offrire

our ways to offer

manifesta di 4 marzo

i want to hurry up and move to italy. fall passionately in love with an italian and get married. i want to dance on the streets and make love all the time. drink wine, sing songs, and say hello to my neighbors. swim in the sea and have babies. and then make art about all that. and publish it. who wouldn't want to read about that or see it? because everybody wants that passion and they rarely have it. and then they can remember the flame. - march 4

il affare

towards the end of last quarter and over my spring break, i neglected writing here frequently. which is not my intention. so maybe a little update is required. sorry, i find this slightly unprofessional and artistic to include business. allora:
1. i've received george barse's letters. (however, i'm also taking a graduate level english class, so time for reading seems nonexistent).

2. fabio's mother is not well and due to this we are not able to work on our art project as much as we'd like. we are still unclear as to what is wrong, but they are on my mind frequently and i hope her situation will improve as soon as possible.

3. also, many people have asked how i will represent fabio on this blog. they've requested a photograph:


4. a cousin of the barse family randomly discovered this blog, and consequently, me. he has sent me a painting postcard of my greatgrandmother. i believe eventually we should catalog all of the family paintings.

5. for spring break, i was able to visit my family in oklahoma. mother and i made many dresses and a couple skirts as well. this is something that my great grandmother did for as long as i know, and something i am doing for to wear quest'estate. mother will ship them to me (as i did not have room for to take them home) and then i will post. i was also able to visit with my grandparents. i have new photographs of the family to archive, and i even learned some napolitan dialect from grandpa!

una lettera aperta

caro mio,
she reminded me how much i enjoy writing. all those feelings.
and of course, i think to you.
e certo, penso a tu.

ti porto sempre con me.
penso alle parole poetic per usare.
ma ho paura...
ti dire che ti amo.

ma quando ti penso,
io so c'è qualcosa di speciale...
io so che ti amo.

mia storia e mio futuro sentono più sicuri di mio presente.

ma insieme....è troppo?
forse no.

dimmi tutto.
desidero sapere tutto.

(and is it even worth adding?: mi manchi)

Insieme Uguale

Click to Play

insieme/uguale (touching for rachel languages) a manifestation di fabio rocco oliva e rachele maria

my first video. our first video. a consecration of egalitarian partnership. and a manifesto of the italian language. in regards to a conversation.....

improvisation, pt. 2

Click To Play

one of the greatest sounds and smells

Click To Play

boiling water for ravioli and homemade sauce

improvisation

one of my goals in life is to cook as well as my mother. although i am a good cook, i have little improvisation skills. i can only improvise recipes. i cannot improvise my refrigerator. but last night i did.

premade ravioli (in this case i had spinach pasta filled with gorgonzola with garlic)
for the sauce ingredients you will need:
olive oil (GOOD italian extra virgin olive oil)
garlic
sweet onion, sauteed
dry basil
red pepper flakes (crushed in hand)
mushrooms, sauteed
fresh roma tomatoes
artichoke hearts
salt and pepper to taste

put the tomatoes in last, due to the fact that they soften and warm quickly and you don't want them to completely turn to mushy liquid.

of course, dinner is not complete without a glass of red wine....

guardi queste fotografie!

I have stumbled upon this photographer, Branson De Cou. I don't really know who he is, except what's important: he photographed Italy during the 1920s and 1930s and now there is an archive in California, online.

Here is the image index.

De Cou worked in the format of lantern slides. This means he is photographing on glass plates, which, when processed, form a transparent positive (like slide film), and were to be projected creating life size images. De Cou apparently contracted four different painters to color his images.

What I notice is that I feel not much has changed (which is odd, considering Italy was leading up to a fascist regime at the time of the photographs). The architecture remains, the roads are the same. More cars, more people, more street vendors. Same people, same color, same smiles.

per essempio (De Cou siena v. my siena),




Allora, some cities to note of course are:
Capri
Napoli
Amalfi

La Pasticceria

(assisi, july 2006)


I had almost forgotten how wonderful
these were:


Most of my summer will be spent in Napoli. Last summer was strange: Napoli seemed tame and un-fun. Everyone insisted on warning me how dangerous and terrible the city was. I walked around paranoid for no reason, photographing little of the city. I did not see anything even remotely suspiscious. Even the traffic was less intense than Roma. My complaint of the city stemmed from having to walk through sewer to reach my hostel and all the closed chiese. Yet, the people were ridiculously generous and helpful, kind and flirtatious. (My kind of people.) As I walk down Via Toledo from Galleria Umberto I I decided to finally indulge in the wonderfulness of la pasticceria napoletana.

The more I talk with Fabio, absorbing his passion, the more I fall in love with Napoli. I learn: it is not that hard. With the history and reputation la città continues to have, it is clear the people have hope. Anch'io.

(Note: Some will notice to their chagrin that I am linking to Italy wikipedia. If you want to read, click on the English language. But what you will also notice is that in English, we have very little information. Unfocus your desire to know what each word means, and take the entirety of the page in. It's like listening to Italian: by the sheer volume of things, you realize their passion and understand what they say.)