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Europe > Italy > Veneto > Venice > Arts and crafts > Articles > Art in Venice

Art in Venice

by Claire Gervat

We drank in the view of Venice’s famous landmarks as it grew sharper and sharper – more Canaletto than Turner now – and longed for the moment to last for ever

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Standing at the back of the motorboat, wind-blown and happy, we knew we’d made the right decision. Arriving in Venice by water taxi may not be the cheapest journey in the world, but it’s certainly among the most memorable.

As we skimmed across the lagoon, sniffing the sea air, there was nothing to see at first but the odd sea bird perched on a marker buoy. Suddenly there was a promising smudge on the horizon, which quickly resolved itself into a misty outline familiar from many a Turner painting.

We drank in the view of Venice’s famous landmarks as it grew sharper and sharper – more Canaletto than Turner now – and longed for the moment to last for ever. But all too soon the boat had chugged slowly past St Mark’s Square, into the Grand Canal and up to the small landing stage a short amble from our hotel.

We were still dazed from a horribly early start, in spite of the breezy boat ride. Luckily, the tiny Locanda Novecento (just nine rooms) is one of those rare Venice hotels that manages to be both stylish and thoroughly welcoming. In no time at all, we had been ushered into their shady courtyard for a midday ‘breakfast’ of strong lattes, fresh orange juice and pastries, and to make plans for the rest of the day.

Our main aim was to see something of Venice’s art collections, my travelling companion being a painter himself – and in the next three days we saw plenty, in spite of the city’s other distractions. The obvious starting point for art lovers is the Accademia, the city’s main public gallery, which was actually founded by Napoleon around 200 years ago.

We took our time wandering through its 24 rooms, which are plentifully stocked with works by famous and less-famous artists who were either born locally or spent most of their lives here. There were touching portraits by Giorgione and Bernardo Strozzi, inspiring altarpieces by Bellini and Titian, and epic scenes by Tintoretto and Veronese. Those last three names are very much the superstars of Venice’s golden age – deservedly so – but I enjoyed some of the later works as well, especially the city views by Canaletto and Francesco Guardi, showing ‘La Serennissima’ in all its faded 18th-century glory, and Tiepolo’s pink, squishy cherubs gazing down from one of the ceilings.

A little further along the Grand Canal from the Accademia, the Peggy Guggenheim Collection is altogether more modern. In what used to be the American heiress’s waterside house is a small but well-chosen selection of works representing all the major art movements of the 20th-century. It’s not everyone’s taste, especially if you’re a fan of the figurative, but I found all those Picassos a refreshing change during a day or two of gazing at Old Masters.

However, some of Venice’s best art isn’t in its museums and galleries, but in the Scuole. These were peculiarly Venetian institutions, dating as far back as the early 13th century, and best described as private clubs with a charitable slant. Some of them were quite humble affairs, attracting and supporting groups of the city’s artisans. The Scuole Grande, however, had an altogether wealthier membership, providing them with the means to build fabulous premises decorated by the greatest artists and craftsmen of the time.

There’s no finer example of this than the Scuola Grande de San Rocco, one of only two to be revived after Napoleon abolished them in 1806. So much acclaim has been lavished on it over the years by art lovers and critics – from John Ruskin to Henry James – that I was fully expecting to have my breath taken away. I certainly wasn’t expecting a low-ceilinged hall so gloomy you could hardly see the paintings that line its walls.

Luckily, first impressions can be deceptive, as I discovered when we climbed the grand staircase to the upper storey. From its high, gilded and carved ceiling to the panelled lower walls embellished with caryatids and fabulous metal lanterns, the huge chamber was clearly designed to impress. But the most amazing sight was the series of massive paintings by Tintoretto that dominated the rest of the wall space. The New Testament scenes were full of drama and energy, which more than made up for the technical faults. (“Look at that leg,” my voyaging art expert exclaimed about one of the figures. “It’s not even finished.”) I could have gazed at them for hours. Before I’d been wondering if the paintings had been praised too much, but I left thinking they deserved even more.

The Scuola de San Giorgio della Schiavoni, by contrast, was tiny, though not too small to boast its own world-class cycle of religious paintings. This time the scenes were from the life of St George, done in the first decade of the 16th century by Vittore Carpaccio, who also features in the Accademia’s collections. In contrast to the Tintorettos, they were full of captivating details, my favourite being the gruesome scattered remains of the dragon’s former prey in the inevitable slaying episode.

But there’s more to Venice than art, of course. As we were to find again and again, the city itself kept intruding, distracting us from our lofty ambitions. At the Ca D’Oro, a small museum with an eccentric mix of 12th-century statuary, 15th-century marble reliefs and paintings by Mantegna, Titian and Tintoretto, we kept being drawn to the first-floor loggia to soak up the view of the Grand Canal and the even-more-bustling fish, fruit and vegetable market on the opposite bank. Outside the Accademia, we spent hours just leaning on the wooden footbridge, one of only two over the Grand Canal, watching convoys of gondolas glide below us.

Then there were all those enticing side streets and small squares, well away from the crowds and the heaving flocks of pigeons that make Piazza San Marco such a mixed pleasure (the good bits for art lovers being the Doge’s Palace, Museo Correr and the Basilica itself). We lingered over coffee at sunny café terraces in the Dorsoduro district, behind the Accademia; we stopped for ice-creams almost everywhere; we drifted along quiet lanes in Castello, the area east of St Mark’s, noting quirky and very Venetian details like a set of doorbells in the shape of cheeky Pulcinellas.

And when we’d exhausted ourselves, we went ‘home’ to the elegant Locanda Novecento for a peaceful drink, a browse through their library of glossy coffee-table books and, most importantly, to pick the staff’s brains about where to have supper. As I learnt long ago, there’s some truly awful food in Venice, much of it overpriced. So it was all the more pleasing that the Novecento’s recommendations were faultless – and they happily took care of the bookings, as well.

We didn’t need reservations, however, for my favourite suggestion of theirs, the miniscule bar of the Trattoria da Fiore, just off Campo Santo Stefano in San Marco – though you might have to hover for a table. There we picked our way through plates of freshly cooked ‘cicheti’, sort of Venetian tapas, and sampled that day’s short list of local wines by the glass, surrounded by Venetians relaxing after a day’s work.

It was so good we went back the following night for more delicious seafood snacks and biscuity chilled prosecco. Venice’s art, and the city itself, had been such a feast for the eyes, it seemed only fair to let our stomachs have their share as well.