Bettendorf Artist/Gallery Owner and Q-C Students Share Thrills of Italy Trip
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Even though four of the group of 10 students and adults who recently returned from a two-week trip to Italy had been there before, it was a unique, life-changing experience for all involved.
Pat Bereskin – longtime artist, teacher and owner of Bereskin Art Gallery & Academy, 2967 State St., Bettendorf – has taken summer trips to Italy every year since 2004, except for last year because of that pesky Covid deal. She’s taken a select group of her students every other year since 2007, and even with the risks inherent in a global pandemic, the eight teenagers she and fellow chaperone Dana Wilkinson traveled
Pat Bereskin at the Amalfi Coast.
with had the time of their lives.
“One of the things that amazed all of us – we went into these shops, and storekeepers were so happy to see us. Some were even in tears,” said Wilkinson (owner of Davenport-based Paragon Commercial Interiors), noting this was her fifth time in Italy (the last time was 2015).
“I just love Italy; there’s always a new place to discover,” she said recently. “I think my favorite thing about this trip was seeing it through the eyes of these teenagers. It was a different perspective. The questions that they asked, they were all just so attentive and excited, and so much fun to travel with. It was a great experience.”
“Why not go to Italy? It just seemed like a great opportunity to be able to go on this art trip with like the best teacher ever,” said Jaide Logdson, a 2021 Davenport Central grad who has studied with Bereskin since 7th grade and will attend Minneapolis College of Art and Design in the fall. She said she’s most learned patience and precision in her artwork from Bereskin.
Jaide Logdson with her Italy journal.
This was Jaide’s first trip overseas, after wanting to go an archeological dig in Pompeii (a vast archeological site in the southern Campania region) when she was 15.
They didn’t see many visitors on the trip, compared to when Bereskin has gone in the past. “Usually, you’re nose to back,” Pat said of crowds in Italy. This time, the treasured, timeless Sistine Chapel in Vatican City was empty.
“It was really nice; you could move around,” Jaide said. Same thing with the Spanish Steps in Rome – a steep 135 steps between the Piazza di Spagna at the base and Piazza Trinità dei Monti. “Usually it is so crowded,” Bereskin said. Jaide said she took at least 100 pictures a day on her phone; photography is not allowed in the Sistine Chapel.
She said that and the ruins of Pompeii were her favorite sights. “Da Vinci is one of my favorite artists so getting to see the Sistine Chapel was a big deal for me,” Jaide said. “When I was 15 years old, I applied to be an archeological intern at Pompeii. I didn’t get to go, ‘cause I was too young, but I finally got to go to Pompeii. I wanted to be an archeologist when I was younger and I still want to be one. It just seems so cool to me to uncover all that stuff, and all of the art that has survived it, is just super cool to me.”
“And I had never been to Pompeii before,” Wilkinson said. “I had so many emotions. It’s a tragic thing, and to see the devastation.”
A hallway leading to the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City.
The city of Pompeii, 14 miles from Naples, was destroyed in 79 AD by a volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius.
Wilkinson also has studied art with Bereskin and has taken art most of her life. “I’m nothing compared to these guys,” she said of the high schoolers. One of their highlights was climbing Mt. Vesuvius (which is 4,203 feet high), she said, which was very strenuous. “They seriously ran up the mountain; we made it,” Wilkinson said.
“I was thinking about how hard something was, and then now I think, I climbed Mt. Vesuvius,” said Alondra Gomez of Moline, a homeschooled student who just finished 12th grade and wil be attending Benedictine College in Kansas, majoring in art.
A ceiling at St. Peter’s Basilica.
“I wanted to live that experience, to see all the sights, and have the experience of being in Italy, with all the masterpieces we hear all the time,” she said. “My favorite place was the Vatican – it was just a very exciting moment to finally be in that place.”
“The Sistine Chapel, from what I heard pre-Covid, it’s very crowded, but we could take all the time we wanted to just look at every single detail,” Alondra said, noting she had previously been to Rome in 2018 with a church group, when it was crowded.
She was also thrilled to see the famous “School of Athens” (1509-1511), a fresco by Raphael in the Vatican’s Museum, among other preserved frescoes. Her family is Catholic, so being at the Vatican was very meaningful for her.
A dome at St. Peter’s Basilica.
“My mom always watches the pope’s homilies,” she said. “I don’t know, just the fact I was there.” The group went to a Catholic Mass during the trip (in a different town), and there was a baptism during the Mass.
“It was just so bizarre seeing no crowds anywhere,” said Martha Barnds, a rising senior at Davenport Central. “We had a very unique experience, that very few people are gonna get and I went to Italy of October 2017 with my family, and I was at the Spanish Steps and the Vatican and there were crowds
Michelangelo’s Pieta sculpture at St. Peter’s.
everywhere. You could barely walk or take pictures. It was like a ghost town for us, so I thought that was a very unique experience.”
“I’ve been taking art classes with Mrs. B since I was in 1st grade, so it’s been a long time,” she said, noting a friend of hers went on a past Italy trip. “I knew I was gonna go on this trip, so I’ve been looking forward to it for years, and it was just amazing.
“My favorite part was also the Borghese Museum,” Martha said of the famous gallery in Rome. “The sculptures there are breathtaking; it’s just hard to describe. The same with the Vatican. It’s overwhelming seeing how much art there is and trying to take it all in.”
Inspiration from a health scare
Bereskin’s first trip to Italy was in 2004, beginning on her own with different art groups, after surviving a health scare in 2003. Her gall bladder stopped functioning and when they did a test, Bereskin became unconscious and coded, and during that time, she said she had a vision she was in Italy. She had never gone before, though her mother’s side of the family was from there.
Her maternal grandfather was from the small town of Montefalcone di Val Fortore, and he immigrated to Chicago in 1912, where her mom
A street in Montefalcone, Italy.
grew up.
Bereskin visited Italy three times before finding a cousin who lives there, and she’s become very close. “All these years, I’ve always wanted the kids to go there, to see where my family was from,” she said recently. “It’s a really cool little town and we were scheduled to stay there in the B & B, but because of Covid in Italy, the B & B – if you own it and live in the B & B, you can’t open it. But if you own a B & B and your residence is outside, you can.”
Bereskin first traveled with six high-school students in 2007, plus her friend Marilyn Buel, who went along on subsequent trips, but not this year (since she moved to Kansas City and had a knee replacement), and
The winding staircase at the Vatican Museum.
was replaced by Wilkinson. Typically, Bereskin goes to Italy every summer and brings students every other year; she didn’t go last year at all due to Covid.
Only 25.5 million foreign visitors spent at least one night in Italy last year, in comparison to 65 million in 2019 – a fall of more than 60 percent, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC). The lucrative sector accounted for up to 14 percent of Italy’s GDP before the pandemic hit.
The statistics released by the WTTC in the annual Economic Impact Report suggested that a total of 337,000 people working in the travel and tourism industries in Italy have been left unemployed, according to an April 2021 story.
“Early on it was 10 days, because we were worried about the kids being homesick, but we were pushing so much to get all the stuff in,” Bereskin said of her art trips. “For a lot of them, it’s the only time they’re ever gonna go until they’re married, for an anniversary.”
Her goals for kids are to show them famous artworks and historic sites, and give them a true flavor of Italy (in culture from art, gardens to food), meeting art historians and taking tours.
“Whatever museums we’re at, there are practicing artists that teach university level,” Bereskin said. “That’s important, and while we’re there, we do make art with current artists of the country.”
Pat Bereskin and Dana Wilkinson (right) with artist Leonardo Pappone at his art studio.
In the past, they’ve met with a famous art restorer of frescoes (Alan Pascuzzi) who also teaches at a university, and wrote “Becoming Michelangelo.” This time, they were lucky to meet with artist Leonardo Pappone in his studio, and his best friend owns a paint factory they visited. “Then we were privileged to understand and use a brand-new product they’re putting out that’s more of a structural type of medium, as a thickening agent for paint,” Bereskin said. “We did some pretty cool stuff.”
Traveling with eight students, because of Covid there were different rules in different parts of Italy, Bereskin said. In Rome, they had to have three vehicles to take kids around. In the Naples region, they needed two vans, and in the countryside, they only had to have one, Bereskin said. “We got it worked out OK,” she said. The total $5,200 cost per person included most meals, lodgings, train tickets, museum tickets and airfare.
She required everyone to be fully vaccinated before they went on the trip. In Rome, there’s a big push for vaccination, she said. The group got Covid tests while there, to prove they were risk-free before being allowed to fly home. It was everyone’s first time flying since the pandemic.
A Caravaggio painting at the Borghese Museum.
Jaide was a little nervous before flying, but when she found out everyone had to be vaccinated on the flights, she felt a lot better. “We also had to wear masks on the flights. It felt pretty safe,” she said. The flight was 10 hours from Dallas to Rome.
“When we got to the hotels, the hotels were immaculate,” Bereskin said. “They took it really seriously.” Restaurants also required masks to be seated, she said.
This time, they were pretty much the first American tourists in Italy since Covid, according to tour guides and many places, she said.
“That was the question we got the most – do you think Americans will come back?” Bereskin said. “They’re
Inside St. Peter’s at Vatican City.
in trouble, they’re in big trouble. Here, we’ve had government stimulus, but there, they don’t. The tour guides said, we were some of the first tours in 15 months.”
She spoke with one guide who had three relatives die from Covid, including his father, who passed away as he was driving him to the hospital. In Italy (which has less than one-fifth of the U.S. population), there have been 127,731 Covid deaths (as of July 9), compared to 605,792 in the U.S. Worldwide, the number of Covid-related fatalities recently passed 4 million.
“And there were a lot of boutique type stores that were closed – snack places, bars,” Bereskin said. “They’re ready for us,” she said of Italy’s economy overall. “They’re prepared to make sure things are clean and nice, but the Americans also have to cooperate. People who want to travel, they don’t want to wear masks. They don’t want to do what they’re supposed to do. People with their masks down under their nose, they were visitors.”
Even when they climbed Mt. Vesuvius, they were required to have masks on to get tickets, Jaide said.
One day a “gastronomic delight”
One day in Naples was called “Gastronomic Delight,” starting with tastings of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, then they made homemade mozzarella and Neapolitan pizza in a wood-fired oven, and did tastings at a gelato factory. “That was pretty cool,” Bereskin said, noting Jaide
A pasta dish at one of the group’s Italian hotels.
has Celiac disease, so she couldn’t have gluten. “We managed that through the whole trip.”
Jaide got to make a special gluten-free crust for her pizza, and restaurants accommodated her very well with gluten-free dishes. “They take it real serious, whereas here – I have a gluten sensitivity – and here they tell you it’s OK, and you go home and you’re sick,” Bereskin said.
“I was able to still have my own pizza; I just didn’t make my own dough,” Jaide said.
All the students loved the food day, and were amazed there were so many types of olive oil – including vanilla, lemon, cinnamon, and orange.
Malia Shinbori making pizza.
“My mom, when I was sick, used to give me a spoonful of olive oil and I thought it was disgusting,” Alondra said. “So like, when they said we’d do olive oil tasting, I didn’t want to do that. But you dipped bread into the olive oil.”
“They had a stone oven, where we cooked our pizza and they cooked really fast, like in two minutes,” Malia said. She estimated over the trip, she had 13 servings of gelato. The kids rated the pizzas, which they had every day, and they said it’s not even comparable to pizza in America (true Italian is superior).
“My mom made pizza the other day and it wasn’t very good. I’m like spoiled now,” Alondra said. Her favorite in Italy was the one where they made their own dough and picked their toppings.
“I liked the crust the best; it was very fresh,” she said. Pizza in Italy did not come already sliced, they said.
“Meals there, it’s an experience,” Martha said. “Here, you eat whatever and get on with your life. But half the meals we had were five-course meals. One, I got half-way through and I was like, I have to do the rest of this somehow. I was already after
Jaide Logdson shows off her homemade pizza in Sorrento.
full after the second course.”
“You eat slow and you talk,” Bereskin said. Riley Kramer, a rising freshman at Pleasant Valley, said he weighed himself after the trip, and he had lost seven pounds, though the other kids said he ate the most of all.
“I’ve been hearing about it while taking art classes with Mrs. B and I thought it’d be a great new experience, and a once-in-a-lifetime chance for me to go on a trip like this,” he said. “My favorite part was all the art – I’ve never had an experience like that. The variation, and also all the sights and the food were great.”
Malia Shinbori with her journal.
Each student had to keep a sketchbook/journal, where they detailed their experiences and illustrated many pages with drawings, painting, or mementos from the trip.
“We’ve had kids that had not taken it as seriously, but this group did, by far,” Bereskin said. “On this trip, they took it 100 percent seriously.”
Unlike some past times, this trip didn’t provide enough time to paint while they were in Italy, Bereskin said. “We got to see and do more, because we didn’t,” she said. “Every place we stayed we tried to be really thoughtful. Because of Covid, we didn’t want to stay in the cities. We ate in areas where it wasn’t typical, but it was good local food. We wore our masks; it was 95 degrees in Rome and we were wearing masks.
“It was required by law,” she said. “They’re not fooling around. They’re getting more people vaccinated. But for young people, between 20 and 30, many are not, because there’s a rumor it’ll cause sterility.”
Bereskin and the Italian representatives reinforced the fact that Covid vaccines are safe and effective. However, overall rates of vaccination in Italy are below the U.S. – 48 percent fully vaccinated in America, compared to 36 fully in Italy, which had one of the most lethal starts to Covid in early 2020 of any nation.
The real Isle of Capri
While Bettendorf is home to the Isle of Capri Casino and Hotel, Italy is home to the original Isle of Capri – an island paradise in the Tyrrhenian Sea off the Sorrento Peninsula, near Naples. The students got to swim there, in a Capri grotto, as well as swim off the Amalfi Coast and Positano.
Off the coast of the island of Capri.
The students (who also included Thomas Johnson, home school, Davenport, and Lily Tackett of Davenport Central) loved taking a boat ride around Capri; they said the water wasn’t cold and it was a true highlight of the trip.
“It’s like, I’m swimming at the island of Capri right now. It’s crazy,” Martha said. She celebrated
Brie Howell, Malia Shinbori and Alondra Gomez at the Liquid Art System paint factory in Positano.
her birthday early on the trip, June 23. Over the two weeks, the group walked a total of 78 miles.
Bereskin kept a pedometer and tracked the number of steps they walked every day. The day that was the most was when they went to the Vatican, over 25,000 steps. Here’s the whole schedule – including the number of steps each day, not including the first and last days when they flew there and back –
Monday, June 21, Arrival in Rome (23,156 steps)
Private guide for private Ancient Forum and Colosseum walking tour
Self-guided area of Pantheon, and Trevi Fountain
Tuesday, June 22 (25,232)
Riley Kramer and Thomas Johnson at the paint factory.
Private guide for private tour of the Vatican, Sistine Chapel, St. Peter’s Basilica and Museum
Wednesday, June 23 (19,743)
Visit to Borghese Museum (with reserved tickets, self-guided) with Borghese Gardens and Piazza Spagn
Thursday, June 24 (5,527)
Train to Benevento; Benevento for the day, overnight, first night
Friday, June 25 (13,064)
Montefalcone for the day, transfers, market, return to Benevento
Saturday, June 26 (5, 318)
Day by private vehicle/driver to San Bartolomeo and Campobasso meet artist Leonardo Pappone for the day, transfers, return to Benevento
Sunday, June 27 (9,824)
St. Peter’s Square at Vatican City.
Montefalcone for Mass, and then Campobasso for mural tour, return to Benevento
Monday, June 28 (14,778)
Transfer Benevento to Naples by train; tour of the archeological museum with private guide and reserved entrance tickets and then continue with transfer to Mt. Vesuvius, for hike, and then to Sorrento area
Tuesday, June 29 (17,057)
A day of gastronomic delight — Private tour of olive oil farm with oil and balsamic tasting; hands-on cooking class for mozzarella making, Naples Pizza making and tour of gelato factory & tasting.
Wednesday, June 30 (9,589)
A day to the Island of Capri; Ferry to island – private boat tour of island (swim in the cove) – ferry back
Thursday, July 1 (19,295)
A day along the Coast: Amalfi – Positano – Sorrento
Friday, July 2 (17,972)
Private car/van to Pompeii, private tour of the archaeological site with a private guide, and reserved entrance tickets
Dana Wilkinson wih some of her sketches from Italy.
Continue to Naples (mini-tour) Train to Rome, Leonardo Express to airport, shuttle to hotel.
Bereskin documented each day of the trip on her Facebook page as well (and took about 1,500 photos), posting this on July 2: “We went to the Amalfi coast — Positanto and Amalfi. It was amazing. The drive alone was an experience. How can explain how much I love my students? Such well behaved ambassadors for the USA and IOWA.”
“I’ve been doing art with Mrs. B for a long time and I’ve known about the trip. I liked getting to see the different culture of Italy,” said
Brie Howell of Bettendorf, a rising sophomore at Pleasant Valley. “It was very interesting because in Iowa, it’s not like you can branch out to a completely different culture like that. I really enjoyed going to the Borghese Museum, because I enjoyed seeing all the different statues, different art. You’ve been hearing
The gardens at St. Peter’s Basilica.
about it in history class, and we got to see artists like Michelangelo’s work.
“I really liked one piece at Borghese that really showed dramatic contrast,” she said of a Caravaggio. “The dark and light and I really liked that. I’ll try to implement that more in my artwork, like more contrast. I’ve never gotten to go on a trip like this.”
Brie wants to do a series of watercolor paintings of each meal they had, since she took so many pictures of them. Martha said on the Amalfi Coast, she had fresh-squeezed orange juice that was the best she’s ever had.
One student said she could have easily spent a month or two there. They also loved the speed and ease of trains there, which they wished they could have back home.
The Bereskin students at the Vatican Museum.
Martha said compared to her family trip to Italy, this one was more special because of the people Bereskin introduced them to, including her own family. “We definitely had some unique experiences you couldn’t figure out on your own,” Martha said.
“That was the biggest worry before we left – was this going to be an authentic experience?” Bereskin said. “We were really worried about that. It was like, because of being a pandemic, we didn’t know what the aftermath would be.”
The group at the Colosseum in Rome.
“I think it was even better, because you didn’t have to wait in lines,” Martha said. “I would tell other people, don’t wait to go.”
Alondra agreed the different itinerary (compared to her prior time in Italy) was good. “I like for restaurants, we didn’t have an itinerary. We just went to the first restaurant we saw.”
“One of the things I thought was cool, when we went to church that day, we found this restaurant and she usually wasn’t open on Sundays. But since we were Americans, she opened up just for us,” Martha said. “That’s how willing people were for Americans, how glad they were to see us. I thought that was really great. They were so welcoming and so excited to see Americans back.”
Many restaurants were better prepared to serve vegan or gluten-free dishes than in the U.S., they said.
“You’d think they would struggle more with that, since they have a very specific diet over there, but if anything, they had more options than here,” Martha said.
Appreciating many artistic talents
“I went on the trip because I wanted to see more actual art, because Iowa is a small collection. You get to see the roots of where a bunch of art
Brie Howell with her journal.
came from,” said Malia Shinbori, a Bettendorf rising senior. “Italy, everybody knows Italy is just amazing. I liked seeing all the new things and Rome especially. That was one of the first big empires in the world. It was my first time out of the country.”
She was dumbfounded by the frescoes on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, painted by Michelangelo (1475-1564).
“You just look up and like, wow, you think of Michelangelo just on his back, painting all day,” Malia said. “How did you do that? And it’s so detailed and so good and every time you look around, you notice
Riley Kramer with art from his journal.
something different.”
“Michelangelo’s also an architect, which I didn’t know, and you look at St. Peter’s dome, and he did that too,” she said. The artist received that commission at age 71, from Pope Paul III, to design the sprawling basilica at the Vatican. “And we just have square buildings.”
“I had never seen marble carved sculptures,” Jaide said. “I liked to see the frescoes and mosaics you don’t really see here. Just different techniques in detail they use was very interesting to see and learn about. I want to try it all now. All the marble carvings were so beautiful. I want to try it. I want to get into sculpting.”
Alondra Gomez with her journal.
She also appreciated all the history in Italy, she said. “I want to study the pictures of the sculptures and paintings I have and learn from them in every way that I can,” Jaide said.
Bereskin teaches a drawing technique called “Bargue,” a type of drawing from the Renaissance that uses shadows to get more realistic, and the student photos from Italy can be used for that.
“I liked all the artwork at the Vatican were mosaics and they looked like oil paintings,” Alondra said. “So it was like, I want to try and make a mosaic, even a paper mosaic. Something that looks like an oil painting. You could barely tell the difference. It gives you the feeling, I want to try that.”
Martha Barnds with her journal.
“There isn’t a single painting in St. Peter’s; they’re all mosaics,” Wilkinson said. “They said they made mosaics because they were so close to the river, the dampness would have ruined the paintings. They are incredible.”
Alondra marveled at how much Raphael produced in his short life, before his death at 37 in 1520. “I don’t want to compare myself,” she said.
“But that was all they did; that was their job,” Bereskin said. “You guys, you think about the age you are –
Pat Bereskin (center) with her students at the Borghese Museum gardens.
you’re incredible for your age, like unbelievable.”
“I can be very impatient when it comes to painting, when you look at how Michelangelo worked on the Sistine Chapel for three years, or looking at the Borghese, you get up close to paintings and see the brushstrokes and everything, and that was many, many years ago,” Alondra said. “It’s just so fascinating.”
“I felt guilty, because sometimes the rooms were so filled with art on the walls,” Bereskin said. “You walk by this painting that earned the privilege and honor to be on the walls, yet you cannot physically or mentally take it all in. As an artist and gallery owner, I am walking by and going, ‘I’m really sorry’.”
Jaide loves painting acrylic portraits best. “It feels like you’re sculpting with a pencil, which is something I find cool,” she said. Now, she has her whole life to sculpt her own artistic career.
To see a selection of photos from the Italy trip (as well as some of students at Bereskin’s Bettendorf gallery), click HERE.
