A Leica on his wrist, black-and-white film, and Venice: this essential practice defines the gaze of Gianni Berengo Gardin, a key witness to the city’s everyday life. The exhibition brings together thirty-six prints donated in 2021 to the Fondazione di Venezia, part of the series La più gioconda veduta del mondo. Venezia da una finestra (Contrasto, 2018), conceived from a single vantage point overlooking the Rialto area – once observed, in the sixteenth century, by Pietro Aretino as he watched life unfold between the Pescheria, the Rialto Bridge and the Fontego dei Tedeschi.
Curated by Denis Curti and presented at Palazzo Flangini, the exhibition moves between regattas, urban views, traditional water-based trades and moments of social gathering, portraying a Venice both unchanged and transformed in its gestures and customs. The crisp black and white, stripped of sentimentality, maintains a balance between observation and narrative. The result is a coherent body of images where faces, architecture and everyday situations compose a suspended sense of time – reflecting a practice that remains classical in its vision while engaging with the challenges of contemporary reality.
