I’m sorry everyone but I have to say it… it’s so sad seeing this semester in Rome come to an end already. I don’t want to talk about it, but it’s on my mind and I’m already getting emotional just thinking about it! Everyone is busy traveling on the weekends and pumping out papers and projects during the week that we hardly realize how fast the last 2 and half months have already gone by. We’ve all made our group of new friends and I feel as though Temple U Rome has become a group and a community all together.
Thursday was my last on site class day for my contemporary art history class, Galleries and Studios. I have thoroughly enjoyed that class, and every week I learned so much about the contemporary art world that I did not know before. On Thursday we went to see a Dr’s private collection in his home. He kindly invited us in and showed us the works of art he has been collecting over the last 25 years. As we got off the bus, we walked through the gates of a housing community, and it was almost like walking on a yellow brick road, except the bricks were dark red. Palm trees and plants were hovering over the path as if they were leading us in the right direction. We climbed the stairs to the 5th floor and the Dr. invited us into his home. This was my first time being in an Italian’s personal home, and it was really nice to have the first home I visit be filled with tons of art. He introduced us to his first work of art he bought, and we slowly moved along from the main room to the living room, kitchen, and hallways. Everywhere I looked there was art! Transavanguardia and Arte Povera Italian artists covered the walls. What I liked most about this visit is that it wasn’t visiting a studio or a room where he kept his art. He was generally interested in art, as his father was a collector, and wanted to be living with the art that he collected and loved. It’s easy to sometimes think that only artists collect art and only people working in the art world can be interested in art. I love meeting people that are art collectors or visit galleries weekly just because they love it and don’t get to work with it. I love seeing it as a hobby and not just a profession. A collection can be one piece to a hundred pieces. A collection of art, or anything for that matter, can really show a lot about that person. It’s like opening up and going into their own personal world of likes and dislikes.
Thursday was another great experience and I’m going to miss my on sight contemporary class. In about 20 days we will all be leaving and going back to our “normal” lives back in America, or where ever else we came from. To me, I like to think of this as my “normal” life and I hope that everyone else can feel the same way. Our normal lives could be living in Rome or somewhere else that we’ve never been. I think this whole experience has been life changing, and I’m glad to see how I’ve grown in the past 2 and a half months.