Only-apartments' blog

ONLY BE AMSTERDAMMER

ONLY BE BUDAPESTER

ONLY BE VENETIAN

ONLY BE BARCELONIAN

ONLY BE BERLINER

ONLY BE VALENCIAN

ONLY BE ISTANBULITE

ONLY BE FLORENTINE

ONLY BE LISBOETA

ONLY BE LONDONER

ONLY BE NEW YORKER

ONLY BE MADRILENIAN

ONLY BE MALAGUEÑO

ONLY BE MILANESE

ONLY BE PARISIAN

ONLY BE PORTUENSE

ONLY BE PRAGUER

ONLY BE ROMAN

ONLY BE SEVILLIAN

ONLY BE PROXIMAMENTE

ONLY BE ATHENIAN

ONLY BE COMING SOON

Last posts

The Tomb of Pope Innocent VIII

Mónica Boixeda Only-Be, Roman

History, as we all know, is only the history according to the dictum of the present day. Each society carries out historical investigation according to the prevailing circumstances and interests of the time – it´s this to which history becomes subordinate. Dates and facts are organised and prioritised to create a determined past. Perhaps with this in mind, we shouldn´t immediately dismiss the curious investigation which led to Ruggero Marino (author of Cristóbal Colón: el último de los templarios) and Javier Sierra (La ruta prohibida y otros enigmas de la Historia) suggesting the possibility that Christopher Columbus was in fact a Templar knight, and that he in fact arrived in America for the first time earlier than the famous date (in 1492), with special guidance from the religious Order. According to economist Jacques de Mathieu, some of the knights of the Temple appear to have used and exploited the South American silver mines during the 12th and 13th centuries, having perhaps arrived on the trail of the lost tribes of Israel. This would certainly explain the large amount of templar silver money in Europe around that time, and the fact that the templars established the principle port for their fleet not via the Mediterranean, which would have been the obvious and natural choice, given the context of the period – but the Atlantic, in the Normandy area La Rochelle. A further piece of evidence for this interesting hypothesis might also lie in the left corridor of the basilica of San Pedro in Rome, atop the magnificent tomb of Pope Innocent VIII – who Ruggero Marino argues was Columbus´ true... read more

Nico Vascellari: a new exhibition at Rome’s MACRO

Mónica Boixeda Only-Be, Roman

Italian artist Nico Vascellari is a master of eccentricity. His incredible installations are a complete mix up of painting, collage, video, performance and sculpture. His main reference points are folklore, nature and the alternative underground scene. Vascellari is one multi-faceted man – as well as being a contemporary artist, he also brings his rebellious spirit to music, singing in punk band “With love.” In 2007, Vascillari participated in Manifesta, one of the most radical, and interesting contemporary art biennales. His contribution – a large scale video installation – caught the eye of curators and art critics from all round the world. That same year, he won the “Young Italian Art Award,” and his work was included in hugely successful corporate art collection The Deutsche Bank Collection. 2007´s “Cuckoo” was one of his most daring projects yet; an installation which fused concepts of the ritual, iconography, rhythm, the church and sacrifice, and involved an impromptu performance by members of his punk band. Now showing at Rome´s contemporary art museum MACRO, Vascillari is one of Italy´s most exciting artists. Back in October of last year, he opened with exhibition “Blonde” a show which inspired by the museum´s curved walls. For more information about “Blonde” go to: http://en.macro.roma.museum/mostre_ed_eventi/mostre/nico_vascellari_blonde Heloise Battista If you´re interested in finding out about one of today´s most interesting emerging artists, rent one of the apartments in Rome and don´t miss out on Vascillari´s new exhibition at Rome´s MACRO, on until the 22nd of May Translated by: Poppy... read more

Fears in Paris

Mónica Boixeda Only-Be, Parisian

In early 1998, as if foreseeing his own death, which occurred just a few months later, the English poet Ted Hughes gave the press a collection of letter-poems written in first person over a period of more than 25 years directed almost entirely to his first wife, American poet Sylvia Plath, who committed suicide 35 years earlier. It´s called Birthday Letters, a book of breathtaking beauty where Hughes first addressed, since the time that perhaps he first saw her in the Strand in London in a group photo of Fulbright Scholars, the question of death and absence of Plath and the tense, beautiful and dramatic life they shared. Through this collection we know that behind his modest wedding in Joycean Bloomsday (June 16, when Ulysses passes) in the parish of St George of the Chimney Sweeps in the district of Holborn in London, on whose altar, where Plath saw “the sky open and show ripe riches to fall on us, Hughes, levitating at her side, saw himself subjected to a strange time: the bewitched future”, both went to a Paris honeymoon. There, while Plath enthusiastically revived the myth of the city that we owe to Stein, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Miller and other Americans of the Lost Generation, for Hughes, secretly, there was only “the capital / Of the occupation and the old nightmare. / He read each bullet scar on the Quai stones / With a familiar sinister feeling, / And stared at the afflicted way in which the sun exposed the sidewalk / Below…” It isn’t difficult to share the feelings of the English poet when visiting the French... read more