Tag: william shakespeare

Postcard from London, England: ‘Strange bedfellows’ for eternity

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Above left: Monumental effigy of Mary Queen of Scots (1542-1587). Above right: Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603). Lady Chapel, Westminster Abbey

There is no other shelter hereabouts: misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.” 

The Tempest, William Shakespeare, 1611

In recent years, you’ve been exposed to an immense quantity of footage showing the interior of Westminster Abbey: the wedding of Prince and Princess of Wales in 2011; the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II (1926-2022); and the coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla in 2023.

With no need to cover that aspect, this taphophile is jumping straight to the everyday role of Westminster – a splendid monumental cemetery housing the remains of more than 3,300 elite, a veritable who’s-who of a thousand years of British history. Grave markers underfoot lie ignored, overwhelmed by the sculptural and polychrome effigies and memorials climbing ever higher up the church walls.

If ghosts rise in the night, what bedlam must reign. According to the Westminster website, the remains of 13 kings, four queens regnant, 11 queens consort, and two more queens are interred there. Blood might run thicker than water, yet British bluebloods frequently spilled that of their kin.

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Postcard from Rome, Italy: ‘Time Is Out of Joint’ reflects Roman reality

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The time is out of joint. O cursed spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!
Nay, come, let’s go together.

Hamlet, William Shakespeare

La Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna has pulled the rug out from the rigid presentation of its collection in any form resembling chronological order.

Instead, works drawn from the collection for “Time Is Out of Joint” are positioned in the galleries to stimulate a refreshing dialogue between seemingly disparate themes and genres; between the art and the architectural design of the galleries themselves; or between the art and patrons, as the Mister so gamely illustrates.

The dismemberment of dateline restrictions resembles Rome itself, where ancient art runs into that of the Renaissance and then runs smack into manifestations of everyday contemporary life within almost every block of the historic center. Roman reality.

Centered on both Italian and international 19th and 20th-century art, the collection of the National Museum of Modern Art is housed in a 1911 neoclassical building designed as a “temple for the arts” by Cezare Bazzani (1873-1939). The building is located on the edge of Villa Borghese Park and a row of embassies.