ROME: PIAZZA NAVONA

One of Rome's more prominent public areas is Piazza Navona.  The plaza is filled not just with fountains and interesting public art but with would-be artists and street performers.

As to the latter . . .

OK, so a didgeridoo is not exactly Italian, but this busker and is dog seemed to be having a good time in another place altogether.

So did the following mime, whose gig was to appear to be running to an office job, complete with briefcase, suit, and tie, which was permanently bent upward like Dilbert's, as though it were being blown by the wind.  Clever, but can you really make a living doing that?

Then there were the caricaturists.

I didn't feel I was very successful in capturing the plaza's fountain statuary.

This sea god figure, along with his evil dolphins, was about as ugly as it looks, and conversion to black and white didn't help.

I thought it might work to shoot the following sculpture from behind.  Only partially successful, I thought, though I did like that I posed the figure with the building opposite in the background.

My best effort was a sculpture of Neptune, apparently in the process of dispatching an octopus.  The figure is filled with action, the lighting was nice, and I especially liked the building in the background that I blurred a bit by opening the lens aperture to reduce depth of field.

But then there was that pigeon.  I think I waited at least five minutes for the pigeon to fly off.  Never happened.

John