Art and Artifice

Art and artifice all in one most beautiful city: Roma.

This morning afforded us with the opportunity to revel in the classically inspired works of the Italian artist, Bernini. Bernini took the best lessons of the sculptors of the Greek Classical and Hellenistic eras and breathed into them the most incredible sense of movement, tangibility, and ethereal beauty. Two of his most beautiful works, both Classical in nature, are the Apollo and Daphne & the Aeneas and Anchises.

Many other works originating in or derived from antiquity are housed in the walls of the glorious Galleria Borghese, which itself sits in the largest green space in Rome: the Borghese gardens. Once the seat of the powerful Borghese family, the gardens, museum, and zoo now provide all of Rome with an oasis of nature and culture in the heart of the bustling modern city. When walking through the gardens, the noise of the vehicles and people drop away, leaving you with the tranquility of the birds nesting in the ubiquitous umbrella pines.

At the base of the Borghese gardens, a glorious view of the city awaits the trekker: the Piazza del Populo, the distant St. Peter’s and a grand panorama.

One of Rome’s Egyptian obelisks, taken from Egypt and brought to Rome after the annexation of Egypt by the emperor, Augustus, in the first century BCE, graces the Piazza del Populo.

From here, we continued our journey along the famed Via del Corso to the place where the “three roads meet”: the Trevi Fountain. Having thrown our three coins in the fountain, Roma makes us a promise that we will see her again!