Today was a big art day.
Regional
Art Gallery
First up was the Regional Art Gallery. The
staff were curt and unfriendly despite us being the only patrons. We were
constantly under attendants’ watchful eyes in every room that we visited. They
must have thought we were a suspicious lot. Almost all works were of a religious
nature, but there were three that were notable: The Triumph of Death, a large wall fresco, a blue Madonna, and an exquisite miniature
three-part folding panel. No photos, so I had to borrow these from the web.
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| Triumph of Death |
Capella
Palatina
To avoid too much walking we caught the Linea Verde bus to the vicinity of the
Capella. It took a while to find because the tourist map is a little shy on
detail. On arriving there we discovered we were just too late for the morning
session. I won’t repeat how we actually felt about this cavalier treatment of
tourists. We headed off to kill several hours by finding food and the main
cathedral.
Cathedrale
The main cathedral is an impressive
structure with a nice square in front of it. We didn’t look on the far side.
Continuing with the wedding theme, there was a marriage service in progress,
with an area roped off for the wedding party. Tourists still milled around on
several sides, all the while photographing what must be a unique event (guilty,
m’lud). One of my pet peeves of course is other tourists who show little
respect for the environment in which they find themselves – there was much
talking and flash photography.
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| Wedding |
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| Meridian Line |
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| Meridian Line |
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| Meridian Line |
Fountain
of Shame
We walked through some nearby piazzas and
came across several of the forty-odd churches of Palermo. Outside one was a prominent
fountain. “Sculpted for a Florentine villa in the 1550s but rejected by its
commissioners, Palermo bought the thing and set it proudly at city centre.
However, the local populace—scandalised by the racy nude figures and lewd
glances these statues were throwing each other across the water jets—promptly
renamed it the Fontana della Vergogna (Fountain
of Shame)”.
Santa
Catarina
We had to pay to view this church but it
was worth it because it was so extensively decorated.
Capella
Palatina
We returned to the Royal Palace (housing
the Capella and royal apartments) in time for the afternoon session. After
queuing behind tour groups for a while, we entered what is the most extensively
decorated structure I think I have ever seen. The words “over the top” come to
mind. Most of it was very high quality work though, so well worth seeing. It’s
just that in my by-this-time exhausted state, it was too overwhelming to absorb
all this material.
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| Cain and Abel |
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| Pillar detail |
Afterward I was reluctantly dragged through
the royal apartments, but I had switched off by this time – exhaustion and
information overload.
Afterward we walked quite a way to find a
taxi to take us home (can't just flag them down). This was the most clapped-out vehicle I have ever been in, but it
got us safely back to our hotel for a desperately longed-for extended siesta.
We went for an early dinner to a square
beyond the weird one from last night and settled into a more salubrious-looking
place. We were one of few patrons because of the early hour. What amused us was
the local posers dashing in and out, stopping to have a drink, or a quick plate
before moving on. At about 8:30pm the place filled up very rapidly and it
became quite noisy, despite being outdoors. We had very good Insalata as a starters and seafood for
main, but these were rather tasteless.
Palermo is a challenging place to be
tourist – possibly the most demanding we have encountered. It’s the humidity.
We are only away from the coast for two nights over the next three weeks.
Perhaps good training for Naples which is yet to come.
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| Open-air concert stage |
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| Porta Nuova |
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| Quattro Canti - four fountains |
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| Bannister-sliding deterrent |
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