Fond Memories Coming Back

In contrast to yesterday's post I do have some pleasant memories coming back and obviously they are too many to even mention. There is my discovering one of my favourites, Thierry de Cordier and his wonderful mind, or sitting in front of Titian's Assumption of the Virgin after a cleansing rain shower, for the tension in my art class was too much for me to take.


A very private conversation with Luc Wolff, an artist from Luxemburg, on his outpost on Giudecca was great. We talked about his feelings about the curator of the Biennale and I told him that I liked his installation art much better than Anselm Kiefer's paintings. He even presented me with two catalogues and added that tey were not for sale and only nice people would get them for free.

Then there was the attendant at the Argentinian pavillon who regretted, after my inquiring for a catalogue, that there was none. Yet, when I was about to leave he came yelling after me and gave me one of the last copies of a catalogue that was only meant for special guests on the opening night.

The experience I still cherish the most, though at the time it felt pretty odd and weird, was taking my time to travel out to the isle of San Lazzaro degli Armeni to have a look at Atom Egoyan's contribution. What actually tempted me about it, was that Egoyan explored the painter Arshile Gorky and I had read Barnett Newman's tribute to him. The first thing when entering the boat was that the driver on hearing my destination commented that I would not actually like to go there, for transfers were rare and I would have to wait for three hours. I insisted nevertheless. When I was on the island I realised that I was the only person visiting the exhibition. But I was not the only person present because the island is dominated by an Armenian monastery. So somewhere but not visible for me there must have been monks. Odd also the fact that the island is situated inbetween Venice and its beach, the Lido. It was summer and there surely was a lot of traffic on the water, but none would come to this island. Thus I had this otherworldly sensation of being surrounded by people I could not see and being quite remote yet looking out on the busy life - in retrospect a wonderful experience.