Miguel Marcos and I took the train from Barcelona to Valencia the other day to visit collector and gallerist Ana Seratossa. It's a three hour train ride each way. It was my first time there and we were on a day trip there and back. I was able to see this fabled city after all this time, so very interesting it was to get a feel for the southern frontier of Catalunya, a disputed issue since many will identify Tarragona with this designation... but then I also hear that Valenciana is identical to Catalan, differing only in accent. I hear too that Valencia is considered to be Madrid's beach (only two hours' drive away) and that the federal government has graced the city with the means to build out the civic zone of the city with several Santiago Calatrava super-star-structures. With Catalunya voting out bullfighting and reasserting a statute that seeks more autonomy, I wonder how Valencia will fare in this dispute? As I put this question to folks around here, responses range from aggravation to shoulder shrugs.
Ana took me out to lunch and afterwards we taxi'ed about in a whirlwind tour of the city, ending up at the museum of contemporary art and meeting with painter Jos? Maria Yturralde.
Muy amable todo.
Un ciutat mol macu.
This movie is a foto stream slide show made from a sequence of casually shot fotos. I kept twitching the trigger finger along the way, so I was happy to drag and drop my way into iMovie to make a passable representation of Valencia for this post. Total length of the compilation was a little over eight minutes long, so I scrolled down my list of music to the eight minute mark and found the best match. The music is Anouar Brahem's C'est Ailleurs from the album Le Pas Du Chat Noir.
Kismet.
Posted by Dennis at July 31, 2010 1:33 AM
They say that every Valencia citizen is a fire freak, and this theory is certainly borne out by the city�s most important fiesta, the insane Las Fallas festival. Even though the festival itself lasts only around a week the preparations take place all year, so that, by the middle of March, the city is ready to turn into one vast, extremely noisy, street party. Every important square is adorned with its own Falla, a huge statue made of wood and plastic, often related to current political or social events.