Palermo, Sicily.
Palermo’s late 1920s post and telegraph office is best described as a fascist shrine. To mail a letter, the individual (click on picture) is reduced to insignificance when confronted by the state’s monumental power.
In architectural terms, this is a rationalist structure although the columns evoke links with the Romans whose empire Mussolini hoped to replicate.
As mentioned in my post on Messina, there are elements (should I be uneasy?) of such design that I quite like. Despite the columns, there’s a futuristic feel, for instance, in the winged figure and once illuminated sign for TELEGRA I, even if telegraphs are now history.
After the post office, it’s almost a relief to view the human-scale exuberance on a shutter just down the street.
In a nearby square, a man checks his phone unaware he’s being watched …
… and a waiter wonders if he’ll have any customers on a quiet December day. After a coffee, I enjoy exploring Palermo’s lanes …
… but come across an open air bookstall, which, surprisingly, seems to have lots of interesting secondhand books in English. This brings exploration to an end as I wonder how many books before I’m over the limit on the flight home.
