Saturday, 20 January 2024: I’ve always been impressed by the residential architecture in central Valencia, most of it built in the 18th and 19th centuries. (I think.) Especially the way many are decorated with plaster bas reliefs and ornate wrought ironwork.
I noticed the bas reliefs on a building over in Eixample the other day and photographed them. It’s an affluent neighbourhood, and I assumed the level of decoration was a function of the wealth of the barrio. But no. Once you’ve noticed one ornately decorated building front, you start noticing them everywhere, including in our neighbourhood, which was traditionally a working-class and lower middle-class area. (Ruzafa has gone way up market just since we started coming to Valencia.) Here are two within a few blocks of us, both at least as ornate as the one in Eixample. (If you want to see the decorations, click on the picture to enlarge it.)
The stuff built this century and the latter half of the last are, of course, mostly just as boring and utilitarian as the modern architecture in other big western cities. But in the older neighbourhoods like Ruzafa and Eixample, looking up is often a small delight.
I ran today, down to the river and along it to the centre. I came up near the Alameda tube stop, and jogged back a way to Carrer de Ciril Amorós. It’s one of my favourite streets. Since it runs right through the heart of affluent Eixample, I was surprised to learn that it was named for an early 20th century Valencia-born footballer. The street is lined with posh shops - including the ones we call abuela shops: expensive kids’ clothing stores where we imagine the neighbourhood’s rich grannies shop - and equally posh-looking apartment buildings. I was looking for a cross street and a bookshop on it with the unlikely name of Railowsky - the bookshop, that is.
After writing about the Pierre Gonnord book I’d seen at the library the other day, I went looking for it online. I was disappointed to find that it was ‘temporarily unavailable’ at Amazon in the UK and in Canada and out of stock at Chapters-Indigo too. The list price in Canada, when it was available, was $80, which put even more of a damper on things. Abe Books, an online second-hand seller, didn’t have it either. Then I found it at a Spanish online seller, on sale for €19.90 (about $30). Whoop! Trouble is, it would have cost extra to have it shipped, and receiving a package here would be complicated for us given our incompetence with both the Spanish language and our intercom system. On the off-chance, though, I checked the company’s location and found they had a shop right here in Valencia, not that far from us.
Later the same day: I went out again for my now almost routine late afternoon solo ramble. Karen is nursing her bad knee and quite involved in her painting and stitching right now, so doesn’t want to come. Plus, the weather wasn’t great, though at least it was dry today.
I headed for the historic centre, as always. It’s clear the golden age of Valencian street art is over, as I wrote last time, but I thought I’d try to document the decline. This first one is an example of the ambitious massive-scale murals that I’ve enjoyed photographing in the past. But it and others on this three-storey-high wall were made in the mid- to late-teens and are starting to look their age, with paint flaking and bubbling on some. It was made by a competent artist and has a sort of mysteriousness about it that I’ve always liked. But note the way some no-talent tagger has encroached on it. There seems to be some respect for classic murals like this one, but not a lot. It didn't stop this tagger from partly covering it.
The next one is another favourite from a few years ago. But as in the first example, it’s now starting to look a bit decrepit. And the taggers and scribblers have cluttered the wall around it with their unimaginative kilroy-was-here scratchings.
This one is like a lot of the newer stuff I’ve seen this year, not that there’s that much about. It’s smaller and, to my eye, lacking in subtlety or wit - kind of cartoonish.
And then, here are three that give me some hope. They’re still much smaller than the big murals of the past, but they at least have some originality and a sense of design.
I also like the streetscapes in Carmen. The first is just around the corner from Plaça del Tossal, a very lively square with a bunch of restaurants and bars. It’s a bit touristy but has a young hipster vibe about it. The picture was taken in Pl. de Sant Jaume, looking down two forking streets that go deep into the less touristy parts of Carmen. The second is a cul-de-sac with flats on one side and a series of murals - now old - on the other. I always forget it’s a cul-de-sac, walk down to the end and mentally slap my forehead.
It’s also hard for me not to photograph the mediaeval towers, the remnants of the wall that once went all the way around the old city. This one is Torre del Quart. It was built between 1441 and 1460. The pock marks in the stonework are from shelling by Napoleon’s troops in a successful siege that lasted from 3 November 1811 to 9 January 1812.
The other neighbourhood I like in the old city is the network of streets just to the east of the Central Market and Silk Exchange - don’t know what it’s called. I love the streetscapes here, with the pastel buildings and their overlapping planes. The walking woman who appeared unexpectedly from around the corner just as I shot was a gift.
Sunday, 21 January 2024: The weather is getting back to normal, though it was still unseasonably cool for my fast walk down to the river and back this morning. The Weather Channel said it was only 4C when I went out, but it didn’t feel anything like that cool. The pixel boards said it was 12C or higher. The sun was shining again.
Later in the morning, I went out, alone again, to a free concert at MuVIM, the Museum of Illustration and Modernity (don’t ask why those two things go together, I don’t know). It’s the museum we visited the other day when the cleaner was here. Karen didn’t come because she doesn’t do classical music. The concert was by a group called the Covent Garden Soloists, which is made up of players from various orchestras in England, though none of them, seemingly, is actually English. The director and one of the soloists are Hispanic - the reason, perhaps, that they were appearing here - and the rest appear to be Russian. The music was a kind of baroque sampler, with excerpts from various works by big-name composers of the era: Handel, Vivaldi, Bach, Telemann, Albinoni.
There was a long line of mostly older folk snaking around the building waiting to be let in, which I joined. Ten minutes later the queue started moving. When we finally got downstairs to the room where the concert was happening, I suddenly noticed that everyone ahead of me was proffering tickets. The concert was free, but apparently you needed to ask for a ticket at the front counter on the ground floor. It was a way to limit entry to just the number of seats available. I shrugged and looked puzzled when I came to the ticket taker. “No entry without a ticket,” she said. Then she pointed to the side, indicating I should wait. A couple of minutes later, a man already inside - either one of the organisers or another patron - stretched out his hand and passed me a ticket. I had to sit near the back, but it was on the centre aisle, so I could see the players when they finally appeared.
The important thing was, I was in! I wouldn’t have wanted to miss this concert. It was superb. These are really world-class players. They play a vigorous, muscular style of baroque music. Two violins, viola, cello, double bass, continuo and a trumpet soloist for some of the pieces. I think you’d call it a chamber orchestra. It filled the room with ease. The audience response was rapturous, two or three standing ovations at the end. The band played one of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons concertos, complete, for its encore, the final Scherzo movement at break-neck speed. Not your grandmother’s Vivaldi.
Later the same day: Karen and I went for a walk over to Central Park, a few blocks away. By this time of day, the sun is long gone from our tiny balcony, but it’s more open at the park with no tall buildings to block the sun. Being Sunday, the place was hopping. Lots of families, kids racing around. In one of the renovated railway buildings, there was some kind of ethnic festival going on. Lots of Africa-looking people, a flag outside that looked vaguely familiar. Turns out, it’s the Pan-African colours. Loud music came from inside and it looked like there were booths set up, possibly offering food.
We walked on a little further and found a bench in the sun and settled. I went for a wander at one point but came back and sat down again to read. I’ve started a brave article in the latest Harper’s by Bernard Avishai, an Israeli-Canadian journalist. It’s entitled “Israel’s War Within: On the Ruinous History of Religious Zionism.” Not that I didn’t know it already, but it’s heartening to have confirmed that many Israelis dislike the country’s religious right and sympathise with their Palestinian neighbours - if not their jihadist government - as much as I do.
We stayed for almost an hour. Members of an American-style marching band sitting not far away by one of the fountains were noodling on their xylophones and pounding on drums. Eventually, it got a little irritating. African children ran up and down the watercourse that flowed by our bench. They were having a grand time, playing with the water and watching things float along on it. When the sun finally deserted our bench, we got up and walked for a bit, then headed home.
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