Last weekend, several of us took a trip to Rome. The city was overwhelmingly full of tourists, smelly streets, and very old but gorgeous buildings. We managed to get around the city using the subway quite easily, thanks to all the subway riding we’ve done here in Milan, and we managed to cram quite a lot into two days of travel.
A couple of my sketchbook entries included several windows, doors, and arches that i saw in Rome. My badly thought out presumption of Rome was that everything would be Roman style, but I keep forgetting that although historical events might not take place simultaneously, they do tend to layer upon each other. Seeing all this history overlap really set that misconception straight, and the jarring reality that so much has already transpired in this world hit me. Here was the evidence right in front of me. The early Roman period, the rule of the Tetrarch, the introduction of Christianity, the Italian Renaissance, Michelangelo, the Vatican, all that happened, and there it stood right infant of my eyes. Wow.
I couldn’t scribble my sketches down fast enough, nor pick out a few favorites to draw. I did pen down a few that captured some of the different events that transpired in Rome:
This first sketchbook spread has the arch of Titus and an arch inside the St. Peter’s Basilica side by side.
This second spread was a church facade we stumbled upon while walking the back roads to the Pantheon.
And finally, some of the crowning commercial brands of today, Prada and Dior.
