Stepping off the train and rounding the corner of the station, I spied the surroundings of a new city for the first time. The air was warm for April and the sky was painted dark, promising an afternoon thunderstorm. People scurried to and fro, dragging their oversized luggage across cobblestone lanes and up and down, up and down, and up and down the hundreds of bridges that crowned the canals. This could be many cities around the world, but it wasn’t just anywhere. This, my friends, is Venice.
Venetian Delights
Even though my backpack straps dug into my shoulders (and after 3 ½ weeks of carrying it, I secretly wished I could just hoist half of my belongings overboard into the canals), I didn’t want to dash through Venice’s labyrinthian city streets. Instead, I wanted to soak it all in. After all, this was my last city on my last day of my first trip to Italy, and I didn’t want anything to feel rushed.
I stopped at several locations to snap photos, as I always did on my travels. I marveled at the quintessential gondolas that glided through the turquoise waters, piloted by crooning costumed gondoliers. I people-watched the hordes of tourists who made the place feel more like an amusement park than a historical city, and I window-shopped my way past tasty Venetian delicacies (which I vowed to try later), elaborate Venetian carnival masks, and brightly colored soft Italian leather accessories. The purses and shoes, I assure you, were most certainly calling my name. But my backpack forced me to refrain.
Google proved to be an excellent navigator as I made my way through the city's narrow alleyways. This surprised me since I had heard that GPS navigation cannot always be counted on in Venice's unique landscape of more than 100 tiny islands, 150 canals, and more than 400 bridges. About an hour after the arrival of my train and my slow sauntering through the city, I checked into my hotel—a delightful little abode tucked into a quiet courtyard in the Cannaregio District.
Solving a Mystery
The signorina who clerked the front desk was a native Venetian, so I knew she would be the perfect person to help me solve a mystery. You see, when I was a child, my parents had a print of a famous painting hung in their home that depicted a scene from old Venice. And when I say old, I mean really old, as the painting hailed from the 1700s. In the scene, Venetians in their 18th century attire went about their daily routines in front of beautiful buildings flanked by a canal with floating gondolas. I was always intrigued by this scene and hoped that if I ever made it to Venice some day I would be able to find this place.
"I want to find this scene from this painting," I explained, showing a picture on my phone. "Do you have any idea where this could be? I'm not even sure if these buildings still exist."
The signorina examined the image, zooming in to get a closer look. After thinking for a minute, she said, "Yes, I do know where this is located. This building right here," she pointed to the building that was facing the piazza with its unique rounded roofline, "is currently being used as a hospital."
She then pulled out a tourist map and circled the location of Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo and highlighted the directions of how to get there from the hotel. "It's a quick 10-15 minute walk from here," she explained.
Journeying to My Venetian Scene
Excitedly, I dropped my bag in my room and then journeyed back out. Luckily, those dark gray clouds that had previously promised precipitation had floated out to sea without delivering any rain, and so the walk to the piazza was now under a pale blue sky. I strolled along the canals, crossed over the bridges, all while keeping an eye on the directions on my phone. As the destination neared on my Google map, I noticed that one of the buildings from the painting was just on the other side of the bridge in front of me. As I sped up my pace, my heart racing, I realized that this bridge I was about to cross was part of the painting, too!
As I walked over the bridge, I stepped directly into the scene from that painting that I had spent countless hours studying as a child! It was almost like I had stepped back in time. The buildings were exactly the same. There was even a gondola station in the exact same location as it was in the painting! And the sky looked eerily similar too, just more clouds on this day than on the day the artist (Bernardo Bellotto, aka Canaletto) painted the scene.
I breathed in every inch of the scene, trying to commit everything—the sights, sounds, feel of the air, and warmth of the sun—to memory. I also took about a gazillion pictures (give or take) like I usually do because I like to make sure I have explored a variety of angles, lighting, and settings so I end up with a shot I'm happy with. It was a little challenging getting the angle to match the painting since a few things were different now (lamp posts, etc.) and it seemed impossible to get all the elements just as they appeared in the painting. However, in the end, I was fairly pleased with the way this particular shot turned out. It showed the canal, people in the gondola, and the activity in the piazza that was similar to what the artist saw here so many centuries ago.
After filling up the digital cloud with images, I meandered into the white building with the rounded roofline—the one that is currently housing a hospital (the Ss Giovanni e Paolo Hospital to be exact). On the second floor is a museum (The Museum of Pathological Anatomy) and the docent inside graciously explained more about the history of the building. It was constructed in the early 1500s as the Scuola Grande di San Marco, and was originally a school for the middle class.
"I've never seen this painting before," the docent commented when I showed her why I had come into the building. "The perspective the artist took is a little different than how it really is, as I'm sure you noticed, but amazingly everything else looks very similar!" I agreed with her and now had confirmation as to why it had been so difficult to get the shot exactly right with my camera.
Memorable Travel
So much of my travel is inspired by things I've experienced at other moments of my life. Being able to walk into this scene that had left such an impression on me as a child was truly something that made my very first trip to Venice absolutely unforgettable. And now when I look at that painting, I can proudly say, "I walked over that bridge!" "I stood right there taking photos!" "I went inside the building and watched people get on the gondola on that canal."
The picture I took that day—shown above—now hangs proudly on my wall, right next to that original print that had inspired my young adventurous heart so many years ago.
Author's Notes: Bernardo Bellotto's painting is titled The Campo di SS. Giovanni e Paolo, Venice, 1743/1747. It is part of the Widener Collection at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The print my parents had was just credited to Canaletto and titled "View in Venice." Upon further research, it's clear that Bellotto was Canaletto's nephew and would sometimes be referred to as Canalettino or just Canaletto. See this article for more information.
