August 2, 2010…Constable Beaton is a tall blond man with empathy that made explanation of the evening’s events easier. He took copious notes. Did the pub have CCTV? Do you remember seeing anyone suspicious? What time did it all take place? What did she have in her purse that was stolen? His hat sat on the seat next to him. He wore a bullet proof vest but carried no firearm. “London is one of the safest cities in the world,” he explained in a cockney accent. “Unfortunately there are elements that make a living stealing pocket books and purses.”
We had immediately called Bank of America and Chase to notify them of the stolen cards. Amazingly they already detected illegal activity with attempts nearby in Notting Hill and Bayswater to advance cash at ATM machines. Operators were available 24/7 and could access and cancel the card information immediately. Contacting the UK bank and cell phone company was not so easy and it took several attempts by phone. Once we connected Barclay’s couldn’t locate Rebecca’s account in their records and Orange couldn’t see if any attempts were made on using the phone. Notifying the US Embassy proved entirely fruitless. No one answered the 24 hour emergency number.
All this put something of a bad spin on what was so far a good experience. Rebecca arrived on June 14 and looked at the apartment another woman by chance was vacating. She got the apartment no problem and it’s a great 1 bedroom with a modern kitchen and bath. She figured out how to get to work on the 94 bus she picks up at Lancaster Gate at Hyde Park, just a few blocks away. Work started out well. The office is located in the heart of Soho with lots of interesting sights and restaurants.
Monday, we spent the morning at the US Embassy. It was a four hour ordeal first getting lost trying to find it and then waiting for her number to be called.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Thursday, August 5, 2010
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London Part 1 - Westbourne Terrace
We reached the Mitre Pub at the corner of a quiet residential street, minutes on foot from our flat at Westbourne Terrace. At the corner above a double door entrance the pubs name in large gold letters, masts the building like most London pubs emboldened by a deep red background. We chose to go in the side entrance just past a small hotel and local shops. Rebecca started her new job in London working for The Motion Picture Company and JJ and I arrived for a two week visit to help her settle in.
The area commonly referred to as Bayswater is bordered on the south by Hyde Park, on the north by the Westbourne Bridge, on the west Notting Hill and east by Marble Arch is quintessential 19th Century Victorian. At the center of it all is Paddington Station, the quickest way to get to Heathrow Airport and central to the Underground lines including the Circle, Bakerloo, Hammersmith and other destinations I haven’t figured out yet. The area around Paddington station is not well known for great food but in searching for best fish and chips the Mitre seemed to be a good choice close by. We were greeted by a stout barmaid with thick glasses and bright rosaceous cheeks. She advised us to have a seat and a Young’s bitter along with the cod fish and chips. We navigated a table between the two entrances tucked up against a wall covered in deep mahogany paneling. I was thrilled to have my first beer and fish and chips at a pub in London and the three of us, Rebecca, JJ and I sat back to enjoy the warm homey atmosphere.
The homes nearby were built in the 1840’s and 1850’s and according to one report our street Westbourne Terrace was considered the neighborhood centerpiece in its time: “The most spacious and dignified avenue unrivalled in its class in London or even Great Britain.” Typically four stories the white stucco houses built side to side sport large portico entrances with massive wood doors and neatly framed balconies on top with black railing. Roof tops are reminiscent of Mary Poppins with varying sized chimney peaks and tutor roofs with plenty of hips and valleys. The neighborhood has had some famous inhabitants including writers William Thackeray, James Barrie, and Bret Harte, politicians Winston and Randolph Churchill, as well as numerous well known socialites, artists and businessmen. Down the street from our flat are the headquarters for the Royal Parks and the home for Conservatives Friends of Israel. An antiquity bookstore used to be located somewhere close by as was the world’s first bicycle shop. It was important to find a neighborhood where Rebecca felt safe, easy to get to work in Soho on public transit and close to the famous sites of central London. Westbourne Terrace seemed to have everything going for it.
Our fish and chips arrived, an impressive golden brown crisply fried in beer batter. A crunch of bodies coming and going was neatly penetrated by the barmaid who suggested a darker brew and I succumbed to a flat warm beer, something I am not particularly fond of. I cut into the fish and a puff of steam revealed a soft white cod cooked to perfection. I spiced it up with a splash of vinegar and stuck a fork into the crisp cover, scooped up the white fish with a couple of chips and savored the moment.
The London 1800’s had its underside. In its Victorian grandeur and wealth the real villain that lurked among the Mews and fog was a city gripped by cholera and sewage problems, and a sharp contrast between rich and poor. Just two Underground stops away from Paddington Station is Baker Street, stomping ground of the fictional London sleuth Sherlock Holmes made popular at a time when the notorious mass murderer, Jack the Ripper stalked the ladies of the night on London’s East Side. In the 1850’s and 1860’s a sensational press wrote often about street robberies termed “garroting” where Londoners were accosted, beaten and robbed even though the actual practice was not that wide spread.
We were satiated and a little tipsy from the beer. Happily we got up to leave. Rebecca looked for her purse and it was gone. Her camera, iPod, credit cards, California Drivers License and US Passport all gone from the back of her chair where she had put it. We were stunned and despair fell on us like the darkness of the London sunset.
During the day the weather changes from cloud to sunshine and back again constantly. At night seagulls can be heard still cruising the waterways that were once rivers but are now canals or culverts paved over with development. Pigeons are plentiful but not a single bug could be found. A fat little church mouse sat preoccupied on the sidewalk as we left the Mitre in search of the Paddington Green Police Station.
The area commonly referred to as Bayswater is bordered on the south by Hyde Park, on the north by the Westbourne Bridge, on the west Notting Hill and east by Marble Arch is quintessential 19th Century Victorian. At the center of it all is Paddington Station, the quickest way to get to Heathrow Airport and central to the Underground lines including the Circle, Bakerloo, Hammersmith and other destinations I haven’t figured out yet. The area around Paddington station is not well known for great food but in searching for best fish and chips the Mitre seemed to be a good choice close by. We were greeted by a stout barmaid with thick glasses and bright rosaceous cheeks. She advised us to have a seat and a Young’s bitter along with the cod fish and chips. We navigated a table between the two entrances tucked up against a wall covered in deep mahogany paneling. I was thrilled to have my first beer and fish and chips at a pub in London and the three of us, Rebecca, JJ and I sat back to enjoy the warm homey atmosphere.
The homes nearby were built in the 1840’s and 1850’s and according to one report our street Westbourne Terrace was considered the neighborhood centerpiece in its time: “The most spacious and dignified avenue unrivalled in its class in London or even Great Britain.” Typically four stories the white stucco houses built side to side sport large portico entrances with massive wood doors and neatly framed balconies on top with black railing. Roof tops are reminiscent of Mary Poppins with varying sized chimney peaks and tutor roofs with plenty of hips and valleys. The neighborhood has had some famous inhabitants including writers William Thackeray, James Barrie, and Bret Harte, politicians Winston and Randolph Churchill, as well as numerous well known socialites, artists and businessmen. Down the street from our flat are the headquarters for the Royal Parks and the home for Conservatives Friends of Israel. An antiquity bookstore used to be located somewhere close by as was the world’s first bicycle shop. It was important to find a neighborhood where Rebecca felt safe, easy to get to work in Soho on public transit and close to the famous sites of central London. Westbourne Terrace seemed to have everything going for it.
Our fish and chips arrived, an impressive golden brown crisply fried in beer batter. A crunch of bodies coming and going was neatly penetrated by the barmaid who suggested a darker brew and I succumbed to a flat warm beer, something I am not particularly fond of. I cut into the fish and a puff of steam revealed a soft white cod cooked to perfection. I spiced it up with a splash of vinegar and stuck a fork into the crisp cover, scooped up the white fish with a couple of chips and savored the moment.
The London 1800’s had its underside. In its Victorian grandeur and wealth the real villain that lurked among the Mews and fog was a city gripped by cholera and sewage problems, and a sharp contrast between rich and poor. Just two Underground stops away from Paddington Station is Baker Street, stomping ground of the fictional London sleuth Sherlock Holmes made popular at a time when the notorious mass murderer, Jack the Ripper stalked the ladies of the night on London’s East Side. In the 1850’s and 1860’s a sensational press wrote often about street robberies termed “garroting” where Londoners were accosted, beaten and robbed even though the actual practice was not that wide spread.
We were satiated and a little tipsy from the beer. Happily we got up to leave. Rebecca looked for her purse and it was gone. Her camera, iPod, credit cards, California Drivers License and US Passport all gone from the back of her chair where she had put it. We were stunned and despair fell on us like the darkness of the London sunset.
During the day the weather changes from cloud to sunshine and back again constantly. At night seagulls can be heard still cruising the waterways that were once rivers but are now canals or culverts paved over with development. Pigeons are plentiful but not a single bug could be found. A fat little church mouse sat preoccupied on the sidewalk as we left the Mitre in search of the Paddington Green Police Station.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Venice Part 3 – The Poet
“The soul of man, Signor Baldassare, is incorruptible, immortal, and divine, created and infused by G_d into our body when the fetus in the maternal womb was made fit to receive it. This truth is as certain, infallible, and indisputable for me as it is, I believe, for every Jew and Christian.” – Poet Sarra Copia Sulam, Venice, Italy July 1621
Crossing over a canal bridge, we descended a steep set of stairs through a low hanging doorway to the Ghetto Nuovo. Emerging from the dark passage to the light of day, an expansive piazza surrounded a collection of multicolored buildings six stories high.
On March 29, 1516 by decree of the Venetian Senate all Jews living in Venice were required to immediately move to the confines of this 17 acre Campo and would be prevented from leaving or reentering by two locked gates from sundown to sunup each day. The existing Christians were ordered to vacate the former copper foundry and the Jews, not allowed to own property, were required to pay one third higher rents. The 1500’s began in a tumultuous time: there was a grave threat to European Sovereignty by the Ottoman Turks and the Church was fending for its existence against the Protestant Reformation movement. Charles V led his French army into Northern Italy and Florence and Milan fell under his control. The Black Death had reduced the population of Europe by 40% and the Franciscan order was anticipating the End of Days at the turn of the century. A great Renaissance of humanist ideology challenged the foundation of leadership and faith. Spanish ships began their rule of the oceans from the New World to the Mediterranean Sea forever undermining Venice’s dominance of trade. The Inquisition was in full force, tolerance was on a short string and Jewish houses of worship were forbidden in the Ghetto or anywhere else in Venice. But a long partnership between Jewish artisans and merchants with the Venetians had just enough root to allow them to stay. Fleeing persecution or expulsion from Spain, Portugal, England, Germany, France and the Levant (Holy Land) other not so fortunate Jews came to Venice in droves as a safe but restricted haven.
In the heat of the midday sun I was approached by a short pale young man in a black coat and hat with scarlet red beard and hair. A member of the Orthodox sect of Chasidic Jews, he asked me in a Brooklyn accent if I wanted to “lay out” Tefilin, two black prayer boxes that are worn on the forehead and above the elbow and bound to the head and arm with leather straps. The young Rabbi seemed a natural bridge between the present and centuries past so I engaged him in conversation deflecting his question by asking him to tell me about some of the local sites and history of the Ghetto. He was well versed.
Within 100 years of its establishment, the Jewish Ghetto had quadrupled in population. Because growth was restricted in area, housing was built up with floor additions. The top floors were surreptitiously made into houses of worship. When it was politically or financially expedient restrictions were loosened and the nearby Ghetto Vecchio was annexed as part of the Jewish area. Not long after, three Synagogues were allowed to be built. In the later part of the 17th Century Venice began new relations with the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and in a strange redirection Jews from the East were invited by the Doge to live in Venice.
Moshe, embellished his history a bit and mentioned a Jewess poet from the early 1600’s and her Literary Salon that entertained both Christians and Jews. My interest was piqued to learn more about her but I had tapped Moshe’s knowledge of the subject and perhaps his patience. It was later that I learned about the native Venetian Sarra Copia who married Jacob Sulam, a wealthy Jewish merchant in 1614 and a year later gave birth to a daughter Rebecca who died at the age of 10 months. Several years later Sarra miscarried and was never able to bear children again. Though she said it was her deceased father’s wish to start a Literary Salon in 1618 it would not be hard to surmise that she did so to somehow heal the pain she felt for the losses she suffered. Venetian relations had become tolerable, enabling the young Sarra to open the Salon in the Ghetto where Christian and Jewish artists, poets and musicians came to perform and discourse on philosophy, religion and politics. Her admirers praised her extraordinary beauty and humble nature. She bleached her hair blond and dressed in the latest style and fashion for a wealthy Venetian woman. She was an accomplished musician and singer, literate in 6 languages and a student of the Greek classics. This precocious young woman would match wit and intellect with the finest artists of the day in Venice and is regarded as one of early modern Italy’s more significant poets.
That same year Sarra began a highly irregular correspondence with Genoese Christian monk and poet Ansaldo Ceba after reading his sonnet L’Ester about the Jewish Biblical Queen of Persia. Despite Sarra’s marriage to Sulam, she wrote to Ceba of her great admiration and love of him and his work. Ceba in his 50’s was ailing in health and unable to travel. Sarra was just 18. They never meet and over the next five years carried on an unconsummated romance of the heart. It’s difficult to understand why she was so enamored of Ceba but it would seem to be part of a broader ambition to connect with Christian artists who appeared sympathetic to Jews and to fill a void left by the death of her father. It is pure speculation on my part but her marriage may have also been strained with her husband since she could no longer bear him an heir. For the moment at least the opportunity opened for Jews and Christians of similar mind and expression to engage with one another but it was dangerous. New ideas and religious beliefs were threatening the status quo. At any moment things could change with disastrous results. One such movement was the rapidly growing Jewish mystics of Kabala. Sarra’s close friend and spiritual advisor Rabbi Leone De Modena was a Jewish leader in Venice of the predominant Talmudic Tradition and an outspoken opponent of Kabala.
It is the very same Kabala teachings from long ago that is the foundation for today’s Chasidic Jews. I asked my new friend Moshe how he happened to be in Venice. He seemed slightly annoyed with my questioning but said he was originally from Australia but spent several years in yehiva (religious school) in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn where the Chasidic movement is headquartered. He had only recently been sent to Venice to work at the Chabad House in the Ghetto Nuovo, a place where Jews can come to worship and where it was his job to recruit secular Jews to Tefilin. The heat of the day weighed on my heavily clothed companion and I could see a bead of sweat trickle from the hatband of his fedora down his forehead. He removed his glasses and used his jacket sleeve to wipe the moisture from his brow. If I wore the Tefilin he said, even once I could find a more righteous path to G_d. There was now, more than a bit of impatience in his voice and I thought it would be a good idea to let him tell me what he intended to say from the start.
How is it I asked that I could make such a profound connection through two little boxes with leather straps? It is like a father, said Moshe, now comfortably settling into to his mission, who sits down to play blocks with his child. G_d sits with us at our level and like the father who gently encourages his child in simple direction; G_d speaks through mediums or Metaphors that humans can understand. And He uses Metaphor to explain the complex and often contradictory world. Tefilin, Moshe continued, is a Metaphor for binding the heart and mind with good deed. Further, it is the practice of good deeds in this life that allows the immortal soul to return to heaven.
The idea of an afterlife had been around for a very long time among the ancient Canaanites and Hebrews. The common practice was to place the dead within caves where the recently passed were reunited literally with the bones of their ancestors. Archaeologists have found in these caves gifts left for the dead and believe that these offerings were a form of ancestral worship. Caring for dead ancestors is a deeply rooted belief in Judaism. In the 6th Century BCE when the Bible was transcribed Heaven was considered the House of G_d and angels, not a place for human souls. The Old Testament in Psalms and the books of Isaiah and Job refers to a world called Sheol, not related to Heaven, where unfulfilled human spirits reside. Influenced by the Egyptians, Babylonians and later Greeks the concept of a soul ascending to Heaven for the Righteous evolved over time. Nearly two centuries before Jesus In the year 165 BCE the Book of Daniel is the first record in the Judeo Christian tradition of eternal afterlife for doers of Mitzvah (good deed) and is the basis of religious belief in an immortal soul for all three monotheistic religions, Jewish, Christian and Muslim.
The Talmud and the Kabala were two of the most important “Oral Tradition” works that were recorded over the next two millennium. The Talmud detailed beliefs and practices that were articulated by centuries of rabbinic study of the Old Testament. Kabala was in many ways a Jewish parallel to the Christian Reformation. At its heart was the rejection of seemingly out of touch leadership of the Talmudists and a desire for a personal connection to G_d. Among Kabalists that connection involved spiritual practices that were often misunderstood by Christians as sorcery. The Rabbi’s of Venice like other European cities had to maintain a delicate balance with the Church. Anything that could possibly trigger a backlash of new recriminations was carefully avoided. The Kabala represented just such a threat. At the same time another movement was starting to take shape, not only challenging the established Talmudic order but rejecting the notion of the immortality of the soul altogether. It was bad enough that the Christians thought of the Jews as sorcerers but not believing in Heaven was intolerable. That movement is considered the beginnings of modern Rationalist thought, a philosophy articulated later in the century by Baruch Spinoza that equated G_d and Nature as one in the same. Spinoza’s book Ethics is considered today to be one of the great works of Western thought. Spinoza like his predecessors was a Converso or Spanish/Portuguese Jew forced to convert to Christianity during the Inquisition. Fleeing further persecution they left Spain or Portugal and rejoined the Jewish faith settling in large numbers in Amsterdam, Venice and Hamburg.
The Rabbinic Council of Venice had to act quickly on this new front. An erudite voice that held the forces of Kabala in check was called upon by the Rabbinic Council of Venice to respond to those who accused the established Talmudic order of not practicing the true religion as originally conceived in the Old Testament. In his published reprimand of Rationalist thinking, Sarra’s Rabbi Modena took the threat head on; unless the heretics retracted there denunciation, the key issue being their rejection of immortality of the soul, they would be excommunicated from the faith. What was not calculated by the enigmatic Rabbi Modena was how this controversy would draw his dear friend and student Sarra Copia Sulam to its center.
In time Sarra’s correspondence with the Ceba took a turn when the old poet began to insist that she convert to Christianity to save her soul. He professed so much love for her that his only wish was to see her saved for eternity in a Christian Heaven before he died. Despite his repeated efforts Sarra refused to convert and in a desperate measure Ceba enlisted the help of Signore Baldassare Bonifacio, a Venetian poet, priest and legal scholar who frequented Sarra’s Salon. Perhaps picking up on the controversy raging inside Jewish Synagogues, Baldassare published on June 21, 1621 his public “Discoursa” accusing Sarra of not believing in the immortality of the soul as she had repeatedly not accepted the advances of Ceba to convert to Christianity. This was a terrible blow on Sarra’s reputation; contrary to what he was saying she did believe in the immortality of the soul. It was a very cruel accusation for a woman who still grieved for her dead children and father. The unrelenting persistence and even coercion to convert her was a gross perversion in light of the fact that ascending to Christian Heaven would mean renouncing her religion and making it impossible to reunite in the afterlife with her own family. Sarra acted swiftly with a published response she called her “Manifesto” in which she pointedly tells Baldassare that he is neither a theologian nor a philosopher but rather a fool for speaking on subjects he does not understand. And since the charge that she does not believe in the immortality of the soul in not true she did not wish to engage him in any further public debate about it.
A flock of pigeons descended onto the Ghetto Nuovo Campo and I felt the pressure to rejoin the rest of my party who had wandered off to different corners of the Jewish Ghetto. Rebecca and Sal were looking at a series of bronze plaques that lined two long white stucco walls remembering Italian Jews that died in the Holocaust. The boys were exploring some of the shops and galleries. Rabbi Moshe looked at me probably sensing that my mind was drifting elsewhere and explained to me that laying out the Tefilin would not only bring me to a more Righteous path but in so doing would bring the moment closer when the Messiah would bring Heaven down to Earth.
Look, Moshe, I said, I have enjoyed talking to you. I believe biblical stories are metaphors for explaining things that are hard to understand about the nature of this world. I believe in an immortal soul that lives on in memory, legend and history. There are great sinners and good doers who live in the large collective memory of the world but I believe most souls live on as memories with their children and grandchildren or friends, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters and sometimes with great pain fathers and mothers. By my doing good deeds in the world I believe my soul will live in a greater way in their memory which I think of as Heaven. Perhaps one day a person will come and leave a legacy so great that it will significantly and positively alter the way those that follow will act in the world but I will not wait or act in anticipation of it. In this way I am a Jew. I took Moshe’s hand in mine and shook it. I do not need, I said to him, to wear the Tefilin to be Righteous.
Sarra Copia Sullam heroically defended her name until her death in 1641 at the age of 41 even though she came under repeated attacks of others whose aim was to discredit her. It is believed she anonymously supported the literary world in Venice playing a significant role in the establishment of Accademia degli Incogniti, an important Literary Salon during the 1630’s and closing her own Salon following the Baldassare affair. Rabbi Modena continued his friendship with Sarra until her death and wrote her Epithet. An orator, writer, artist, musician and actor Modena in his autobiography admitted to an obsession for gambling. Despite having a few unsavory financial obligations including one with Baldasarre, Modena remained true to Sarra never seeking to settle his debts with her charity. The Jewish crisis within the Synagogue grew beyond Modena’s day. A former Modena student and Chief Rabbi of Amsterdam Saul Levi Morteira is best known for being the Rabbi who imposes a cherem (excommunication) on the philosopher Spinoza. Considered a heretic by Jews and Christians alike during his lifetime Spinoza lived a relatively obscure life and died young from a lung disease caused by his trade of lens grinding for spectacles and telescopes. The Kabalist movement spread rapidly throughout Eastern Europe eventually leading to a momentous showdown of Talmudist versus Kabalist rabbi’s in Poland. A moderated version emerged in the 18th and 19th Centuries as modern day Chasidic Judaism.
I rejoined my party and we made our way to the edge of the Ghetto to a kosher restaurant on the canal called GAM GAM. We had a wonderful meal of Italian and Middle Eastern inspired Jewish comfort food. As the sun set I thought about the gates that would close the world away from the Ghetto hundreds of years ago. A breeze along the canal stirred the air and a chill could be felt as Rebecca draped a shawl over her shoulders. I felt oddly at home here, thinking of the souls from years past that perhaps still walked among us searching for fulfillment. There must have been so many.
Crossing over a canal bridge, we descended a steep set of stairs through a low hanging doorway to the Ghetto Nuovo. Emerging from the dark passage to the light of day, an expansive piazza surrounded a collection of multicolored buildings six stories high.
On March 29, 1516 by decree of the Venetian Senate all Jews living in Venice were required to immediately move to the confines of this 17 acre Campo and would be prevented from leaving or reentering by two locked gates from sundown to sunup each day. The existing Christians were ordered to vacate the former copper foundry and the Jews, not allowed to own property, were required to pay one third higher rents. The 1500’s began in a tumultuous time: there was a grave threat to European Sovereignty by the Ottoman Turks and the Church was fending for its existence against the Protestant Reformation movement. Charles V led his French army into Northern Italy and Florence and Milan fell under his control. The Black Death had reduced the population of Europe by 40% and the Franciscan order was anticipating the End of Days at the turn of the century. A great Renaissance of humanist ideology challenged the foundation of leadership and faith. Spanish ships began their rule of the oceans from the New World to the Mediterranean Sea forever undermining Venice’s dominance of trade. The Inquisition was in full force, tolerance was on a short string and Jewish houses of worship were forbidden in the Ghetto or anywhere else in Venice. But a long partnership between Jewish artisans and merchants with the Venetians had just enough root to allow them to stay. Fleeing persecution or expulsion from Spain, Portugal, England, Germany, France and the Levant (Holy Land) other not so fortunate Jews came to Venice in droves as a safe but restricted haven.
In the heat of the midday sun I was approached by a short pale young man in a black coat and hat with scarlet red beard and hair. A member of the Orthodox sect of Chasidic Jews, he asked me in a Brooklyn accent if I wanted to “lay out” Tefilin, two black prayer boxes that are worn on the forehead and above the elbow and bound to the head and arm with leather straps. The young Rabbi seemed a natural bridge between the present and centuries past so I engaged him in conversation deflecting his question by asking him to tell me about some of the local sites and history of the Ghetto. He was well versed.
Within 100 years of its establishment, the Jewish Ghetto had quadrupled in population. Because growth was restricted in area, housing was built up with floor additions. The top floors were surreptitiously made into houses of worship. When it was politically or financially expedient restrictions were loosened and the nearby Ghetto Vecchio was annexed as part of the Jewish area. Not long after, three Synagogues were allowed to be built. In the later part of the 17th Century Venice began new relations with the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and in a strange redirection Jews from the East were invited by the Doge to live in Venice.
Moshe, embellished his history a bit and mentioned a Jewess poet from the early 1600’s and her Literary Salon that entertained both Christians and Jews. My interest was piqued to learn more about her but I had tapped Moshe’s knowledge of the subject and perhaps his patience. It was later that I learned about the native Venetian Sarra Copia who married Jacob Sulam, a wealthy Jewish merchant in 1614 and a year later gave birth to a daughter Rebecca who died at the age of 10 months. Several years later Sarra miscarried and was never able to bear children again. Though she said it was her deceased father’s wish to start a Literary Salon in 1618 it would not be hard to surmise that she did so to somehow heal the pain she felt for the losses she suffered. Venetian relations had become tolerable, enabling the young Sarra to open the Salon in the Ghetto where Christian and Jewish artists, poets and musicians came to perform and discourse on philosophy, religion and politics. Her admirers praised her extraordinary beauty and humble nature. She bleached her hair blond and dressed in the latest style and fashion for a wealthy Venetian woman. She was an accomplished musician and singer, literate in 6 languages and a student of the Greek classics. This precocious young woman would match wit and intellect with the finest artists of the day in Venice and is regarded as one of early modern Italy’s more significant poets.
That same year Sarra began a highly irregular correspondence with Genoese Christian monk and poet Ansaldo Ceba after reading his sonnet L’Ester about the Jewish Biblical Queen of Persia. Despite Sarra’s marriage to Sulam, she wrote to Ceba of her great admiration and love of him and his work. Ceba in his 50’s was ailing in health and unable to travel. Sarra was just 18. They never meet and over the next five years carried on an unconsummated romance of the heart. It’s difficult to understand why she was so enamored of Ceba but it would seem to be part of a broader ambition to connect with Christian artists who appeared sympathetic to Jews and to fill a void left by the death of her father. It is pure speculation on my part but her marriage may have also been strained with her husband since she could no longer bear him an heir. For the moment at least the opportunity opened for Jews and Christians of similar mind and expression to engage with one another but it was dangerous. New ideas and religious beliefs were threatening the status quo. At any moment things could change with disastrous results. One such movement was the rapidly growing Jewish mystics of Kabala. Sarra’s close friend and spiritual advisor Rabbi Leone De Modena was a Jewish leader in Venice of the predominant Talmudic Tradition and an outspoken opponent of Kabala.
It is the very same Kabala teachings from long ago that is the foundation for today’s Chasidic Jews. I asked my new friend Moshe how he happened to be in Venice. He seemed slightly annoyed with my questioning but said he was originally from Australia but spent several years in yehiva (religious school) in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn where the Chasidic movement is headquartered. He had only recently been sent to Venice to work at the Chabad House in the Ghetto Nuovo, a place where Jews can come to worship and where it was his job to recruit secular Jews to Tefilin. The heat of the day weighed on my heavily clothed companion and I could see a bead of sweat trickle from the hatband of his fedora down his forehead. He removed his glasses and used his jacket sleeve to wipe the moisture from his brow. If I wore the Tefilin he said, even once I could find a more righteous path to G_d. There was now, more than a bit of impatience in his voice and I thought it would be a good idea to let him tell me what he intended to say from the start.
How is it I asked that I could make such a profound connection through two little boxes with leather straps? It is like a father, said Moshe, now comfortably settling into to his mission, who sits down to play blocks with his child. G_d sits with us at our level and like the father who gently encourages his child in simple direction; G_d speaks through mediums or Metaphors that humans can understand. And He uses Metaphor to explain the complex and often contradictory world. Tefilin, Moshe continued, is a Metaphor for binding the heart and mind with good deed. Further, it is the practice of good deeds in this life that allows the immortal soul to return to heaven.
The idea of an afterlife had been around for a very long time among the ancient Canaanites and Hebrews. The common practice was to place the dead within caves where the recently passed were reunited literally with the bones of their ancestors. Archaeologists have found in these caves gifts left for the dead and believe that these offerings were a form of ancestral worship. Caring for dead ancestors is a deeply rooted belief in Judaism. In the 6th Century BCE when the Bible was transcribed Heaven was considered the House of G_d and angels, not a place for human souls. The Old Testament in Psalms and the books of Isaiah and Job refers to a world called Sheol, not related to Heaven, where unfulfilled human spirits reside. Influenced by the Egyptians, Babylonians and later Greeks the concept of a soul ascending to Heaven for the Righteous evolved over time. Nearly two centuries before Jesus In the year 165 BCE the Book of Daniel is the first record in the Judeo Christian tradition of eternal afterlife for doers of Mitzvah (good deed) and is the basis of religious belief in an immortal soul for all three monotheistic religions, Jewish, Christian and Muslim.
The Talmud and the Kabala were two of the most important “Oral Tradition” works that were recorded over the next two millennium. The Talmud detailed beliefs and practices that were articulated by centuries of rabbinic study of the Old Testament. Kabala was in many ways a Jewish parallel to the Christian Reformation. At its heart was the rejection of seemingly out of touch leadership of the Talmudists and a desire for a personal connection to G_d. Among Kabalists that connection involved spiritual practices that were often misunderstood by Christians as sorcery. The Rabbi’s of Venice like other European cities had to maintain a delicate balance with the Church. Anything that could possibly trigger a backlash of new recriminations was carefully avoided. The Kabala represented just such a threat. At the same time another movement was starting to take shape, not only challenging the established Talmudic order but rejecting the notion of the immortality of the soul altogether. It was bad enough that the Christians thought of the Jews as sorcerers but not believing in Heaven was intolerable. That movement is considered the beginnings of modern Rationalist thought, a philosophy articulated later in the century by Baruch Spinoza that equated G_d and Nature as one in the same. Spinoza’s book Ethics is considered today to be one of the great works of Western thought. Spinoza like his predecessors was a Converso or Spanish/Portuguese Jew forced to convert to Christianity during the Inquisition. Fleeing further persecution they left Spain or Portugal and rejoined the Jewish faith settling in large numbers in Amsterdam, Venice and Hamburg.
The Rabbinic Council of Venice had to act quickly on this new front. An erudite voice that held the forces of Kabala in check was called upon by the Rabbinic Council of Venice to respond to those who accused the established Talmudic order of not practicing the true religion as originally conceived in the Old Testament. In his published reprimand of Rationalist thinking, Sarra’s Rabbi Modena took the threat head on; unless the heretics retracted there denunciation, the key issue being their rejection of immortality of the soul, they would be excommunicated from the faith. What was not calculated by the enigmatic Rabbi Modena was how this controversy would draw his dear friend and student Sarra Copia Sulam to its center.
In time Sarra’s correspondence with the Ceba took a turn when the old poet began to insist that she convert to Christianity to save her soul. He professed so much love for her that his only wish was to see her saved for eternity in a Christian Heaven before he died. Despite his repeated efforts Sarra refused to convert and in a desperate measure Ceba enlisted the help of Signore Baldassare Bonifacio, a Venetian poet, priest and legal scholar who frequented Sarra’s Salon. Perhaps picking up on the controversy raging inside Jewish Synagogues, Baldassare published on June 21, 1621 his public “Discoursa” accusing Sarra of not believing in the immortality of the soul as she had repeatedly not accepted the advances of Ceba to convert to Christianity. This was a terrible blow on Sarra’s reputation; contrary to what he was saying she did believe in the immortality of the soul. It was a very cruel accusation for a woman who still grieved for her dead children and father. The unrelenting persistence and even coercion to convert her was a gross perversion in light of the fact that ascending to Christian Heaven would mean renouncing her religion and making it impossible to reunite in the afterlife with her own family. Sarra acted swiftly with a published response she called her “Manifesto” in which she pointedly tells Baldassare that he is neither a theologian nor a philosopher but rather a fool for speaking on subjects he does not understand. And since the charge that she does not believe in the immortality of the soul in not true she did not wish to engage him in any further public debate about it.
A flock of pigeons descended onto the Ghetto Nuovo Campo and I felt the pressure to rejoin the rest of my party who had wandered off to different corners of the Jewish Ghetto. Rebecca and Sal were looking at a series of bronze plaques that lined two long white stucco walls remembering Italian Jews that died in the Holocaust. The boys were exploring some of the shops and galleries. Rabbi Moshe looked at me probably sensing that my mind was drifting elsewhere and explained to me that laying out the Tefilin would not only bring me to a more Righteous path but in so doing would bring the moment closer when the Messiah would bring Heaven down to Earth.
Look, Moshe, I said, I have enjoyed talking to you. I believe biblical stories are metaphors for explaining things that are hard to understand about the nature of this world. I believe in an immortal soul that lives on in memory, legend and history. There are great sinners and good doers who live in the large collective memory of the world but I believe most souls live on as memories with their children and grandchildren or friends, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters and sometimes with great pain fathers and mothers. By my doing good deeds in the world I believe my soul will live in a greater way in their memory which I think of as Heaven. Perhaps one day a person will come and leave a legacy so great that it will significantly and positively alter the way those that follow will act in the world but I will not wait or act in anticipation of it. In this way I am a Jew. I took Moshe’s hand in mine and shook it. I do not need, I said to him, to wear the Tefilin to be Righteous.
Sarra Copia Sullam heroically defended her name until her death in 1641 at the age of 41 even though she came under repeated attacks of others whose aim was to discredit her. It is believed she anonymously supported the literary world in Venice playing a significant role in the establishment of Accademia degli Incogniti, an important Literary Salon during the 1630’s and closing her own Salon following the Baldassare affair. Rabbi Modena continued his friendship with Sarra until her death and wrote her Epithet. An orator, writer, artist, musician and actor Modena in his autobiography admitted to an obsession for gambling. Despite having a few unsavory financial obligations including one with Baldasarre, Modena remained true to Sarra never seeking to settle his debts with her charity. The Jewish crisis within the Synagogue grew beyond Modena’s day. A former Modena student and Chief Rabbi of Amsterdam Saul Levi Morteira is best known for being the Rabbi who imposes a cherem (excommunication) on the philosopher Spinoza. Considered a heretic by Jews and Christians alike during his lifetime Spinoza lived a relatively obscure life and died young from a lung disease caused by his trade of lens grinding for spectacles and telescopes. The Kabalist movement spread rapidly throughout Eastern Europe eventually leading to a momentous showdown of Talmudist versus Kabalist rabbi’s in Poland. A moderated version emerged in the 18th and 19th Centuries as modern day Chasidic Judaism.
I rejoined my party and we made our way to the edge of the Ghetto to a kosher restaurant on the canal called GAM GAM. We had a wonderful meal of Italian and Middle Eastern inspired Jewish comfort food. As the sun set I thought about the gates that would close the world away from the Ghetto hundreds of years ago. A breeze along the canal stirred the air and a chill could be felt as Rebecca draped a shawl over her shoulders. I felt oddly at home here, thinking of the souls from years past that perhaps still walked among us searching for fulfillment. There must have been so many.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Venice Images 2
Di Vinci's Vitruvian Man
Masks from Ca'macana
Cherries and Bowl
Assorted Lamp Work Rebecca bought
Two birds I bought in Venice for my mother in 1972
Venician glassblowers
Monday, February 8, 2010
Venice Part 2 – The Artisan
An angular balding man could be seen just inside his shop door slowly and delicately moving a piece of red glass over a propane torch creating a hat to doff the head of a tiny crystalline woman in a cobalt blue dress. His eyes peered over his reading glasses to summon us in, transfixed outside as we were, watching him work. The small shop was filled with hundreds of pieces of individually crafted lamp work in dazzling colors and Rebecca poured over the array with a discerning eye picking out some of her favorite pieces. This glassmaker was among a new breed that have pursued the craft as an art form outside the mainstream of Murano production houses that cater to the throngs of tourists wanting to buy the highly valued Venetian glass for souvenirs.
We were on our way back from the Gallerie dell’Accademia looking for food to eat. We could not agree on someplace for all six of us, so we had gone separate ways when Rebecca, Jon and I wondered into the glass shop. At the dell’Accademia, I found out that Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man of universal proportions, the famous “cosmografia del minor mondo” (cosmography of the microcosm) was kept in a controlled environment to preserve its paper medium and offered for public viewing only every few years. Our glassmaker said there was a rumor it might be displayed in the next month as he carefully wrapped up a miniature 19th Century-looking black and red woman’s boot Rebecca had picked out. Look, he said handing me change, here is your Leonardo man on the Euro coin. I could not tell if his comment was supposed to be endearing or sarcastic. My face must have telegraphed my confusion. He went back to his work and we resumed our search for food.
The idea of universal proportions was the work of the 1st century BCE Roman Architect Vitruvius in his treatise De Architectura (The Ten Books on Architecture) and is considered one of the great treasures preserved from antiquity. Leonardo’s version is by far the most famous of many Vitruvian depictions from the Renaissance and has become the quintessential icon of the symbiosis of art and science. Simply put, it is the single most widely used representation of the artisan. Vitruvius’ extraordinary work also describes the proportional relationships of buildings and surrounds and in detail the techniques used by the Greeks and Romans in construction; great stuff for the engineer Di Vinci and equally interesting to me having been in the Building business for 35 years. In the past year I had left the corporate world of engineering and construction where I spent the majority of my career, to start a company with Sal in Construction Management. After making the move I had quickly realized how far removed I had become from the day to day job of managing people, projects and clients. In the recent past I spent the majority of my time as a Sr. Vice President managing up into the corporate organization that demanded more involvement and control of what I was doing. It is certainly an understandable ambition for any corporate structure but I had become wholly unsatisfied with the disconnection from the work we did. It was important to me to find in my life the right balance of job and personal satisfaction. The artisan of old represented that perfect balance and I hoped it was not yet entirely lost within this world dominated by technology that minimalized the personal connection to craft.
Settling into a café Rebecca, Jon and I were treated to one of our best meals in Venice of simple but deliciously prepared ravioli and arugula salad served by an elderly and unusually formal waiter. We could see our oldest son Nick sitting by himself through the window eating pizza in the café next door. Things had suddenly turned tense in our party when Nick announced that a vigorous texting relationship started in Israel with a long time friend of both our families had become more amorous. The romance consumed him and Domo, Nick’s best friend, became increasingly more upset with Nick’s obsession. To make matters worse, in a fit of frustration Nick bit his cell phone with his teeth when he could not get a signal, breaking the protective lens and rendering it useless. He had to borrow his brother’s phone to continue the chatter. Arguments ensued and Domo devised a punishment charging a Euro each for fighting. He got rich while I could not figure out where my boys were spending all their money. Traveling with six people was proving to be more complicated than it was with just Nick and me in Israel and Greece. The temptations of breaking his gluten free diet was too much and we watched him through the glass, strangely distanced, succumb to it.
We followed after him as he entered the mask shop next door to our café. No ordinary shop, Ca’macana had made the masks for Stanley Kubrick’s final film Eyes Wide Shut starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in which the characters are up to no good while hiding their identities. It seems Venice had a similar problem and by the mid 18th Century the Republic of Venice had limited mask wearing to 3 months of the year following December 26 until the Carnevale presumably in an attempt to curb Venetian clandestine activities. Nick purchased a devilish red ornamental piece for himself and a plain white one for his text friend back home that he would paint himself. Sal and Domo had also converged on the scene and were purchasing a variety of masks to ship home. With full stomachs giving sustenance and buoying the mood of our party Nick and Domo were able to move past their differences. We left with the Ca’macana faces neatly concealed in bubble wrap stored in a shopping bag that Nick carried with great delicacy for the remainder of the trip.
It was now late afternoon and Sal and I had given in to shelling out 18 Euro each for a 24 hour pass to ride the vaporetti (water bus). It was beyond our nature however to consider the extraordinarily expensive water taxi or worse, a gondola. We quickly found out that the best place to ride the vaporetti was the bow of the boat where our speed reaching 15 to 20 knots stirred a constant breeze and blew through the heat of the afternoon. The vaporetti pulled away from the Santa Margherita stop, first backing up and then full throttle forward. As the boat revved up its engine to move forward I watched the island of Guidecca (literally translated to Jew Town) glide by. It was not the area known as the Jewish Ghetto which was located in a cannon foundry on the other side of Venice. I could see in full view the famous Venetian architect Andrea Palladio’s impressive church San Giorgio Maggiore. A 16th Century Renaissance man, Palladio is considered the most influential individual in the history of Western Architecture. Commissioned for many of the most important buildings and churches in Venice of his time, he is best known for his design of Italian Villas. Constructed of brick and stucco, his villas were economical in cost and practical in design. As a dedicated student of Vitruvius he borrowed a great deal from the ideas of classical Greek and Roman buildings and of course universal proportion.
It did not take long to reach San Marco where we could slip off the boat for an espresso and gelato and then get back on. The Florian Café is reported to have brewed the first cup of coffee in Italy and Sal; an avid coffee drinker had to have one. Our waiter with an ego far grander than his job took our order as we all sat around a very small table amid hordes of tourists hustling by. The grand palazzo inspired by Palladio resonated with music from a score of bandstands as pigeons dove in and out of the empty spaces between crowds. An endless line up of shops displayed the volumes of glass artifacts interspersed between cafés and gelato stands. The famous names of glassmakers like Toso and Barovier could be seen advertised in the display windows.
Gianni Toso was only 10 years old when he started working with glass. His family had a legacy of more than 700 years of glass blowing and he was so enriched by it that he would skip school to work 12 hours a day in the factory. He was taught the secrets of the trade handed down generation after generation and at 14 years old attended the Abate Vincenzo Zanetti, Maestro d'Arte fine arts academy for master glass blowers on the island of Murano, where he studied the history and the craft for the next seven years. At 23 disillusioned with the production of tourist glass, Gianni broke from family tradition and set up shop in the Jewish Ghetto of Venice making lamp work. His piece “Jews vs. Catholics” a chess set with Hasidic Jews facing off with Franciscan Monks received a first place award from the Murano glassblowers and he achieved international acclaim when he was commissioned by Salvador Dali to make 12 of Dali’s works in glass. In 1972 he attended an international conference of glassmakers in Zurich where he shared some of the secrets of Venetian Glassmaking for the first time in the world. The collaboration was inspirational to him and he traveled to the United States where he felt the freedom to be able to pursue his art. Today he lives in Baltimore and is considered one of the great glass artists in the world. He works in the traditional medium of glass where many of his contemporaries are using tempered glass to reduce breakage. In joining two pieces together said Gianni in a recent interview with another glass artist, it is critical that the glass for both are heated to the same temperature for the same time so that when they are fit together the bond is strong and the glass does not break. He does not believe in using the tempered glass because it does not teach the right technique. It has taken years of tradition, practice and patience to do it correctly. In a world that believes the technology and not the craft produce the perfect art Gianni says: “Production is from the human being. It does not matter the technology…it’s just the instrument.”
I watched our waiter return with our tray of coffees and desserts. He approached us with an air of superiority. As he leaned down to set the tray on table, he missed the edge ever so indelicately and everything landed on the floor in a heap of molten beverage, pastry goo and broken cups and saucers. The Palazzo stopped right there for everyone to gaze at our party as if we had somehow ruined their vacations. Our waiter walked away and never returned. An eternity went by as people sidestepped the spillage and pigeons became curious, when a new waiter appeared showing us to another table and apologizing for the mess, saying that everything was on the house.
“You learn when you break the glass” the master, Gianni Toso said in the interview. The meaning is profound. It is not the final product that matters or even what you do as much as the process you take to get there. It is through the personal challenge of perfection that we achieve satisfaction in what we do. Our party headed back to the vaporetti when we finished our re-served coffees and desserts.
As dusk fell, we rode on, positioning ourselves with each stop to own the front of the boat. Several stops beyond San Marco we were all there and darkness descended on us. In the black water and night sky, rolling slowly out into the Adriatic Sea I felt as if I could be transported back in time to the empire that was once the greatest merchant enterprise in the world. The boat powered through the water and the engine blast brought me back to the sight of Lido directly in front of us, our last stop where the boat would turn around and come back. On the left in the distance were the lights of the glass islands of Murano.
European glasswork recast from “cullet” or glass blocks and shards existed since Roman times, but the making of the raw material was a closely guarded secret and only produced in ancient towns on the far eastern shores of the Mediterranean. Following the crusades all of this changed and by the late 13th century imported sand and soda ash were being used to make glass in the first Venetian frit furnaces. A new era of glassmaking was born. In 1292, the governing Council of Ten for the stated reason of fire danger ordered the growing industry be moved from the crowded international trade market of the Rialto district to the cluster of small islands known as Murano. The Venetians were to zealously guard the secret they now possessed and confined the glassmakers to Murano. Marriage was allowed only within families from their guild. Under the penalty of death these artisans were also restricted from leaving Venice. So high in importance was it to keep the secret that it was decreed that the Doge himself would pursue any such wanderer and assassinate the traitor on the spot when found. Nevertheless, the Venetians were not the only ones to have the secret in Italy after the Crusades and an industry paralleled Venice in the forests of Altare outside Genoa.
The earliest known discovery of manmade glass dates back to the late 2100 BCE found in cemeteries of the ancient Semite civilization of Akkadians who were also credited with early forms of cuneiform writing and accounting. It is believed that glass was discovered when the soda powder from decomposing plants could be added as flux allowing melting at lower temperatures. The resulting cooled material would dissolve in water and lime was added to solidify. Other minerals would be used to introduce color or clarity.
Following the invention of glass several hundred years later from the same land of Ur where the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers converge, emerged the most important idea in Western Civilization. It was here that Abraham shattered the idols of his forefathers and said there was only one God to worship. There was no longer a god for everyone and everything. There was only one Universal God responsible for everything and you could talk to him. What God told Abraham was to leave this place for the land of Canaan. From then on wherever the Hebrews of Abraham went the making of glass came too.
We had reached our stop at Santa Margherita late in the night and across the way the lights of Guidecca could be seen but Palladio’s church had disappeared in the darkness. Domo and Jon talked about the masks we saw earlier in the day and Nick was busy texting. Things were not what they appeared to be. When the Council of Ten had moved the glass factories to Murano, Guidecca housed a population of about 6,000 Jews who were agents for trade, partners with the Venetians in the vast empire that dominated the Mediterranean for nearly 1,000 years forever opening the door between Europe and the Orient. With the rise of the Venetian Glass Industry on Murano, the vibrant Jewish community on Guidecca of merchants and artisans began to deconstruct giving way to the churches and elaborate villas that exist there now. Signaling the end of a great communion of business enterprise it was at once a foreshadowing of Venice’s decline and the beginning of a more vigorous persecution and displacement for the Jews.
But where the Jews went so did the glass. In the next several hundred years the secret of glassmaking could be found in Spain, France, Germany and then throughout Europe. While the craft survived many of the artists had to renounce their faith as years of Inquisition and banishment prevailed in Europe. Jews had to convert to Christianity or were exiled. Not willing to give up their lucrative business they converted but while the devout continued to secretly practice their faith many did not and both time and prejudice would erase their heritage.
Gianni Toso rediscovered his faith in the late 60’s buried deep within the 700 year history of making glass on the Island of Murano. Rejecting the industry for what it had become he found new inspiration working in the Jewish Ghetto of Venice making his craft and later in America finding the connection between his work and the satisfaction he felt in doing it. He speaks eloquently about the difference between Craft and Art, Craft being what we know and teach others and Art being the ultimate expression of what it means to be human. “In order to be a human being with a high level of humanity we must control the animal what we are,” said the Master Artisan, Gianni Toso. “Art is the most powerful instrument to develop humanity.”
We got back to our Venetian apartment around midnight and Rebecca laid her pieces of lamp work carefully out on the kitchen table. Nick admired his devil’s mask turning it in his hand and moving it on and off his face. Sal rested his tired feet on the couch and Domo and Jon jumped onto their computer games. I emptied my pockets of change and turned over a Euro coin to study Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man. As it turns out there is no such thing as universal human proportion. There is only balance to make us upright to strive at a craft whatever that is and push ourselves to learn as much as we can in the lifetime we are given. Self –fulfillment is not what we become; only what we do getting there.
We were on our way back from the Gallerie dell’Accademia looking for food to eat. We could not agree on someplace for all six of us, so we had gone separate ways when Rebecca, Jon and I wondered into the glass shop. At the dell’Accademia, I found out that Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man of universal proportions, the famous “cosmografia del minor mondo” (cosmography of the microcosm) was kept in a controlled environment to preserve its paper medium and offered for public viewing only every few years. Our glassmaker said there was a rumor it might be displayed in the next month as he carefully wrapped up a miniature 19th Century-looking black and red woman’s boot Rebecca had picked out. Look, he said handing me change, here is your Leonardo man on the Euro coin. I could not tell if his comment was supposed to be endearing or sarcastic. My face must have telegraphed my confusion. He went back to his work and we resumed our search for food.
The idea of universal proportions was the work of the 1st century BCE Roman Architect Vitruvius in his treatise De Architectura (The Ten Books on Architecture) and is considered one of the great treasures preserved from antiquity. Leonardo’s version is by far the most famous of many Vitruvian depictions from the Renaissance and has become the quintessential icon of the symbiosis of art and science. Simply put, it is the single most widely used representation of the artisan. Vitruvius’ extraordinary work also describes the proportional relationships of buildings and surrounds and in detail the techniques used by the Greeks and Romans in construction; great stuff for the engineer Di Vinci and equally interesting to me having been in the Building business for 35 years. In the past year I had left the corporate world of engineering and construction where I spent the majority of my career, to start a company with Sal in Construction Management. After making the move I had quickly realized how far removed I had become from the day to day job of managing people, projects and clients. In the recent past I spent the majority of my time as a Sr. Vice President managing up into the corporate organization that demanded more involvement and control of what I was doing. It is certainly an understandable ambition for any corporate structure but I had become wholly unsatisfied with the disconnection from the work we did. It was important to me to find in my life the right balance of job and personal satisfaction. The artisan of old represented that perfect balance and I hoped it was not yet entirely lost within this world dominated by technology that minimalized the personal connection to craft.
Settling into a café Rebecca, Jon and I were treated to one of our best meals in Venice of simple but deliciously prepared ravioli and arugula salad served by an elderly and unusually formal waiter. We could see our oldest son Nick sitting by himself through the window eating pizza in the café next door. Things had suddenly turned tense in our party when Nick announced that a vigorous texting relationship started in Israel with a long time friend of both our families had become more amorous. The romance consumed him and Domo, Nick’s best friend, became increasingly more upset with Nick’s obsession. To make matters worse, in a fit of frustration Nick bit his cell phone with his teeth when he could not get a signal, breaking the protective lens and rendering it useless. He had to borrow his brother’s phone to continue the chatter. Arguments ensued and Domo devised a punishment charging a Euro each for fighting. He got rich while I could not figure out where my boys were spending all their money. Traveling with six people was proving to be more complicated than it was with just Nick and me in Israel and Greece. The temptations of breaking his gluten free diet was too much and we watched him through the glass, strangely distanced, succumb to it.
We followed after him as he entered the mask shop next door to our café. No ordinary shop, Ca’macana had made the masks for Stanley Kubrick’s final film Eyes Wide Shut starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in which the characters are up to no good while hiding their identities. It seems Venice had a similar problem and by the mid 18th Century the Republic of Venice had limited mask wearing to 3 months of the year following December 26 until the Carnevale presumably in an attempt to curb Venetian clandestine activities. Nick purchased a devilish red ornamental piece for himself and a plain white one for his text friend back home that he would paint himself. Sal and Domo had also converged on the scene and were purchasing a variety of masks to ship home. With full stomachs giving sustenance and buoying the mood of our party Nick and Domo were able to move past their differences. We left with the Ca’macana faces neatly concealed in bubble wrap stored in a shopping bag that Nick carried with great delicacy for the remainder of the trip.
It was now late afternoon and Sal and I had given in to shelling out 18 Euro each for a 24 hour pass to ride the vaporetti (water bus). It was beyond our nature however to consider the extraordinarily expensive water taxi or worse, a gondola. We quickly found out that the best place to ride the vaporetti was the bow of the boat where our speed reaching 15 to 20 knots stirred a constant breeze and blew through the heat of the afternoon. The vaporetti pulled away from the Santa Margherita stop, first backing up and then full throttle forward. As the boat revved up its engine to move forward I watched the island of Guidecca (literally translated to Jew Town) glide by. It was not the area known as the Jewish Ghetto which was located in a cannon foundry on the other side of Venice. I could see in full view the famous Venetian architect Andrea Palladio’s impressive church San Giorgio Maggiore. A 16th Century Renaissance man, Palladio is considered the most influential individual in the history of Western Architecture. Commissioned for many of the most important buildings and churches in Venice of his time, he is best known for his design of Italian Villas. Constructed of brick and stucco, his villas were economical in cost and practical in design. As a dedicated student of Vitruvius he borrowed a great deal from the ideas of classical Greek and Roman buildings and of course universal proportion.
It did not take long to reach San Marco where we could slip off the boat for an espresso and gelato and then get back on. The Florian Café is reported to have brewed the first cup of coffee in Italy and Sal; an avid coffee drinker had to have one. Our waiter with an ego far grander than his job took our order as we all sat around a very small table amid hordes of tourists hustling by. The grand palazzo inspired by Palladio resonated with music from a score of bandstands as pigeons dove in and out of the empty spaces between crowds. An endless line up of shops displayed the volumes of glass artifacts interspersed between cafés and gelato stands. The famous names of glassmakers like Toso and Barovier could be seen advertised in the display windows.
Gianni Toso was only 10 years old when he started working with glass. His family had a legacy of more than 700 years of glass blowing and he was so enriched by it that he would skip school to work 12 hours a day in the factory. He was taught the secrets of the trade handed down generation after generation and at 14 years old attended the Abate Vincenzo Zanetti, Maestro d'Arte fine arts academy for master glass blowers on the island of Murano, where he studied the history and the craft for the next seven years. At 23 disillusioned with the production of tourist glass, Gianni broke from family tradition and set up shop in the Jewish Ghetto of Venice making lamp work. His piece “Jews vs. Catholics” a chess set with Hasidic Jews facing off with Franciscan Monks received a first place award from the Murano glassblowers and he achieved international acclaim when he was commissioned by Salvador Dali to make 12 of Dali’s works in glass. In 1972 he attended an international conference of glassmakers in Zurich where he shared some of the secrets of Venetian Glassmaking for the first time in the world. The collaboration was inspirational to him and he traveled to the United States where he felt the freedom to be able to pursue his art. Today he lives in Baltimore and is considered one of the great glass artists in the world. He works in the traditional medium of glass where many of his contemporaries are using tempered glass to reduce breakage. In joining two pieces together said Gianni in a recent interview with another glass artist, it is critical that the glass for both are heated to the same temperature for the same time so that when they are fit together the bond is strong and the glass does not break. He does not believe in using the tempered glass because it does not teach the right technique. It has taken years of tradition, practice and patience to do it correctly. In a world that believes the technology and not the craft produce the perfect art Gianni says: “Production is from the human being. It does not matter the technology…it’s just the instrument.”
I watched our waiter return with our tray of coffees and desserts. He approached us with an air of superiority. As he leaned down to set the tray on table, he missed the edge ever so indelicately and everything landed on the floor in a heap of molten beverage, pastry goo and broken cups and saucers. The Palazzo stopped right there for everyone to gaze at our party as if we had somehow ruined their vacations. Our waiter walked away and never returned. An eternity went by as people sidestepped the spillage and pigeons became curious, when a new waiter appeared showing us to another table and apologizing for the mess, saying that everything was on the house.
“You learn when you break the glass” the master, Gianni Toso said in the interview. The meaning is profound. It is not the final product that matters or even what you do as much as the process you take to get there. It is through the personal challenge of perfection that we achieve satisfaction in what we do. Our party headed back to the vaporetti when we finished our re-served coffees and desserts.
As dusk fell, we rode on, positioning ourselves with each stop to own the front of the boat. Several stops beyond San Marco we were all there and darkness descended on us. In the black water and night sky, rolling slowly out into the Adriatic Sea I felt as if I could be transported back in time to the empire that was once the greatest merchant enterprise in the world. The boat powered through the water and the engine blast brought me back to the sight of Lido directly in front of us, our last stop where the boat would turn around and come back. On the left in the distance were the lights of the glass islands of Murano.
European glasswork recast from “cullet” or glass blocks and shards existed since Roman times, but the making of the raw material was a closely guarded secret and only produced in ancient towns on the far eastern shores of the Mediterranean. Following the crusades all of this changed and by the late 13th century imported sand and soda ash were being used to make glass in the first Venetian frit furnaces. A new era of glassmaking was born. In 1292, the governing Council of Ten for the stated reason of fire danger ordered the growing industry be moved from the crowded international trade market of the Rialto district to the cluster of small islands known as Murano. The Venetians were to zealously guard the secret they now possessed and confined the glassmakers to Murano. Marriage was allowed only within families from their guild. Under the penalty of death these artisans were also restricted from leaving Venice. So high in importance was it to keep the secret that it was decreed that the Doge himself would pursue any such wanderer and assassinate the traitor on the spot when found. Nevertheless, the Venetians were not the only ones to have the secret in Italy after the Crusades and an industry paralleled Venice in the forests of Altare outside Genoa.
The earliest known discovery of manmade glass dates back to the late 2100 BCE found in cemeteries of the ancient Semite civilization of Akkadians who were also credited with early forms of cuneiform writing and accounting. It is believed that glass was discovered when the soda powder from decomposing plants could be added as flux allowing melting at lower temperatures. The resulting cooled material would dissolve in water and lime was added to solidify. Other minerals would be used to introduce color or clarity.
Following the invention of glass several hundred years later from the same land of Ur where the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers converge, emerged the most important idea in Western Civilization. It was here that Abraham shattered the idols of his forefathers and said there was only one God to worship. There was no longer a god for everyone and everything. There was only one Universal God responsible for everything and you could talk to him. What God told Abraham was to leave this place for the land of Canaan. From then on wherever the Hebrews of Abraham went the making of glass came too.
We had reached our stop at Santa Margherita late in the night and across the way the lights of Guidecca could be seen but Palladio’s church had disappeared in the darkness. Domo and Jon talked about the masks we saw earlier in the day and Nick was busy texting. Things were not what they appeared to be. When the Council of Ten had moved the glass factories to Murano, Guidecca housed a population of about 6,000 Jews who were agents for trade, partners with the Venetians in the vast empire that dominated the Mediterranean for nearly 1,000 years forever opening the door between Europe and the Orient. With the rise of the Venetian Glass Industry on Murano, the vibrant Jewish community on Guidecca of merchants and artisans began to deconstruct giving way to the churches and elaborate villas that exist there now. Signaling the end of a great communion of business enterprise it was at once a foreshadowing of Venice’s decline and the beginning of a more vigorous persecution and displacement for the Jews.
But where the Jews went so did the glass. In the next several hundred years the secret of glassmaking could be found in Spain, France, Germany and then throughout Europe. While the craft survived many of the artists had to renounce their faith as years of Inquisition and banishment prevailed in Europe. Jews had to convert to Christianity or were exiled. Not willing to give up their lucrative business they converted but while the devout continued to secretly practice their faith many did not and both time and prejudice would erase their heritage.
Gianni Toso rediscovered his faith in the late 60’s buried deep within the 700 year history of making glass on the Island of Murano. Rejecting the industry for what it had become he found new inspiration working in the Jewish Ghetto of Venice making his craft and later in America finding the connection between his work and the satisfaction he felt in doing it. He speaks eloquently about the difference between Craft and Art, Craft being what we know and teach others and Art being the ultimate expression of what it means to be human. “In order to be a human being with a high level of humanity we must control the animal what we are,” said the Master Artisan, Gianni Toso. “Art is the most powerful instrument to develop humanity.”
We got back to our Venetian apartment around midnight and Rebecca laid her pieces of lamp work carefully out on the kitchen table. Nick admired his devil’s mask turning it in his hand and moving it on and off his face. Sal rested his tired feet on the couch and Domo and Jon jumped onto their computer games. I emptied my pockets of change and turned over a Euro coin to study Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man. As it turns out there is no such thing as universal human proportion. There is only balance to make us upright to strive at a craft whatever that is and push ourselves to learn as much as we can in the lifetime we are given. Self –fulfillment is not what we become; only what we do getting there.
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