Police Stations of Venice

Police stations we have visited since arriving in Venice

1. 30 May. Polizia di Stato, via Cosenz Enrico 11, Marghera - Maurizio registers us as tourists on the way from the airport to the farm.
2. 6 June. First Monday off - failed attempt to find the police station in Mestre.
3. 7 June. Carabinieres, Piazzale Roma, Venezia - our first attempt to register ourselves (in accordance with the terms of our visas). They sent us to another (the following) police station.
4. 9 June. Questura di Venezia, via Aurelio Nicolodi 21, Marghera - An immigration centre in a police headquarters, really a new kind of experience for us. They sent us away with a list of documents to collect before returning.*
5. 10 June. Polizia di Stato, via Castellana, Zelarino - cannot help us with the ...*, must go to via Ca' Rossa.
6. 10 June. Polizia di Stato, via Ca' Rossa 13, Mestre - No, no, wrong via Ca' Rossa police station, you want the one down the road.
7. 10 June. Polizia di Stato, via Ca' Rossa 5, Mestre - Yes, we're in the right place here, but no, they want Maurizio present in order to process us.
8. 19 June. Polizia di Stato, via Cosenz Enrico 11, Marghera - Maurizio thought his 'friend' here might be more help to us, but no luck.
9. 19 June. Polizia di Stato, via Ca' Rossa 5, Mestre - closed on Mondays, come back tomorrow, but no no, Maurizio doesn't need to be there.
10. 20 June. Polizia di Stato, via Ca' Rossa 5, Mestre - first success, one stamp down, many more to go.
11. 23 June. Questura di Venezia, via Aurelio Nicolodi 21, Marghera - after 3 hours waiting, we were finally processed (another hour - forms, stamps, finger prints, hand prints, etc), and we are now holders of Venezia resident permits. 

*One of the documents was a form that needed to be filled out by our host, Maurizio. Then, along with copies of his resident's permit, we needed to get this form stamped at a different (not specified, just different) police station.

The waiting game.
F in one or other of the police stations.

Italian bureaucracy is about leaning to be patient.
Really patient. 

All of this was in aid of attempting to continue the 'do right' theme of getting our long-stay visas for Italy. But also in the theme of the visas, it really seems like a hell of a lot more trouble than it's worth.

The document that accompanied our visas stated that:

You are required to report your presence on Italian territory to the local Central Police Station ('Questura') of the province in which you are staying within 8 working days from the date of entry and apply [here's the crux] for a resident permit ('permesso di soggiomo') persuant to article 5 of the Law 286/1998.

Along with a bunch of other requirements...

So now, finally, we have paper copies of a Dichiarazione di Soggiorno per Stranier i - Foreigners' Statement of Stay.

And in 2 months, more or less, we are to return to the immigration processing police station, on a Wednesday afternoon, to claim our residents permits. That visit should only take a couple of hours, more or less...

Finn Robson Marsden - legal resident of Venezia, Italia, until 1 January 2012.

The next trick was to get a Codice Fiscale - a tax number, so as to be able to sign the lease for our apartment. Also we (Finn) would need this number for any kind of Italian employment.
Apparently all they would require was to see our passports - proof of identity, birth dates, etc. In reality it took some convincing (waving of permits and showing of vacanze di lavoro visas). But once convinced we could work legally, we were processed fairly speedily. Unbelievably speedily compared to previous experiences.

The crumbling palazzo housing the Agenzia Delle Entrate (their inland revenue department).

Now we have everything. All the documentation Italy could possibly want about us is held in at least 4 separate police stations and public offices in Venice, and we have legal status. And a house.

29 June 2011

The Wild Man of Venice

Last thing last Tuesday, I was visited by the Wild Man of Venice - Giorgio Foresto.
Foresto is not his given name, but his chosen name. In the Venetian dialect Foresto is the name given to a foreigner or a forester, or a man of the forest - all identities the Wild Man, as he refers to himself, has adopted.

Foresto is an artist living in Pellestrina (way out on a narrow peninsular between the lagoon and the gulf), who happens to have spent a considerable amount of time in New Zealand. About 20 years ago he spent 8 months living at Hundertwassa's place up north, and during another trip he spent a few months decorating a fellow Venetian's restaurant somewhere near Picton.

The Wild Man of Venice, in a less wild moment.

His partner is currently in NZ, travelling around the Coromandel, making drawings which she will bring home to Venice and paint into huge 'beautiful' landscapes (as opposed to what Foresto describes as the horrible subject matter of the Biennale, all blood and blasphemy). She paints 'paradises' before they are 'lost'. But only for herself, she won't speak of selling - 'She is even more wild than me!' (An exclamation made with a huge grin.)

The Wild Man's map.

The Wild Man bases his character (somewhat anyway) on a sculpture of Homo Selvaticus, here in Venice.
Homo Selvaticus can be found carved in relief in marble on the front of the house of Tinto Brass, a local pornography film director, on the canal just near the church of San Trovaso.
(I got him to draw me a map, shown above.)

Get off the vapoertto at the Zattere stop...

Head left, then just before the bridge turn right up the first canal...

Past the gondola building workshop on the other side...

Past the church of San Trovaso...

Across the canal...

And there it is - Tinto Brass the pornographer's house.

And there beside the corner window on the first floor...

The Wild Man - Homo Selvaticus.

The sculpture depicts an man whose body is covered in hair, he has a long beard, and wild, tussled hair to his shoulders. In one hand he holds a club ('for crushing women' - not animals?!), and the other ('this is terrible!'), the other is pointing to God. ('Even the wild man is pointing to God!' - Foresto is so indignant.)

Giorgio Foresto has returned twice now, both days spending a few hours at a time reading his way through the Australian Aboriginal art books held in the boxes. He is enthralled by them. And he is in no hurry, unlike the rest of the crowd.






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Update.
30 June.


Found another Wild Man / Homo Selvaticus.

The Wild Man of San Servolo Island

We found the Wild Man last night while exploring San Servolo Island with our Biennale buddies. Well, while they gave us a tour of the island. We were on San Servolo for the finale party on Osloo, one of the works of the Speech Matters (Danish pavilion) exhibition - a floating bar / radio station / public space. We will probably go back tomorrow night for a final finale. Then Finn will spend Saturday, Sunday, Monday helping to dismantle it.

Party at Osloo, the floating offshoot of the Danish pavilion, San Servolo.

25 June 2011

The Farm

Many of you have been asking about the place we rest out weary heads at night, and I agree it is high time I got to this. So here is the farm (otherwise known as rainbow garden).

A freshly ploughed field, by the main house.

Our favourite hedge/fence.

A vegetable patch.

Sonia, the frog catcher from Russia.

The party greenhouse.

Finn barbecuing small fish and aubergine. 

Plums

Finn eating fruits in the orchard.

Bitter dinner at the table just outside our kitchen door - gnocchi with chicory, butter, and parmesan, and a lemony green salad with radicchio and ricotta (my new favourite salad accompaniment).

Currently ripe in the garden

Cherries

Plums (both red and yellow varieties)

Apricots

Rockmelon

Peas

Zucchini (with flowers)

Aubergine

Cucumber

Lettuce

Basil

White onions

Potatoes

Cabbages

Cauliflower

Silverbeet

Fennel

The tomatoes are close, but not quite ready.

The figs and the grapes have a wee way to go yet.

As far as animals go, there are dogs and cats and chickens. Quite a few chickens, 12 or more, plus a rooster. Oh, and frogs of course. They retreat into the trees in the evening, pretty amazing. And also snakes. That's right, we're not safe here either. Finn got a hell of a fright walking to the bus one day - he looked down and there was a snake, slithering along the edge of the road beside him. By the time we walked back that evening it was squashed dead on the road, and that's how we've been seeing them since. (I think we're up to 5 squashed snakes now. Creepy.)

The only downside to this place is the commute - 15-20 minute walk + 30 minute bus + 30 minute boat/45 minute walk to get to work. And then the same again to get home. A bit much really, despite it being an idyllic dinner setting. So we've been doing a bit of scouting and there's the possibility we'll be moving into Venice proper in the next few days. Will keep you posted.

22 June 2011

Late night at the museum, and advice for a royal visit

Last night was Art Night in Venice. All the civic museums had free entry and were open until midnight. Well, in theory anyway. In reality many of them still closed at the normal hour.
Led by our new Biennale friends Arnell and Svesteslava, we joined a musical tour of the Museo Correr. In each gallery, as well as their being being a brief talk (in Italian) about the room and it's display, a group of musicians would play/sing/chant a piece of music composed in response to the setting.

Julian Schnabel was accompanied by a flautist and flamenco guitar, grecian marbles with Fluxus artists huffing into megaphones.
Really it dragged on a bit, but it was a pretty fun way to visit the Venice art world outside the Biennale.





In other news, the Danish Pavilion has been notified that Queen Paola of Belgium will be paying us a visit on Wednesday morning.
I will have to come to work early.
I will have to find something nice to wear.
I will have to choose something poignant to put on display.

The most royalty-related thing we have in the boxes is Thing 001412 (Respect M.E.) - a t-shirt and a belt from Missy Elliott's Adidas merchandise.

Deemed by the Danish royal family to be too similar to Queen Margrethe's own monogram. (And subsequently removed from sale in Denmark by Missy Elliott and Adidas, before any legal action was taken.)

Maybe Queen Paola of Belgium will want her monogram made into a t-shirt, it'd be pretty great.

So I've got a bit of ironing to do, and I should really paint my toenails, but any advice people out there have for royal visitations, now's the time to speak up.
I imagine I'll probably be locked out of the pavilion along with the rest of the plebs, but just in case she is visiting specifically to see the installation by her subject (Kobe being Belgian) and she requests an invocation, I should really be prepared.


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Well, she came. For all of about 5 minutes. If that.

She had an assistant to tell her about each artist's work in the pavilion, and maybe a couple of other assistants. And they were surrounded by security. And then that pack was surrounded by press. A couple of the press guys snuck through behind the shelving to get some shots through, but that was as close as any of them came to my Missy Elliott display.
The assistant doing the talking did give a brief explanation of Kobe's installation to the queen, and she even pulled out a box for a quick peek, but all from the other side of the shelving unit. So no picture moments of me invoking Missy for Queen Paola, I'm afraid.

Despite all my curtsey practice...

I just got these sneak peeks through the boxes.

That's her in the cream. Yep, pretty unexciting. And I can confirm that she did indeed keep her sunglasses on throughout.

19 June 2011

First views of Venice

During our first days in Venice - the preview days of the Biennale - instead of being out and about taking in the sights, I was inside, in the exhibition space shown below, marvelling not at marbles, but at the vast array of colourful trousers.

The outside of the Danish pavilion, looking in to my shelves.

My shelves, from just inside the door.

The display benches.

The view from my bench.

The other views from my bench.

 

    

(Red definitely dominates the trouser colour spectrum, but I've tried to show a bit of a range here.)

Alright, here goes. Time for bit of background and a bit of a description of what on earth we're doing in this amazing place.

I have a job, from 31 May to 27 November 2011, working for Kobe Matthys, in the Danish Pavilion of the Venice Biennale.

Kobe is the founder of Agency, a Brussels based collection of international 'things'.

The connection between us and Kobe was made through Biddy, who was first offered this job but passed it up, and passed it on to me.

Work for Kobe began from Melbourne at the beginning of February, researching and sourcing 'things' from Australia for the exhibition. In April that we finally found out that (some) funding had been approved for my job here and it was time to start making plans for a Venice journey.

So, this list of things, this archive that makes up Agency. 

Each box you see on the shelves contains (in theory) one object - a book, a toy, a t-shirt, a record, a bottle of perfume, etc - and one clipboard with one page of text about the intellectual property dispute in which the object has centred. For this exhibition, the focus is on the notion of authorship assuming that for an object to be art, it should be expressive of a subject's free and individual creativity. Art that doesn't fit this categorisation is refused the protection of intellectual property laws. (For example, indigenous 'traditions' deemed to be in the public domain are not protected.)

The question of the exhibition is: "How can objects be included within art practices?"

All the blurbs about the exhibition refer to me as the 'Keeper', here to facilitate between the archive and the audience. Kobe had intended for me to display items according to the conversations I had with visitors - i.e. one visitor = one box displayed specifically for them. Thankfully Kobe was here for the first few days of the exhibition period though, as we quickly deemed this method untenable. Instead, the idea now is just that I keep the displays revolving, with something on each of the 4 display benches at all times. Additionally, all the 'things' held in the boxes are depicted on a poster (visible in the background of 'The display benches' photo, above), and people can request to be shown particular boxes. Or, like before, based on conversations about the show I can select specific things for people to see.
In reality, only a handful of the boxes have finished texts, so the displays are fairly static. People are more than welcome to see into the other boxes though, and to read the case notes on which the texts will (eventually) be based.

So here I am, working Tuesday to Sunday, 12-6pm, in the Danish Pavilion, in the Giardini, in the Venice Biennale. Come visit!

Lunch with F (mozzarella and prosciutto buns) in the park outside the Egyptian Pavilion.  

The canal by said park.

14 June 2011

St. John Restaurant

Saturday 28 May 2011, London

London is so easy after LA. We can (and do) walk everywhere. Everything (the city, the buildings, the roads, the cars, the people) is of a manageable size.

In the afternoon we walk north-west, through Regent's park, to the Showroom gallery. Here we have our first in-person meeting with Kobe, the artist I'll be working for in Venice. He is full of smiles and introduces me to all his friends, putting me significantly more at ease about this whole Biennale business.

From here we retrace our steps, then it's straight on, south-east, for dinner at St. John's.

As you see below, St. John is a nose-to-tail eating establishment. 

Roast Bone Marrow & Parsley Salad

Peas in the Pod

Quite simply, a bowl of fresh sweet green peas. For balance.

Working the marrow pick

Assembly - toast, marrow, a good pinch of rough sea salt, topped with a pile of parsley salad. 

The parsley salad is vinegary and delicious, loaded with tiny capers, oniony bits (think very small white onion, or maybe the white part of a spring onion - not overpowering, even for anti-onion me), and, well, vinegar dressing, cutting right through the richness of the marrow.

Mmm, delicious.

Lamb Tongues, Butterbeans & Green Sauce

Similar in texture to beef tongue, but more subtle in flavour. Rich and deliciously buttery sauce.

Cornish Potatoes alongside Spring Greens

Lightly roasted potatoes, soft for squashing into our saucy plates.

Chard of some description, strong and crunchy in texture, still perfectly bright green, lovely and buttery.

Plenty of parsley.

Chitterlings & Radishes

Intestines of a pig, which I would like to see raw so as to properly understand what exactly we were eating.  They seemed to have been cured - in a brine, or salt - and tasted a lot like strong bacon, but with quite a different texture... Extremely rich. Nice long crunchy radishes for a fresh peppery bite. Also some tiny spinach wilted into the salty sauce.

To drink we had only one glass each - me of the house white, and Finn a pint of pale ale. Oh, and loads of water.

By the end we were both far too jet-lagged-whoozley-woo for dessert. Had we been up to it, Strawberry Eton Mess would've been our pick.

Time for a refreshing walk back to the hotel, and a long long sleep.

14 June 2011