96. Padua. Private Collection.

 

 

To return to the Grand Canal, here we see the Rialto Bridge, designed by Antonio da Ponte, creating a strong link between the two banks. Canaletto represented this single arch viewed from the east and west with a flotilla of boats stationed around it, with the nearby public monuments, the courthouses and prisons, the herb market,[19] shops and the German and Turkish warehouses. We also notice the Grimani palace, the royal canal and Saint Jeremy, the barefoot Carmelites’ small church, Saint Simeon and, finally, the mouth of the Grand Canal on the Saint Claire side. In other canvases, we find the preparations for a naval battle below the windows of the Balbi palace, landscapes featuring the Bembo, Grimani and Vendrameni palaces, and views between Saint Stephen and the Rialto hill, the sumptuous Pisani palace and Saint Jeremy and the Grimani and Foscari palaces.

 

Then there are the many Venetian churches, whose squares are often graced with a well, such as Santa Maria Formosa, housing the Sainte Barbe of the old Palma, and the square of Saint John and Saint Paul, with its church dedicated to the two apostles, filled with glorious tombs, depicting Saint Mark’s school and, next to it, the heroic figure of Coleone, sitting straight up on his charger, making a commanding, threatening gesture. Saint Nicolas is seen in a poor neighbourhood at the other end of the city. There is Saint Paul’s square and Saint Theodore’s School, the Jesuits’ square and the square of the Apostles. On the corners of bridges, the painter sometimes places basket makers, vendors often frequented by mariners. On the plazas in front of Saint John and Saint Paul’s and the Jesuit school, bowls and royal tennis matches took place and often turned violent. Canaletto excluded no detail, not even the rare vegetation blooming in windows of the city where everything was made of stone, nor the greenery of trees that decorated some of the terraces.

 

The arsenal was situated north of Venice, in front of the Castello, whose double entranceway Canaletto depicted. One entrance includes a monumental door guarded by a marble lion imported from Athens in 1687 by Francesco Morosini. The other is the gate by which the boats entered, pedestrians crossing by means of a swing bridge. Just as remarkable for its vastness as for its dense decoration, the arsenal is a reflection of the Venetian navy’s high popular esteem. It was there, next to the battleships, that the Bucintoro, the peottas and the Republic’s golden galleys were located. It is there that one could build eighteen big boats and arm them on site with cast iron cannons. This deployment of forces became unnecessary, little by little; during the eighteenth century. The management of all of these trappings of war became disorganized after that and the three thousand workers who were still employed at the arsenal succumbed to their natural indolence and worked very little.