Travelogue 2019 – The Italian Diaries

Type: Travel sketches

Year: Fall 2019

Project location: Italy

Artist: Rita John 

This architectural drawing series traces 11 weeks of travel across Italy  as part of the University of Virginia’s Venice Program under the instruction of Prof. Charles Menefee. Over 3 months and in two travel sketchbooks, numerous scenes were captured in Venice, Murano, Torcello, Ravenna, Verona, Bressanone, the Veneto region, Vicenza, Naples, Pompeii, Rome, Tivoli, Bologna, Florence, Fiesole and Milan. The weekly compilation tracks an evolution in drawing style, media and complexity of detail. Using the basic human faculties of the eye, the hand and the feet, and simple drawing tools of pen/pencil and paper – methods of filtering visual information were honed to create this concrete record of every place travelled to. Delayering material systems, identifying spatial patterns and documenting urban conditions within deeply historical settings were themes explored – not with the conventional intention of creating images to communicate, but rather as a way of full immersion into what is observed through the act of drawing.

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