SIXTY-SIXTH
DAY
PAPER,
PAPER, PAPER
November
18, 2005
We had a variety of visitors
during the week. It seems that even
people we don’t know want a close-up of Rome from the vantage point of our time
spent here. Friends of Kimberly’s
sisters from Portland, Tom and Jack, arrive while we are in Spain. Because of our communications gap it takes us
a few days to connect. Finally, we get
on the motorino and run over to the place they are staying near the Trevi
fountain. It is an adventure finding the
small alleys of Rome. As usual, I am
trying to do what all good Roman scooter drivers do, get there as fast as
possible. This means breaking every
traffic law including going the wrong way on one-way streets. As I am heading up the wrong way, a cop steps
out of the doorway and I think I am cooked, but thankfully he waves me off and
I turn around with no further intervention.
We put a business card on their apartment door and amazingly they find
it. They join us for lunch in the ghetto
and we eat at our landlady’s famous restaurant.
They are great guys and bring a fresh perspective to our difficult
week. Jack is an emergency room Doc and
Tom owns a couple of restaurants in Portland.
They buy.
Later in
the day I am picked up near the ghetto by the purported best papermaker in
Rome, Roberto Meninno. And he proves to
be so after we spend the afternoon in his studio looking at his work. It is the best small paper-making place I have
ever seen. It has excellent equipment
including a first rate Hollander beater and an electric hydraulic press that is
superb. The place is neat as a pin and
does not remind me of my studio. His
paper is good and his art too. He shows
me everything that he has ever made. An
interesting guy, half American but grew up in Italy. His degree is from the
Rhode Island School of Design and he speaks perfect English with a wonderful
Italian accent. We will do collaboration
together, I will make the paper and he will do the art. It will be scary to work with this
accomplished guy, but it must be done.
In addition, we’re planning a studio visit for the fellows at the
Academy to learn more about paper-making.
He teaches at Temple, Cornell, and a Roman art school and is very
busy. I manage to further complicate the
day by leaving my backpack at his studio.
He returns it the next day so I am not forced to try and find his
studio, which is outside the walls of Rome.
A nice guy, very intense, mid forties; he should be showing his work at
galleries. I take a couple of pieces of
paper back with me to the apartment and they are now the only adornment on our
walls.
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