular post is so highbrow, it took months of writing and editing...

Whether you're a serious art-lover, a complete ingenue, or like us, you like to pretend to know something about art and make ridiculous, yet informed-sounding, comments like, "the brush-work in his earlier canvases is reminiscent of blue-period Van Gogh," you'll be interested in visiting this website. It's not comprehensive, but it does give you a run-down on some of the exhibits that are going to be on display during the summer in major Italian cities.

As you know, Italy is one of the best places to view celebrated works of art by people you'll have heard of, and many that you won't, and often at little or no cost, as many of the museums and galleries are publicly-owned. Visit www.enit.it, a website of the Italian tourist board, for more complete details of Italian museums, their exhibits, opening hours and locations.

If you want to feel all cultural, but don't want to spend all your time inside pouring over a museum guide, you'll be delighted, no doubt, to learn that the Italians have very kindly put many of their works of art on display outdoors in public piazzas, on churches and other buildings, so they can be enjoyed as you stroll by in the sunshine, gelato in hand.

However, there really is nothing like having your appetite for culture sated by morning in a museum, followed by a long and indulgent lunch, during which you can satisfy your appetite for another, equally famous, aspect of Italian culture, and reflect more deeply on the artistic value of what you've seen...

And, in case you were wondering, of course, we really do know all about Van Gogh's blue period... what? oh...