Tourists at home

We spent this weekend (besides cleaning the flat) being tourists in Sevilla. 
Friday night, while Elias wandered Sevilla quedando with his school class, Ingrid and I had a great date for tapas at the old Las Golondrinas (we've gone to the new one next door a couple times, but this was our first time in the original).  Same great food, older (and beautiful and busy) atmosphere.

Saturday afternoon we walked up the river to the Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporaneo, which was a remodeled monestery (Cartujo), remodeled military site, remodeled pottery factory, and finally, remodeled as an art museum in the 1990s.  The building itself is wonderful, including the chimneys remaining from the days as a pottery factory.   We bike/skate past it every time we go to the EBD, but hadn't taken the time to do more than peak in before.

The displays were really interesting, mostly based around videos.  Some work focused on 1950s French short films by Alain Resnais were great, including one of the National Library in Paris and another on Picasso's Guernica.  Elias was really taken by films from the Occupy movement in various countries by Oliver Ressler, showing footage inside political street protests.  This sparked a great discussion on the way home about protest, civil disobedience, personal responsibility for disobedience, and the difficulties in intervention by powerful countries in problems of smaller countries.  Art at its best to get you thinking. 

Ingrid, Eli, and Christopher C.

Sunday we ¡finally! went to the Catedral de Sevilla and the Giralda, the towering symbol of Sevilla.  The Cathedral dates to the 14th century, claim to the be 3rd largest in the world, and houses tremendous art and, among many others, the mausoleum of Christopher Columbus (Cristóbal Colón). 



The gothic ornamentation everywhere was over the top. 

Besides lots of Virgins, gory Jesuses, and even the severed head of John the Baptist, there was some quite impressive art. 






The view from the top of the Giralda (originally a minaret before the fall of Sevilla to the Christians), across all of Sevilla was spectacular.  We picked an unusually warm and sunny day for the season and were well rewarded with the views.