My Italian Sketchbook

Rating:
Summary: The Wonders Of Italy Gloriously Portrayed In Watercolors!
Review: Florine Asch allows us to accompany her on a Grand Tour of Italy. She takes us along, at a leisurely pace, that does recall a time when travel was more about the journey than the destination. Dominique Fernandez, who writes the Introduction to "My Italian Sketchbook," tells us that "tourist" originally meant, "one who travels, not to arrive, but aimlessly, as the servant of beauty."

Ms. Asch's attachment to Italy is palpable in her glorious sketches, all executed in watercolor. Her elegant sketches, 100 of them, depict the known sites, and the scenes that are rarely seen by the hurried tourist. She captures a sunset view of Saint Peter's in Rome, the beauty of Lake Como, a Tuscan landscape, the medieval majesty of Sienna, the Renaissance glory of Firenze, the Duomo in Milan, a studio filled with Greek plaster figures, a horse and buggy by Rome's Trevi Fountain, the carnival in Venice, street scenes in Naples, a Sicilian piazza, and marketplace.

Florine Asch uniquely portrays the ordinary and extraordinary vistas, and views, of Italy. My tourist photographs never looked like this. A wonderful book to keep as a remembrance, or to give as a gift. Anyone who loves all things Italian, will love this book. I certainly do!