Signs of the time

The Doge’s Palace

The Secret Itineraries at Palazzo Ducale are a special visit, available on advance booking only, at the Doge’s Palace, the residence of the former dukes of Venice. In these halls, back when Venice was a powerful, independent republic, administrator and ministers convened, exercised their power, and dispensed justice. The visit will bring you to the ancient holding cells, the Pozzi, or pits, on the lower floor, and the Piombi, the leads from their lead covering, on the upper floor. The two are connected by a maze of staircases and corridors that hide behind walls. Among the several famous captives that spent time in these cells, Giacomo Casanova is the most legendary. In his memoir, which he wrote as an old man, Casanova recounts his one year and three months (1755 – 1756) at the Piombi and his amazing escape. Even though many of the cells had been renovated over the years, they are still impressive in their own way, and it’s easy for us to imagine our adventurer plotting the escape that would take him and his accomplice Padre Balbi on the roof of the Palazzo on October 31, 1756.

Caffè Florian

The eighteenth century is the century of conversation, and the Florian Coffee House, under the Procuratie Nuove portico in Piazza San Marco, is maybe the most emblematic example of this refined activity. Floriano Francesconi opened the café in 1720 and has been known under its founder’s name soon after. It was everyday business in cultivated, cosmopolitan eighteenth-century Venice to see Venetian noblemen, ambassadors, traders, adventurers, literati, artists meet at Florian’s while sipping that brand new beverage, the black, blistering-hot caffè in exquisite china cups. Also, women were admitted at Florian’s, unlike in most other public venues in town. According to Casanova, as soon as he got out of prison and while waiting for his ride to the mainland and freedom, he did stop at Florian’s for a last cup of coffee.

Hotel Monaco and Grand Canal

The Monaco Hotel sits on the place once occupied by the ridotto, near the San Moisè Church. The ridottos were meeting places for gambling, partying, and all-around fun that perfectly matched Venetian mentality. The casino in question was the first to be run directly by the government. It was a very large affair, opened during Carnival, too, and soon grew a fame among the many travellers who were in Venice in that period. Both locals and foreigners were required to mask their face while there, with the sole exception of fallen noblemen, who ran the gambling tables. Thanks to anonymity, not only patrons could easily waste away gambling their family fortune, but could also partake in usury and prostitution. The government shut down the ridotto in 1774 for moral reasons. Still, the whole reason it existed was to concentrate gambling in one place. Gambling was outlawed, but people gambled everywhere anyway, so the government thought it might as well round it up and tax it heavily. Avid gambler Giacomo Casanova is sure to have visited the place. For a picture of it, see Francesco Guardi’s painting held at Ca’ Rezzonico.

Goldoni Theater

Venice was the city a theatres, and Giacomo Casanova, a son of comedians, patronized them constantly. His relationship with theatre was much deeper and more direct than is commonly thought, as shown by recently-published studies. The Goldoni Theatre is the oldest extant theatre in town. It opened in 1662, and for a long time, it belonged to the Vendramin family. It was first known as Teatro San Salvador, and mainly hosted production of prose and comedy. It raised to international fame after 1752, when playwright Carlo Goldoni authored his unforgettable pieces. The theatre went through closures, fires, and important renovations. In 1833, it adapted to the spirit of the times and was renamed Teatro Apollo and was the first in Italy to boast gas-powered lighting. Impresario Angelo Moro Lin eventually dedicated it to the name of Carlo Goldoni in 1875. The façade we see today was built in 1909.

Carlo Goldoni’s House

In a small Gothic Palazzo with a beautiful courtyard and a majestic stairwell, Carlo Goldoni was born. Goldoni and Casanova met several times (see p. 100). Life-size reconstructions of Venetian theatre scenes from the 1700s populate the upper floor of the house and give life to Goldoni’s authorship and his revolutionary interpretation of then-modern life. You will also see a splendid, precious vintage puppet theatre, originally installed at Palazzo Grimani ai Servi, something common to have in patrician houses. ‘Chamber theatre’, played by voice actors/puppeteers, encompassed melodrama, pantomime, farse, tragedy, and even ballet. Shows were produced to entertain house guests, like the Elector of Saxony in 1714 at Ca’ Mocenigo. Puppeteering was the ‘polished’ version of street theatre, and used a whole inventory of miniature furniture and clothing.

Church of Santa Maria della Pietà

At the times of Casanova, Venice held musical events of all-female production and of the highest renown. They were usually held at four major ancient hospitals: the Pietà (still called that), the Incurabili (now housing the Fine Arts Academy), the Derelitti, and the Mendicanti (part of the modern hospital). Each of these housed disadvantaged persons – their names translate to Saint Mary’s Piety, Incurables, Destitute, Beggars – and also provided musical education, both vocal and instrumental, for selected few girls. The fame of these ensembles got to the far reaches of Europe, and those who had the means travelled to Venice to see them. The Pietà, established as a refuge for unwanted children, had a choir that was for years directed by the very Antonio Vivaldi. Today, Santa Maria della Pietà offers a musical programme in beautiful, evocative corners of the Church, dominated by Giambattista Tiepolo’s majestic ceiling fresco depicting the girls’ choir.

Ca’ Rezzonico – Museum of 18th-century Venice

A real journey into eighteenth-century Venice cannot be whole without a visit to Ca’ Rezzonico. The palazzo houses a rich, fascinating reconstruction of an aristocrat’s home. The building was designed by two of the greatest architects of the time, Baldassarre Longhena and Giorgio Massari, and is as monumental as can be, both for its large spaces and for the excellent décor, especially the art in the Ball Room. The year was 1751, the fresco work would be carried out by a very original artist: Giambattista Crosato, helped by Girolamo Mengozzi Colonna. The two created a very powerful illusion: behind a first order of pilasters and false statues, lies an encircling of grey marble columns supporting an arch of Verona red marble, which in the pictorial fiction echoes the main portal. In the upper level, Crosato expanded the view, hinting at more spaces hiding behind the loggias and balconies. At the centre of the ceiling, Apollo dominates the scene, his chariot illuminating the four corners of the world – Europe, Asia, Africa, America, each personified by young women of different ethnicity. Other than decorative frescoes painted by the best artists of the Venetian eighteenth century – from Crosato to Tiepolo, Guarana, Diziani – Ca’ Rezzonico houses a collection of paintings by Canaletto, Pietro Longhi, Rosalba Carriera, and two masterful pieces by Francesco Guardi. Il ridotto di San Moisè, by Guardi, invites the visitor to see what Venice looked like from the inside and from the outside of palaces that a decadent and decaying Venetian nobility called home. Also: amazing wooden furniture by Andrea Brustolon, precious décor, china, porcelain render the several souls of the Venetian eighteenth century. A fitting conclusion to the Enlightenment age is found in this magnificent palace-museum, with Giandomenico Tiepolo’s extraordinary and emblematic fresco cycle, relocated from the family’s country villa. The work leads toward the Nuovo Mondo (lit: New World), a real as well as metaphorical overturning of the classical concept of representation: the scene does not reveal itself to the viewer but paradoxically denies their gaze.

Fondazione Querini Stampalia

What has been for centuries the home of the Querini Stampalia family is today a museum of unique, intimate, and yet lavish atmosphere, a noble Venetian palace and its life in the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century: furniture, art, chandeliers, globes, clocks, musical instruments, china, sculptures, tapestries. Standing out in this art collection are Pietro Longhi’s paintings. Longhi is a prime interpreter of the customs of eighteenth-century Venetian society. Thirty penetrating, good-natured ‘snapshots’ show domestic and worldly life in Venice: illustrated gazettes, a dame dressing, a furnished room, an open atlas on the floor. Also worthy of attention is artist Gabriel Bella’s ‘immersive’ room, something that will take you by the hand into eighteenth-century Venice: parades, processions, ceremonies, liturgy in the several sacred places of power and faith. Also: parties, games, and everything that is relevant in a documentary on the institutions, rites, and costumes of the Republic of Venice.

Featured image: Perspective cross-section of Palazzo Ducale – Courtesy of Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia