We are now in Naples, having taken the train from Venice via Roma. Unfortunately the train was delayed for two hours which meant we had a long day's journey into night. I thought I'd do a little catch up as we haven't had a great deal of access to the internet over the last three or four days (8 euro per hour in one internet point in Venice!)
As mentioned earlier, we visited the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin, which is housed in an old railway station. The setting was sensational and the artwork ranged from brilliant and visually exciting to very edgy and confronting (a table full of about forty plastic boxes containing rotting matter). Judith was not engaged but Anthea, Andrew and I were. I particularly liked the thousands of roughly hewn slate from the Himalayas (above).
On the morning of the day we were leaving Berlin, we lined up to see the Reichstag along with many others, but found that we were unable to wait long enough as we had to check out of our hotel room by 12.00. We left the queue and then stumbled onto the Holocaust memorial which we'd heard about but had not seen. It was very moving and sensitively done - no mean achievement. It consists of the myriad concrete blocks seen here, with the displays and informative element housed underneath.
After Berlin, Judith and I flew to Munich and stayed with a lovely family Judith had contacted through the internet. Our hosts were extremely hospitable and took us for a drive into the Bavarian countryside where we visited an old castle built by "Mad Prince Ludwig" who only lived there a short time and was reknowned for building four or five castles. This castle was on an island and was modelled after Versailles. Eventually he drowned under mysterious circumstances. We then drove into the hills and had afternoon tea overlooking the lake and island (below). The whole trip was picturebook Bavaria.
The following day we visited munich itself and just had a pleasant day ambling around the streets. Our hosts showed us genuine friendly Bavarian hospitality and our stay was a real highlight of our current trip.
As mentioned earlier, we visited the Hamburger Bahnhof in Berlin, which is housed in an old railway station. The setting was sensational and the artwork ranged from brilliant and visually exciting to very edgy and confronting (a table full of about forty plastic boxes containing rotting matter). Judith was not engaged but Anthea, Andrew and I were. I particularly liked the thousands of roughly hewn slate from the Himalayas (above).
On the morning of the day we were leaving Berlin, we lined up to see the Reichstag along with many others, but found that we were unable to wait long enough as we had to check out of our hotel room by 12.00. We left the queue and then stumbled onto the Holocaust memorial which we'd heard about but had not seen. It was very moving and sensitively done - no mean achievement. It consists of the myriad concrete blocks seen here, with the displays and informative element housed underneath.After Berlin, Judith and I flew to Munich and stayed with a lovely family Judith had contacted through the internet. Our hosts were extremely hospitable and took us for a drive into the Bavarian countryside where we visited an old castle built by "Mad Prince Ludwig" who only lived there a short time and was reknowned for building four or five castles. This castle was on an island and was modelled after Versailles. Eventually he drowned under mysterious circumstances. We then drove into the hills and had afternoon tea overlooking the lake and island (below). The whole trip was picturebook Bavaria.
The following day we visited munich itself and just had a pleasant day ambling around the streets. Our hosts showed us genuine friendly Bavarian hospitality and our stay was a real highlight of our current trip.
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We visited the East wing of the National Gallery of Art in Washington today and we saw a couple of Anselm Kiefer's pieces(including another copy of the lead, poppy seed plane!). There was a painting/metal work piece of his there that made me realise he has a great piece in the Australian National Gallery ("Abendland") - cool huh :o)
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