Theo Chocolate Academy

Theo Chocolate located in the center of the universe is sponsoring a Chocolate Academy (pdf) where you can earn a degree in “chocolatology”. We missed the CHOC 101: The Real Thing class (the first) and picked up with the series with CHOC 102: Sinful and good for you?. Andy McShea, Theo’s CEO and head scientist was presenting. We focused on what is known and not known about the antioxidants in cacao from plant to finished product (chocolate bar) and the role of antioxidants in health and aging. In particular, we focused on epicatechin – a polyphenolic antioxidant found in plants – which is the primary antioxidant in chocolate. Everyone usually talks about theobromine as the interesting chemical in chocolate, but the catechins are where it’s at. Take away from the lesson: chocolate has a fair amount of epicatechin in it and hence antioxidant potential. There have been studies to understand how chocolate’s antioxidant properties affect health. The studies are encouraging, showing some benefit, but there are too few studies and not enough participants to really draw any definitive conclusion. For now, enjoy (dark – more epicatechin) in moderation as part of a balanced diet.

After the presentation we tasted some pre-conched and post-conched Theo chocolate as well as some special chocolate blends that were prepared for the class. In the interest of fairness some Hershey’s Special Dark and Dove were provided for comparison. The Hershey’s bar is something like 45% cacao - essentially a milk chocolate. But why does it look so dark? Because the alkali process (“dutching”) of the chocolate darkens while destroying antioxidants. Also, look at a Hershey’s label. The first ingredient is sugar by weight. Why eat a chocolate bar that has more sugar than chocolate? Finally, the Dove chocolate we sampled tasted like chocolate pudding – again, an artifact of the alkali processing. I can’t say we won’t ever eat Hershey’s or Dove products again but we’ll think twice about supporting products whose are over-processed and have ingredients not easily recognized like PGPR or TBHQ. Luckily there are very good chocolate options today, especially artisanal chocolate, that use basic, identifiable raw ingredients and care in the processing.

The Chocolate Academy is organized into four series. The classes so far (first series) are held at the “theonista” show room which used to be the old Trolleyman Pub of Redhook brewery before it moved out of Fremont. Not that the Trolleyman Pub wasn’t a treasure in a sense, just that we’ve been to Theo more than the Trolleyman – which probably tells you nothing more than we like chocolate more than beer. The presentation we attended was informally projected on a wall with some fold out chairs and miscellaneous comfy furniture to sit on. We are looking forward to this week’s class CHOC 103: Chocolate for Nerds.

Plant Identification Class

 

This evening I started a six week course (one night a week) on plant identification. The course is offered by the University of Washington Botanical Gardens. From the course description: “This course is designed for individuals who want to work on field identification skills and gain familiarity with how to use the keys in Hitchcock and Cronquist's Flora of the Pacific Northwest. Sounded pretty interesting, so here I am. 

So what is plant identification? Well, it involves using an identification key. To describe an identification key I’ll quote Botanical Primer by Joseph Arnett (2005) passed out in class:

Identification keys are the primary tools used to identify unknown plants, and most botanical keys are dichotomous. A dichotomous key is constructed of sets of paired questions, or couplets, that are like a series of forks in the road. At each fork the user has to make a choice, based on the two descriptions that are offered, and go one way or the other. Each choice leads to a set of questions until, eventually, the identity of the unknown species is reached. One great value of dichotomous keys is that they identify the particular characteristics that may be used to distinguish species or groups of species. These diagnostic traits may not always be apparent in illustrations or descriptions.

So we will be working through keys to identify plants. But first, before we can do that we need to have a grasp on some of the botanical nomenclature used in the keys. This is what most of the first class was about. To illustrate points, different plant specimens were passed out. Quite frankly it’s an alphabet soup of very interesting words like calyx, corolla, pistil, stamen, actinomorphic, zygomorphic, petioles, verticil, lenticel, and axil just to name a couple of the ones I remember off the top of my head. (These terms are described at the end of this post.) 

To aid in dealing with the nomenclature we had a couple of handouts that were good and a recommendation for the book Plant Identification Terminology: An Illustrated Glossary by Harris and Harris. I picked this book up and am pleased with it so far. 

 

Commonly used botanical nomenclature: 

• Calyx refers to the sepals of a flower. 
• Corolla refers to the petals of a flower. 
• Pistil refers to the female reproductive organ of a flower. 
• Stamen refers to the male reproductive organ of a flower. 
• Actinomorphic refers to a flower that is radially symmetric. 
• Zygomorphic refers to a flower that is bilaterally symmetric. 
• Petioles refer to the leaf stalk that attaches a leaf to a stem. 
• Verticil refers to an arrangement of similar parts (like flowers) around a central axis (like a stem).
• Lenticels are specialized corky outgrowths from the bark of twigs that are passageways for gas exchange. 
• Axil refers to the space between the petiole and stem. 

There is a diagram (redrawn and modified below) from Arnett’s primer that was especially helpful for orienting myself to what we are to study in this class: vascular plants.

Bryan Magee, The Great Philosophers

Has the sabbatical been that life-changing that we’ve turned to the Great Philosophers for guidance? (By the way, who are the Not-So-Great Philosophers?) Yes, the sabbatical has been great and larger questions are getting asked, but the real reason Travelmarx is reading this book is that the book was found by randomly browsing book stacks in the bowels of the British Institute’s library. I guess, in a way, the sabbatical is directly responsible because what other time would I be in the bowels of a 16th century palazzo in Florence browsing books?

The book The Great Philosophers by Bryan Magee is the transcript of a series of conversations that Magee, a noted British politician, author, and popularizer of philosophy, conducts with 15 contemporary (circa 1980s) writers and philosophers to chart a course through Western philosophy. The format actually works better than you might think. The conversations are well-scripted with each speaker getting ample time to develop ideas. Magee is less interviewing than conversing and he often contributes a lot to simplifying the discussion for the layperson which is something he is particularly good at. And, voilà, many of the conversations are on YouTube. Two conversations that aren’t covered in this book but are on YouTube are are TravelMarx favorites are The Philosophy of Language and The Philosophy of Science. After watching these we go to the park to watch the local dog, Giotto(*), chase his tennis ball for something easy on the brain.

Primary Sources vs. Secondary Sources

One thing that has been nagging at me during this brief (2+ month) study of Renaissance art and culture in Florence is that I don’t consult many primary sources. I tend to, rather, use a lot of secondary sources. Okay, given that I’m not intending to be a scholar in this field maybe it isn’t that important, but the question remains of how to balance the use of primary sources with secondary sources. (For more on sources, read here.) I was even chided by a librarian at the British Institute when I checked in a philosophy book (The Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics by E. Zeller *) and glibly declared, I only read the introduction, not the actual writings (the primary sources). 

A primary source is a work produced during the period you are studying. For example, reading Dante’s Divine Comedy itself would qualify as using a primary source. A secondary source is an interpretation or analysis of a primary source. For example, reading the Wikipedia page about the Divine Comedy would qualify as a using a secondary source. The challenge is that with the “way” information is available to us today reading secondary sources is very easy, addictive (think Amazon book reviews), and a huge time saver. But when does it not help? 

I was of the mind that primary sources are hard to find, especially on the Internet, but this really isn’t true. There are a number of sites like the Gutenberg or Internet Archive that have texts available. The rest you can find easily at a library. (Gutenberg even has texts read aloud. I have On the Origin of Species as an mp3 on my phone – for long train or airplane rides – fantastic!) 

So, I tried the Divine Comedy (written between 1308 and 1321) and got through several pages before I yawned, and wondered if anyone created a nice image showing Dante’s concept. Then I searched and found Paul Laffoley’s vision of hell, purgatory, and heaven. I spent more time reading about this artist than I did reading the Divine Comedy. So the problem is me. 

My next attempt was with a small book called Oration on the Dignity of Man by Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, written in 1487. This speech is considered a key text of Renaissance humanism. This time, I was successful. I finished the 70 or so pages and I think reading it was better than reading about it – though there wasn’t a Wikipedia page on it, honestly, I checked. 

Cleopatra at the British Institute

 

The British Institute puts on different cultural events that are open to the public. I happen to catch the Thursday April 24th event Cleopatra – Exploration to Performance, An Actress’ Process by Bari Hochwald from the Florence International Theatre Company. The event was part of Shakespeare Week 2008 at the Institute. It was an interesting one hour overview of how the speaker studied Shakespeare’s play and constructed for herself the character of Cleopatra. The speaker pointed to various passages that gave insight into what kind of person Cleopatra might be. In particular, we spent some time looking at the very last lines of Cleopatra before she applies the asp to herself. ‘With thy sharp teeth this knot intrinsicate of life at once untie…’

Dawn of the Renaissance Course

I just started the four week course Dawn of the Renaissance at the British Institute in Florence. I have already taken the four week course The High Italian Renaissance and the two week course The Medici: Power and Art of a Renaissance Dynasty. I think there will be some overlap of what I’ve learned already but I will use it to review and go deeper. For every two hours of class or tour, it takes me as long, if not longer, to retype the notes, add images, and add my own interesting tidbits. Along the way, there are thousands of little-side-streets-of-trivia to get lost in. For example, today I was reviewing some notes on the Medici and ended up on the Wikipedia page for Horror vacui. How did that happen? See this post.

Here is a sample program for The High Renaissance course that has past. Note, times and places probably change every time the course is offered (several times a year) so only use this to get an idea of the pacing.

Medicis 1420 - 1520

As part of my research for the British Institute course: The Medici: Power and the Art of a Renaissance Dynasty that I’m taking, I created this graphic to try and see if a visualization of the first family of Florence can be summarized neatly. It helps, but don’t think it quite captures everything. Oh well, it was fun trying. (This graphic was created in Powerpoint.)

San Lorenzo Medici Tombs

The Medici are buried all over the San Lorenzo complex. Unfortunately you can’t buy one ticket and see them all. The church and Old Sacristy are one ticket and the Chapel of the Princes and the New Sacristy are another ticket. You must leave the church and walk around to the Chapel of Princes entrance. The Old Sacristy is Brunelleschi’s doing and the New Sacristy is Michelangelo’s doing (or at least partial doing since he never quite finished). The diagram below was created in, gulp, Powerpoint. I’m experimenting with different ways of presenting the information. I think the information is correct as far as I know. I’m doing this as part of my research for the British Institute course: The Medici: Power and the Art of a Renaissance Dynasty.

Vitruvian Man

 

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio was a Roman writer, architect, and engineer who lived in the 1st century BC. His treatise on architecture, De architectura, gave all sorts of useful advice for planning, designing and building structures big and small. It is the only known written source of classical architecture of that time. As was common in the Renaissance, old Greek and Roman written works were revisited with fresh eyes. 

De architectura was an important inspiration for none other than our favorite Renaissance man, Leonardo da Vinci (1452 – 1519) De architectura is split into ten “books” with each book broken into chapters. Book III is about symmetries you can use when building temples. Chapter 1 of Book III is “On Symmetry: In Temples and in the Human Body.” It is from this part that Leonardo da Vinci got the dimensions for his famous Vitruvian man drawing. I always thought that Leonardo developed the dimensions himself. No worries, he still was a genius artist-engineer. Here is the text from Vitruvius: 

  

“For the human body is so designed by nature that the face, from the chin to the top of the forehead and the lowest roots of the hair, is a tenth part of the whole height; the open hand from the wrist to the tip of the middle finger is just the same; the head from the chin to the crown is an eighth, and with the neck and shoulder from the top of the breast to the lowest roots of the hair is a sixth; from the middle of the breast to the summit of the crown is a fourth. If we take the height of the face itself, the distance from the bottom of the chin to the under side of the nostrils is one third of it; the nose from the under side of the nostrils to a line between the eyebrows is the same; from there to the lowest roots of the hair is also a third, comprising the forehead. The length of the foot is one sixth of the height of the body; of the forearm, one fourth; and the breadth of the breast is also one fourth. The other members, too, have their own symmetrical proportions, and it was by employing them that the famous painters and sculptors of antiquity attained to great and endless renown.” [Project Guttenberg] 

In the diagram with this post is my attempt to show the dimensions. I started without looking at Leonardo’s diagram and got close but decided to just overlay measurements (crudely) on his diagram.

Some Texts I Am Using in the Renaissance History Course

So far (beside many Internet sites, okay, mostly Wikipedia), I’ve used the four books below. The first two I bought and the second two I borrowed. By the way, PaperBack Exchange is the place to go in Florence for these types of text books – forget Edison or Seeber stores.


The History of Italian Renaissance Art is a pleasure to read and is loaded with pictures. Painting, sculpture, and architecture are covered. (The front cover? Orvieto duomo facade.) The book was originally published in the 1960s and has gone through several editions, adding an author along the way. The original author, Frederick Hartt, organized the book using the biographical approach which means artists’ lives and works are discussed, more or less, individually. It’s an interesting approach that makes the reading more intimate and accessible. The book focuses mainly on Florence, Rome, Siena, and Venice. If I had to buy one book, so far it would be this one.



The biographical approach to art history had its biggest advocate in Giorgio Vasari and his influential 1550 book The Lives of the Artists. To this day this book continues to be an important source of information about and introduction to Renaissance artists (mostly Tuscan). Each chapter is based on a particular author, with chatty, sometimes humorous and sometimes inaccurate stories. For me, it’s not a particularly interesting read though everyone raves about it. Maybe it will become interesting the deeper I delve into this subject?


The book Wealth and Demand for Art in Italy, 1300-1600 is a recommended text for the course. On first glance, it seems dry, after all no art works are actually discussed. But on subsequent inspections, it opens up and tells you a lot about what life was like leading up to and during the Renaissance. It presents the kind of information that other art books don’t cover. For example, page 67 (1993 edition):

"The timing of the Renaissance as a consumer phenomenon was very much a function of the political situation – the emergence of strong oligarchical and despotic governments in the towns, ending the secular instability of communal factionalism; the success of the popes in establishing an independent state in central Italy and transforming Rome into a European capital; the general, if percarious, stabilization of the political scene in the mid-fiftenteenth century; and the overwhelming presence of Spain in the sixteenth century, freezing the political system throughout the peninsula into a permanent stability as well as transforming Naples into a significant new market and giving yet another infusion of wealth to Italian interests."

Interesting, huh? Seriously, I like this book.


The last book,
The Scientific Renaissance: 1450 – 1630, was not part of the recommended reading, but I was interested to know if there was a scientific renaissance (yes there was) and who were the key players. This book at times is hard to read, but if you stick with it you get a good sense of some of the scientific work in this period. In particular, the author spends a chunk of time talking about Copernicus and the Copernican Revolution: “the paradigm shift away from the Ptolemaic model of the heavens, which places Earth at the center of the Universe.”[1] After reading this book I came away with the notion that Copernicus wasn’t out so much to topple the old paradigm just to do so, but more that he was really trying to solve a practical problem of the day which was that of calendar reform. (For example, the church had a hard time figuring out where to place Easter.) The Ptolemaic model of spheres within spheres was too inaccurate for keeping precise calendars and astronomical events so, another method was needed. So inaccurate was the old model that even astrologers were complaining! Copernicus’ book De revolutionibus orbium coelestium 1543 laid out the new system of the heavens and a new way to calculate astronomical events. While by far not perfect, it started the slow wheel of change and opened the door for subsequent astronomers to fine tune the model.

British Institute Art History Course

I finished week one of a four week course on the High Renaissance at the British Institute in Florence. (That's why the posts have dwindled....sorry 3.75 readers.) So far I love the course. I’ve never taken an art history course so I do not have anything to compare it to, but the lectures and tour we had so far were great. The lectures take about 1.5 to 2 hours. The tours take about the same time or longer. There is a lecture or tour every day of the four week course.

A perk of taking any course at the Institute is membership into the library located on the south side of the Arno River. The library has a nice view out onto the Arno, looking north. The library has all the features you’d expect to be at a modern library, just at a slightly smaller scale: places to study, media (CD, DVD, and tapes), book check-outs, a small periodicals reading area, knowledgeable librarians, computers, WIFI, etc. If you are not taking courses at the Institute, then you can still join the library for a period of time for a reasonable fee.

Mosaic Project Two Completed

 

Finished the second project at the mosaic studio. I’m more pleased with this effort. It still has a way to go to be more naturalistic, but there is always the next project….

Stone Flower II

I’m still working on the stone flower (part 1) in my mosaic class. I’m changing the design as I go which is not good, but it is a learning experience. The maestro doesn’t like the “unnatural” looking center (a hexagon). So I’ll change that. It will take 3 or so lessons in January to complete.

In the photo above, the stem is missing. The piece is taking long because the background is one piece of stone and I had to remove the parts for the flower and the leaves. To do this I used a bent branch of a chestnut tree with a wire strung between the two ends (the maestro makes these). Sort of a like a bow. I cut of the form applying little bits of grit to help chew through the stone.

Chalcedony Bianca

Five of us (Mark and I, two other students, and the maestro) crammed into the maestro’s small car and headed south looking for something called “chalcedony bianca”, a type of chalcedony that is, you guessed it, white, and very nice to have when you need a nice white for pietre dure. We exited the main road near Poggibonsi and started searching the back roads. How did we know what to look for? We were guided only by the maestro’s memory from several years ago of a straight road and a restaurant. That’s it. No town or road name. So we searched.

After a while we were going in circles and nothing was making sense, though the country side was stunning to look at. We stopped at a marble manufacturer that happened to be along a road we were travelling and we started picking through a pile of leftovers. No invitation, just routing around. That’s how it goes. We found some pieces and loaded them in the trunk. Then a lady (with a mop, always a mop - and I say that in the most positive sense because a mop in Italy has a much different meaning than a mop in the US - in Italy mops are proud) came out of the building and said okay. Then her husband came and pretty soon we were all in the office as directions were being given to some secret location of chalcedony bianca. It was better than a lesson at school because the Italian was fast and furious and even the Italians didn’t understand each other. We kept trying to leave and then one conversation or another would start up. Mark and I talked to the lady who showed us her son’s work (lo scalpellino) and she talked about her plants (there was a small greenhouse and really interesting plants scattered around).

We got back on the road and after another hour we still didn’t find anything. Everyone was giggling, the maestro kept talking about the mysterious restaurant, and the sun was beginning to fade. Then, suddenly we were on a straight road and lo and behold a restaurant appeared, we took a left on a dirt road, gunned it through some mud patches and viola destination achieved. (Always trust the intuition of the maestro.) It was dark but we were able to pick up some pieces.

Tech geeks that we are, we had our Garmin Nuvi and saved the coordinates. Sorry, can’t share the coordinates because that is the maestro’s secret.

Stone Flower (Sister of Stone Lemon)

I started another couple of weeks in Florentine mosaic class. My new capolavoro is a little more complicated – less of jigsaw puzzle for a 3 year old and more like one for a 5 year old. It’s a flower – not particularly realistic, more my own fantasy. So far I’m all thumbs trying to assemble the petals. In the photo you can see I’m trying to fit in the last petal. The flower will be surrounded by black, I hope. When the maestro complements the work he uses "bellina" or cute. But I want stunning!

All Ears

They changed the schedule of our classes (as we head into our last two weeks at Centro Machiavelli). We have grammar in the afternoon instead of the morning. So now our mornings are free. We think it will be nice because a number of museums are open in the morning and close early in the afternoon and we had not been able to visit them. But no museums today -instead we headed to the San Lorenzo market (which is a morning affair as well 7am – 2pm) and did some shopping. Okay, Mark shopped and I mostly watched. One photo shows a guy cleaning some calamari that we bought. It was only a couple of bucks for fresh calamari and mussels. The other photo shows some pig parts (orecchie – ears, testa – head, fegato – liver).

Italian Brain Teaser (Rompicapo)

Today in conversation class we played a game where we were given a “situation” which we explained to the rest of the class (there was only 5 in the class today) and they had to guess what the “solution” was. Basically a brain teaser, called a rompicapo in Italian. The purpose was for people to ask questions that could lead them to the correct solution.

Situazione: “Una persona abita al 15° piano di un grattacielo. In genere per salire prende l’ascensore fino al 10° piano e gli ultimi 5 piani li fa a piedi. Per scendere, invece, prende l’ascensore fino al pianoterreno.”

Soluzione: “La persona è un bambino che ancora non arriva a premere il bottone del 15° piano.”

The Start of Another Capolavoro

Started on another mosaic (stone) project. Not very realistic, sort of a fantasy design. It’s a bit more complicated than my first design, with more pieces and a more complicated assembly (for me at least). In the photo above I’m looking for pieces of yellow calcedonia to use for the petals. You can see a little cup of hot chocolate that I picked up at Vestri. Vestri is on my way to the studio so I can’t resist stopping by for something. It is my favorite chocolate place in Florence, so far. (I bought a chocolate bar from the famous Rivoire and it was waxy. Yuck.)

Qui Italia

We use the textbook “Qui Italia: 1. Lingua e grammatica” every so often in conversation class. My only nit is that it’s a big, heavy book for what it contains. It’s sort of like a magazine format, lots of pictures and space on the pages. I bought it tonight so I’ll see how it works.

Electronic Translator

Almost all the Japanese students that have been in our classes have this translation device (or something very similar): Casio DataPlus.It is a lot quicker than searching through a dictionary, but, I think it takes away from just listening. For example, the dictionary is hard enough (time consuming) to use, that, you can’t look up every word while the teacher is talking in Italian. Hence you concentrate on context or ask questions which is better. Most Japanese, with these devices, can look words up quickly and thus do so and don’t listen as much – it seems. Offline, I’m betting the device is pretty handy – similar to the way we use http://www.wordreference.com/.