I’m so excited to invite you to the Sistine Chapel this summer — in Denver! Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel Exhibition, an exhibit of larger-than-life photographs of Michelangelo’s frescoes, is currently on view at The Stanley Marketplace. And they have invited me to give a series of talks about Michelangelo in the exhibit space.

I am giving two talks — one geared toward children and families and the other for an older audience. And both talks will happen twice!

At both events I will share the story of how Michelangelo came to paint a ceiling when he didn’t consider himself a painter at all. I’ll show you the stories and the evolution of his storytelling as he painted his way across the ceiling. And we will have a chance to examine the photographs in rich detail.

So if you happen to be in the Denver area, I hope you’ll join me as we explore the beauty of Michelangelo’s masterpiece up closer than we could ever be in Rome!

Details on each presentation are below. Tickets can be purchased at The Stanley Marketplace.

See you there!
Angela

Headed to the beach or pool this summer? What's your best beachy packing solution?

My favorite tip: an easy solution for drying swimsuits.

I keep a set of shower curtain hooks in my travel toiletries. So many places in beachy destinations don't have good places to hang swimming suits up to dry. But a set of shower curtain hooks turns any shower curtain rod, towel bar, or balcony railing into a simple clothes line. Mine are metal, but the plastic ones would be even better in some situations, frankly. And we use them all the time! They will keep clothes from blowing away when hung out on a balcony, too!

I've had my set for years! They were very handy in Belize, and I'm sure I'll be using them again soon!

Pin it!

Imagine a vehicle the size of a shopping mall carrying 3,000 people moving through your historic neighborhood. If you lived in Venice, this would be your daily reality. Now imagine that vehicle is out of control…

I was going through some of my photos of Venice the other day, and I was shocked when I looked at this photo that I took a few years ago. That is the MSC Opera — the same ship involved in the accident last week in Venice. We were on the vaporetto, and the cruise ship was being towed through the canal. We were shocked by the scale — this enormous ship that dwarfed everything around it. And my husband and I had a conversation at the time about how much energy, time, and space it would take to stop something that huge... last week’s accident wasn’t the first. It won’t be the last unless something radically changes. 

You may have heard about the controversy over allowing cruise ships in Venice. This is a serious problem for one of the most unique cities in the world. Venice is a city sitting in a lagoon, and it has a delicate ecosystem. Cruise ships bring with them three big problems (and a host of smaller ones).

1. They are so huge that the wake they create is damaging centuries-old buildings across the city.

2. They produce enormous amounts of pollution and environmental waste.

3. And they bring thousands of people into the city for very short periods of time which overwhelms certain parts of Venice.

I have never spoken to a Venetian who favors cruise ships in Venice. Never.

After the accident with the MSC Opera in June, 2019, there were enormous protests in the city with protestors begging the government to ban the cruise ships. These are people who make a living from tourists and tourism. They know that even without cruise ships, Venice will survive. And frankly, Venice would be a more pleasant place for all visitors without the cruise ships.

So if you are taking a Mediterranean cruise, I hope you will consider one that does not visit Venice. There are many other amazing ways to visit this beautiful city. Contact me! I’ll help you plan a wonderful trip! And Venice deserves more than a few hours’ visit, anyway. So come to Venice — just visit by vaporetto, not cruise ship.

In the meantime, check out my Instagram feed and be sure to subscribe. You’ll find all kinds of interesting and beautiful photographs almost every day.

Ciao!
A

@PiningforRome

As an alumna of Highland Park High School, an author, and a former AP English teacher, finding reports in my Facebook feed that HPISD allowed the shrieks of unhappy parents to undermine the integrity of the HPHS’ English Department curriculum is disturbing.

None of the books in question -- when read in their entirety -- are inappropriate for high school students. Sacrificing quality literature in this seemingly minor quibble signals a dissolution in the academic standards that HPISD touts so proudly. No educational institution committed to “an unyielding commitment to excellence” which brags that it will “empower each student to become an eager lifelong learner” then censors that student’s literary experience.

No. HPISD kotowed to a group of parents squeamish about the truth that their children are growing up. Are these same parents limiting their teen’s access to the ubiquitous music that promotes misogyny? Do they limit their kids to G-rated movies? Have they removed The Song of Solomon from their family Bibles? Do they allow their children to look at the works of Picasso or Matisse or Michelangelo?

These are parenting issues not educational ones, to be sure, but the students at HPHS are sheltered and privileged. These privileges afford them powers of which they are not even aware because they have no contact with the powerless in their daily lives. They do not step over the homeless sleeping in doorways on their way to school. They do not depend on free meals at school to fill their empty bellies. They do not even consider the inherent power that their race, their gender, their socioeconomic status afford them -- because they do not need to. And if they never encounter books like The Song of Solomon or The Working Poor, they may never develop that which is most important in growing a whole and decent human being: empathy.

Many of the parents at the center and on the fringes of this screaming match were my classmates at HPHS. Some of them were even in my AP English classes. When I went off to a prestigious liberal arts college, I was fantastically prepared for school -- as my classmates were, I am sure. But I quickly realized one thing: my high school reading curriculum was composed almost exclusively of dead white guys -- with a few dead white girls thrown in for good measure. I had never read Toni Morrison. I had never read Edwidge Danticat. I had never read Booker T. Washington or Sherman Alexie or Pablo Neruda. And I was the poorer for it. Had those parents digested both Shakespeare and Siddhartha within the halls of High Park High, the school we love so dear, they might be more empathetic, more sophisticated, and more judicious in wielding their tremendous power -- in this context and beyond.

Books are powerful tools -- especially books that shine a light on lives and experiences that people might not ever have otherwise. I have had many powerful conversations with my students launched from the pages of books and the sometimes-controversial material we would cover. There is a limit. I agree. And we must always remember that high school students are not adults -- they are in that murky, shadowland between childhood and adulthood, straining to be grown and yet longing for the comfort of youth, too.

The more we talk about their adult experiences in open, honest, and loving ways, the better they can navigate those experiences. And trust me, they are having those adult experiences whether we want them to have them or not. Indeed, the lyrics of popular songs, the subject matter of blockbuster films, the online content at their fingertips, and the tenets of highly-rated television shows are much more disturbing than any of the books on the “suspended” list.

But there is something far more insidious going on here. HPISD’s actions tip the balance of power in favor of the parents in what has become a battleground: the classroom as consumer marketplace. This isn’t isolated in HPISD. From sea to shining sea financially-empowered parents have declared themselves educational expert, judge, and arbiter in disputes ranging from grading practices and disciplinary measures to college placement practices and curriculum. But being a doctor or an attorney or a nuclear physicist or a former high school student in no way equates to being a professional educator. Parents may have opinions, but teachers are trained to make decisions for students for which parents are ill-equipped.

So, I am calling upon you, Dr. Orr and the School Board, to trust the professionals you have hired -- your English department. They are competent, intelligent, highly-skilled educators who, in this case, know better than the parents, what is best for the young people of HPHS. Their book choices show a keen understanding of their student body and a desire to expose their students to a range of voices and a diversity of perspectives. And their job is to educate the next generation of a republic deeply divided. Trust your teachers to do their job.

Yours,

Angela K. Nickerson