Piazza del Duomo in "Inferno by Dan Brown"

I am in the midst of reading "Inferno" by Dan Brown. In Chapter 53, his adventures reached the Piazza del Duomo. I recalled the photos I took when I was there in May. What struck me was how little I knew from the trip compared to what was written in the book. Trips nowadays are just the "Been There, Seen That" kind of affair. The Piazza had 3 main structures. The Giotto Bell Tower (tall building on the right) described in the book as 300 ft tall with more than 20,000 pounds of bells in the belfry. The Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore (middle building including the red dome) had a ceiling fresco The Last Judgement and the dome was the biggest at that time. The octagonal building (to the left) was the Florence Baptistery where in the novel the Dante's Death Mask had been hidden; that Robert Langdon was searching Venice for.

All I saw during the trip were the exterior facades; no doubt very beautiful, but how much did I missed?

The main feature at the Baptistery was the East Doors (bronze doors) with the ten panels by Lorenzo Ghiberti. The doors took him 27 years to complete. It was said that Michelangelo commented they were so good they should be the Gates to Paradise. I did take some photos of the panels. As pointed out in the novel, the doors were actually a copy put up in 1990 so that the original doors could be treated for preservation. In the novel, the inside of the Baptistry was described in detail. Again I missed a lot; the ceiling had scenes from the Bible, constructed from small mosaic tiles, depicting Heaven and Hell.

The Golden 50 Art Carnival - Kota Kinabalu

This year, in Sabah, many events will have "50" in their title. Sabah got its Independence from the British on 31 August 1963 and jointly formed Malaysia, on 16 September 1963, with Sarawak, Singapore (they left subsequently) and The Federation of Malaya. Today and tomorrow, an Art Carnival is being held at the Sabah Arts Gallery.

The events and the map to the Art Gallery from the brochure. The Gallery was actually behind the State Achive and The National Archive (Sabah Branch).

As I turned into the road beside the State Archive, I saw a lot of cars parked beside the road ...

... even beside the main road! I was pretty surprised that the attendance at the Art Carnival would be so good.

But they were actually the cars belonging to the participants at the Launching of the "Want To Be Healthy Campaign". This was being held at the park just beside the main road.

The Minister was giving his speech in the sun...

... while the participants were preserving their health under the shade.

So I continued to the "artsy" building that was the Sabah Art Gallery.

Various booths were set up in front of the Gallery entrance ...

... the calligraphy fella was there ...

... the world's smelliest flower was there, beside the world's sexiest flower ...

... and a very useful dinner dress.

Since I was there, I visited the Art Gallery itself.

It was a very nice building; 3-storey, airy, ...

... very nice curving staircase ...

... with natural lighting from a skylight.

Entry was free during these two days of the carnival; normal fee is RM3 (Malaysian adult).

There were more than just paintings; this one by Maduni Majidin ...

... and one by Christianne Goonting.

There were even some fabrics.

Of the paintings, some caught my eye (I don't claim to be anything artistic). One by Muslim Mattajim.

This one by Datuk George Chin.

Waterfall by Adrian Ho.

A Tina Rimmer.

There will of course be paintings of Mt Kinabalu. This one by Benedict Chong.

A more modernistic acrylic by Tan Sheau Ling.

A very nice grouper by Zaimie Sahibil.

Oh, don't forget to say "Thanks and Goodbye" to the guy holding up the front counter.