VENETIAN PAINTING IMMERSIVE TOUR

VENETIAN PAINTING IMMERSIVE TOUR

This tour is dedicated to all art and history lovers, with special attention to Renaissance painting.

While a great deal of the milestones of Venetian painting are to be seen in the Accademia Galleries (that we also recommend) some of the absolute masterpieces by Giovanni Bellini, Titian, and Tintoretto, can still be appreciated in their original sites. Of course, this helps understanding the paintings themselves, and the reasons why there conceived in a certain way. History, somehow, unfolds clearly in front of your eyes.

A short boat ride along the Grand Canal and some of the minor waterways will bring us to San Polo area, not far from the Rialto Bridge, for a visit to the Frari Church first and then to the Scuola Grande San Rocco.

The impact with the enormous space inside the Frari can be overwhelming: slowly, with the help your guide-lecturer you will start appreciating the most important works and like in puzzle, you will soon be able to assemble the components that formed the Venetian society in the 15^th and 16^th centuries: the big noble families, the State, the foreign communities, the citizens, the monastic orders, the benevolent institutions.

The main artistic figures we shall take into consideration here are of course Titian, who is present here with the Assumption of the Virgin and the Family Pesaro altarpiece. Both paintings were recently restored. These fundamental works in the artistic life of Titian were examined by enlightened art historians who revealed their ‘secrets’. The third ‘big’ is the Holy Conversation by Giovanni Bellini, fascinating and almost hypnotic.

Your guide will sketch the important relationship between Giovanni Bellini and Titian, master and pupil, and their importance in the development of Venetian painting, celebrated during the Renaissance for its supremacy in coloring, while, on the other hand, Florentine painting predominated in the art of drawing.

We leave the Frari retaining strong emotions conveyed by the flow of images you saw and by the things you learned. A few minutes coffee break will let your mind repose and absorb all the beauty you were exposed to. Ready for another immersion? Just behind the apses of the Frari stands Scuola Grande San Rocco…

A ‘scuola’ was in Venice the seat of a benevolent organization. San Rocco was a large fraternity of citizens and noblemen – women were excluded – whose main task was