PlanetEye

The time has come to close shop for summer and refresh the senses for the next winter season. And St'A is gonna cook up a fab closing party this FRIDAY MAY 16th, giving the first to enter a free cd with an 'anthology' of the music played throughout this past season. The cd has been skillfully mixed by their resident dj Siddharta. Entry is free, so you'll be able to splurge on drinks while reclining on black leather couches and velvet walls. Dance the night away while sexy '50s videos show in the background.

If you're lucky and wink at the dj, you might just get an invitation to a private party for the launch of 7oz Records, the latest Italian electronica label to hit the shelves this week!!!

St'A , Vicolo della Cancelleria (piazza navona) 

So you can't eat anything with gluten, and if you're travelling thru Italy, the truth is, your screwed. But don't give up hope so fast! Rome, as many other Italian cities, is finally catching up on what has become a known fact in Italy: a growing number of Italians are gluten-intollerant. So here's one place, trendy and cool (why give up fashion?) that offers different menus for different tastes and needs. Located inside the Abitart Hotel in Ostiense, Estrobar is a modern and elegant restaurant which has succesfully combined cuisine with art. The artistic nature of the restaurant can be seen throughout, with spaces tastefully decorated with valuable art pieces and exhibitions showcasing young talents. And while art hangs on the walls, excellent food is served for those who love eating as much as they love art. Specialties from all over Italy are served with an original twist and always prepared with the best ingredients. Open from Monday to Saturday, 8pm to 12:30am, this place also serves pizza (only on Mondays) as well as sophisticated fare such as 'bass tartare on rice noodles, zucchini and carta musica (extremely thin pasta)'. To wash down all their yummy flavors, the bar holds more than 200 wine labels and serves 'Health drinks' made with veggies and fruit. Estrobar is proof that cooking is really an art.

 And here are a few more restaurants cooking up  gluten-free food:

1. La Mimosa Fiorita, Via Bari 11/A

2. Renovatio, Piazza Risorgimento 46/A

3. Albella Salute e Gourmet Via Igea, 2 

So you've heard the bad news: Rome, like many European cities, has pick-pockets just waiting for innocent tourists to come by and steal their hard-earned money, beloved digital cameras and state-of-the-art cellphones. But before you change your travel plans remember that there are bad people everywhere, you just have to be smarter than them! And although some might sound silly, here are some personal tips.

1. Don't keep your wallet in the back pocket of your jeans. Duh!

2. Always keep your purse closed, or if you can't zip it up, always keep your hand/arm over it. And always keep it in front of you (this counts for backpacks too). Some pickpockets will try to slash the bottom of the bag with a pocket knife.

3. Don't stop to look at a map in the middle of the street. Enter a cafè, study the route, then head out!

4. When walking in an alley, always keep your bag on the wall side. Kids on scooters waiting to snatch your purse are always ready, specially in the city center.

5. Don't walk around with a camera hanging from your neck. You're a big red target, and if someone snatches it, you could get injured.

6. Don't wear flashy jewellery.

7. Beware of gypsies with kids in their arms - they are also highly trained in stealing! 

And here are a few Italian words you might want to know and use:

AIUTO (ah-you-toe)- HELP

BASTA (sounds like pasta)- STOP

POLIZIA (poh-lee-siah) - POLICE

FERMO (fehr-moe) - STOP (running)

NO - well, that's easy.

Try to follow these basic hints, because after all, we all just want to have fun on vacation!

As the temperature rises and Spring finally decides to reside in this part of the world, take a day to stroll around the Garbatella neighbourhood. Found behind Ostiense and St. Paul's Basilica, this place is simply enchanting. Built during the fascist regime to house Roman citizens, it's made up of independent villas and gardens. Each villa has a number inscribed on them in fascist script and rigidity. But you'll forget its fascist history and severity once you walk around the rose gardens, the children playing in the silent and car-free streets, and the organic cheese markets. Take via delle Sette Chiese and see the old-folks playing cards as ice cream drools down a little girl's cheek. Stop in the main square and enjoy the silence, in the heart of the city. If you're lucky, you'll find La Città dell'Utopia and its flea market.

 To reach Garbatella, take the metro and get off at Garbatella. Or take the 23 bus to Ostiense and walk from there. 

Speed is the focal point of this fascinating and scenically spectacular exhibition entititled 'The Legend of Speed', a theme developed in all its forms through a chronological overview of the 20th century that goes on to explore a range of entrancing future scenarios. Engines and their inseparable links with art will constitute the primary basis for exploration and interpretation of other key strands such as design, cinema and fashion in Italian life. Automobiles of various periods, motorcycles, aeroplanes, period photographs and videos will accompany the visitors on a journey of mind and body, both cultural and sensory, through the history of Italy as seen through the eyes of those who conceived, wrote and experienced it in a state of constant acceleration.
If you love cars, particularly old Fiat, Ferrari, Maserati and Lamborghini, you will not want to miss this exhibition running through May 18th.

Palazzo delle Esposizioni

Via Nazionale

Ticket: 12,50 or 10 with a stamped bus ticket 

MACRO’s permanent collection offers a selection of some of the most significant expressions characterizing the Italian art scene since the 1960s. Works by Italian artists of international repute illustrate how Italian nationals have figured along-side key protagonists of the international art world during recent years.

During the first years of the 1980s in the studios of the former Cerere pasta factory in Rome’s San Lorenzo neighbourhood, the artists Piero Pizzi Cannella, Gianni Dessì, Marco Tirelli, Domenico Bianchi, and Bruno Ceccobelli gave life to what would later be called the Nuova Scuola Romana.

MACRO’s collection also documents recent trends by key contributors to the development of the arts, to name just a few: Gianni Asdrubali exponent of the Astrazione Povera movement, Giovanni Albanese who uses irony and simulated flames to create poetic Ready-mades and mechanical inventions, and Cristiano Pintaldi who contests the structure of televised images through re-presentations in manual brushstrokes.

MACRO Contemporary Art Museum

Via Reggio Emilia, 54

Tickets:1 Euro 

A pupil first of Giambellino and later on of Giorgione in Venice, Sebastiano del Piombo skillfully mediated between the former’s traditional figurative culture and Giorgione’s revolution.
Sebastiano's extraordinary life is the subject of a retrospective exhibition that follows his entire stylistic evolution as a cntemporary of Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael, Giorgione and Titian. The eighty works exhibited, including imposing paintings, full-scale portraits, small paintings on slate, cartoons and comparison works, reveal a sequence that offers the public a true journey, not to be missed.

Sebastiano del Piombo 1485 – 1547
Palazzo Venezia
Via del Plebiscito 118
Till May 18th, 2008
Daily – from 10.00 am to 08.00 pm
Fridays and Saturdays – from 10.00 am to 10.00 pm
Price: 10 euros, groups 8, students 4