Venice July 27-29

Note on Venetian construction techniques:

The basic materials are brick and Istria limestone.  These are said to be lighter than marble and other stone and less likely to sink.  Both materials are subject to decay.  The brick is, at least initially, covered with stucco and painted.   The surface is, apparently, ignored after the stucco starts to fall off.  

This building is near our place.  It is for sale.

It would probably make a great hotel, but it would need some work.

Close-up of front door:

The stress on the joint caused cracking and an opening, perhaps helped by rodents. 

If the canal water comes into contact with the brick, it will be taken up as with a wick.  Evaporation leaves a salt efflorescence.  It is hard to say whether it is the brick’s clay, firing, or the salt  makes it deteriorate.  

This is to the the right of our front door:

Besides being built on mud, earthquakes add stress to the buildings here.  The brickwork, limestone, and terrazzo floors seem to have some give.  Note the uneven window frames:

Scenes like these no doubt influenced John Ruskin to predict imminent ruin 160 years ago.  

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Until the mid-19th Century, Venetians drained water into sand filters and saved it in cisterns.  Hundreds of wellheads, now disabled, remain.

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Sun. July 27.

The Ca’ Rezzano is an enormous palazzo, now serving as a museum of 18th Century Venice.  

The courtyard:

We found the contents not to our taste.

This ceiling by Tiepolo was painted in only 12 days:

For this room:

We offer “Allegory of the State” by Giulio Carpioni:

Then why do we love Venice and baroque music?  

We have dinner at ae Cravate again.  Bruce had the venetian menu:  shrimp with onions (should have been sardines), tagliatelle with black ink sauce,  bacalao  with cream sauce, and tiramisu.  Leslie had veal with a wine sauce.

Monday, July 28.

The Peggy Guggenheim Museum.  She inherited (at age 14) a substantial, but not gargantuan, fortune from her father when he went down with the Titanic in 1912.  Upon reaching adulthood, she adopted a sort of bohemian attitude to life and was a friend and benefactor of many of Europe’s greatest abstract and surrealist artists.  With the help of Max Ernst, she assembled a truly impressive collection.  After WWII, she bought a small palazzo on the Grand Canal to house her collection.

Giacometti’s Model for a Square (a proposal):

And his Woman with Her Throat Cut:

 

(different allegory; different state):

There was a temporary exhibit, “From Mannerism to Surrealism,” based upon the collection of Richard and Ulla Dreyfus-Best.  The collection might be described as consisting of weird artworks.  There were a few Breugels, a Bosch, a Durer,  Dalis, etc.

Lunch at the museum cafe.

dinner in.

Tues, July 28.

The Correr Museum.   

      Correr collected objects reflecting Venetian history and culture after the fall of the Republic.  He donated them to the city’s civic museum around 1830.  Venice’s public collection of Roman statuary actually dates back to the 16th Century.

       This item covered a container for denunciations.  Citizens were encouraged to report waste, fraud, and abuse.

      

 The Correr occupies the south and west space in the buildings on Piazza San Marco above the stores and cafes.  Looking out, we noticed water beginning to emerge from the drains:

   

  The level peaked about an hour later:

Venice has been sinking while the sea level is rising.   Thiis acqua alta used to happen only in the fall and winter, but is becoming more frequent.

Lunch at Chalice (appetizers).  Dinner was taken-out lasagne.