Palermo, world city of culture

the four corners of a vibrant pedestrian mall

Guidebooks are filled with superlatives where Sicily is concerned, and this goes double for Palermo. Mostly they're accurate.

Sicily is the largest island in Italy and the Mediterranean (slightly larger than Sardinia) and the third largest in Europe (nope).

Palermo is the most conquered city in the world. Related: Palermo has the best street food in Italy.

So, food is Sicily is extraordinary even by Italian standards. They invented granita; we tend to think of it as related to espresso, but the roots are the same as pomegranate, which incidentally are huge and grown here.

Cannoli is Sicilian. So are caponata and arancini.

Every glass of table wine has been a knockout. The cookies are the cookies you dream about. I mean, if you don't, you should. They are rich in almonds and pistachios.

Civilization in Sicily is also really old, especially by North American standards. Like 800 BC old. I stopped by a pretty church: something has been there since 1100 AD. Marble fountain filled with lifelike statues? 1500.

Not everything is perfectly restored, but that's part of the charm. You could ignore the anti-gentrification graffiti and pick up a palazzo.

Everyone was here: the Greeks, the Romans, the Arabs. Yesterday, when all the shops were closed for natale, Indian merchants opened their doors.

Tonight's kebab pizza (yes, really) was made by Tunisian Muslims. The crust was a lot better than that soft Neapolitan stuff.

I am curious why Mt Etna's eruptions have gotten so much coverage at home. Palermo is less than 100 miles away. Skies are blue as can be. Catania's airport, very close to Etna, and where I'll be flying back from, has resumed normal operations. Still, here's a shot from the Space Station. I hope I'll be able to see the lava flow at night from Catania or Taormina.

People use the same words to describe Palermo that they do Naples: gritty, chaotic, earthy. Maybe it's because the city was deserted for Christmas, but I just don't see it. Tonight was the first night locals returned en masse.

Maybe it's good I went to Napoli first. Or the weather's just better here. Both Napoli and Palermo lived under the iron fists of fascists and then the Mafia for generations.

But Palermo seems to be in the middle of a renaissance. In fact they declared this past year an official city of culture.

So what did I do for 3 days? Not much. A lot was closed for Christmas, and I hadn't realized my loft was not exactly downtown. I did wander into a few churches that were open.

There was a service going on, so I didn't want to be obtrusive.

Jesus and the apostles aren't as fair skinned as they are in Rome.

One of the few things open on Christmas besides churches was a digital Modigliani exhibit. A digital what?

I had mixed feelings about this concept, which basically involved projecting digitally retouched images of Amadei Modigliani's paintings in a dark room. You could do this online without going to Palermo. Only one or two actual paintings were there, and they were minor works.

His first and only solo exhibit caused a scandal because of nude women with pubic hair. 

Most of the biographical film was about his premature death from poverty, hunger, and tuberculosis and the even more tragic death of his young partner Jeanne, pregnant with their second child, by suicide days after his.

There was also a fun virtual headset art thing, where you got to explore the world's beyond Vermeer and Van Gogh and DaVinci paintings; all good until you tried to get up and everything was spinning.

Back out in the sunshine...

Don't forget to look up.

Notable: Palermo has lots of free, fast public wifi on the pedestrian mall. This is a boon to tourists. No funky log on or cookie warnings in Italian or email you need to provide to be spammed. It just works.

I found this fun globe, which reminded me of the Bean in Millenium Park in Chicago. It turned out to be an exhibit by Tomas Saraceno, who had that crazy room with the spider webs and mirrors that Joanie and Carol and Tom and I loved at SF MoMA.

The globe was part of an Urban Forest exhibition at a museum of contemporary art, and I happily spent a few hours admiring works by Ai Wei Wei and Berkeley's own Bill Fontana and several Sicilian artists I hadn't heard of until today.

 

Ai Wei Wei's tree is actually assembled from multiple other trees. It has visible screws holding it together.

I loved this room with the nightmare forest.

The giant rotating flowers were great too, like a Disneyland acid trip.

Palermo has a cathedral that clearly shows its location at the crossroads of Christianity and Arab cultures. Unfortunately it's much less interesting inside.

The details are reminiscent of the gorgeous cathedral in Sevilla.

Last stop: the epitome of culture. Il Massimo, Palermo's legendary opera house.

The dome can actually be opened!

Our tour was in English for me and in Italian for everyone else. It was fun to see the view from the boxes. Although the opera house is the third largest in Europe, it doesn't have that many seats. But the stage is huge and deep, 50 meters deep. (San Francisco Opera has almost twice as many seats.)

Massimo's acoustics are notable. No microphones required. We also visited this echo chamber, formerly a gentleman's smoking room. The murals are inspired by Pompeii.

When we emerged from Il Massimo at night, even more people had gathered to celebrate on the steps. Imagine Americans taking selfies with their little dogs at the opera house the day after Christmas!

It was quite a gift to behold.

Tomorrow: heading south to the best preserved Greek ruins outside of Greece.