The Venetian culture
survives on the crumbs of its grandiose past. It rests firmly on
its laurels as the home of Vivaldi and the centre
of the world for music during the 16th century.
Musicians dressed in foppish costumes entertain tourists with one-off
renditions of Baroque music in local churches,
while string quartets vie for space in St Mark’s Square.
La Fenice, the home of Venetian opera
and theatre, was devastated by a fire in 1996. Gone are the days
when the prolific Venetian dramatist, Carlo Goldoni, produced 16
works in one year and had the critics rolling in the aisles. The
theatre scene these days is a fairly middle-class affair, with its
cap firmly set at the euro-laden tourists. With the declining population
and young people choosing to leave, Venice’s home-grown performance
groups are virtually non-existent. The city has come to rely on
outside artists to spice up the cultural scene. Only the cinema
keeps abreast of contemporary traditions when, every September,
Venice welcomes the moneyed and the honeyed to the International
Film Festival.
For further information and listings, A Guest in Venice
is published fortnightly during the summer and monthly during the
winter season and is available from good hotels. Information is
also available online (website: www.doge.it).
Tickets for major cultural events are available for purchase from
Ciaoticket
(tel: (848) 888 444).
Music
The temporary home for La
Fenice, the PalaFenice, Tronchetto island (telephone number:
(041) 786 511; fax number: (041) 786 580), is a grand name for what
amounts to a large tent. The PalaFenice holds over 300 more people
than the original opera house and is conveniently reached from St
Mark’s Square by vaporetto (marked La Fenice), leaving 45
minutes before each performance. The opera season is somewhat overshadowed
by neighbouring Verona but the standard of the music is very high.
Tickets cost from €20 and are available at the venue from two
hours before each performance or at a temporary box office alongside
the Cassa di Risparmio di Venezia (a local bank), in Campo San Luca,
between 0830 hrs and 1300 hrs.
Other music venues in the city include the Frari Church,
San Polo 3003, which offers recitals from May to October (excluding
August) every Friday at 2100 hrs, and La Pieta,
Riva degli Schiavoni, Castello, known as the Vivaldi church, because
it stands alongside the Ospedale where the composer taught. Not
surprisingly, this is a popular and atmospheric spot for renditions
of Vivaldi. Tickets prices start at around €20
are usually available on the door or at hotel receptions. For a
serious art and music splurge, visitors should reserve seats in
the Scuola di San Rocco, Campo San Rocco, San Polo 3052, where the
Accademia
of San Rocco gives regular performances of Baroque music on
period instruments. Tickets cost from of €25 and visitors can
book these in person or by telephone (telephone number: (041) 523
4864).
Theatre
For any aficionado of Venetian Commedia dell’Arte, a visit
to the Teatro
Goldoni, Calle Goldoni, San Marco (telephone number: (041) 240
2011; fax number: (041) 520 5241), should not to be missed. Renamed
to mark the playwright’s death in 1867, this wonderful theatre
offers a comprehensive repertoire of Venetian classics and this
includes works from the rib-tickling Goldoni. Opening nights are
often booked well in advance and seats must be reserved at the box
office. It is advised that tickets be picked up at least an hour
before the performance to avoid disappointment.
Visitors searching for more alternative theatre should go to Teatro
a l’Avogaria, Corte Zappa, Dorsoduro (telephone number: (041)
520 6130), the home of experimental theatre since 1969. Venetian
professor Giovanni Poli, who died in 1979, was the guiding light
behind contemporary theatre in Venice and has a strong following
in the city. In keeping with his groundbreaking ideas, the theatre
has no ticketing system but just asks spectators to make a donation.
Dance
Classical ballet forms part of the season at the PalaFenice
(see above) but otherwise dance performances in Venice are a little
thin on the ground.
Film
The city has been the setting for many famous films, including Luciano
Visconti’s Death in Venice (1971), Nicholas
Roeg’s Don’t Look Now (1973) and, more recently,
the adaptation of Henry James’ Wings of the Dove (1997).
The final scenes of The Talented Mr Ripley (1999)
were filmed aboard the Croatian cruise liner, the MV Dalmacija,
in the Venetian lagoon.
The Accademia,
Calle Gambera, Dorsoduro (telephone number: (041) 528 7706), is
one of Venice’s oldest and best-loved cinemas, with an excellent
range of flicks from American blockbusters and European independents
to arthouse (especially on Wednesday and Thursday). More recently,
however, it has been overtaken in the popularity stakes by the brand-new
Giorgione Movie D’Essai, Cannaregio 4612,
Rio Tera de Franceschi and includes a two-screen miniplex holding
over 300 seats and showing films in the English language every Thursday.
Cultural Events
Two cultural names dominate the Venetian calendar, the Biennale
and the Venice Film Festival.
The
Venice Film Festival was originally founded by Mussolini
in 1932, as a reflection of Italy’s increasing global
importance and despite the low-key influence of Italian cinema,
the event remains the second most important film festival in the
world, after the Cannes Film Festival.
The cinematic merry-go-round takes place around the end of August
and lasts 10 days. All the action is centred on the Lido
where the paparazzi rub shoulders with directors and starlets in
pursuit of the Leone d’Oro.
Films are shown in the Palazzo del Cinema, Lungomare
G Marconi, and the Astra, Via Corfu, although tickets
are only available by queuing at the door. A programme of events
should be available in advance at the tourist office. The
Biennale is a forum for contemporary art, frequented by the
enfant terribles from all over the world. From early Italian Futurists
like Marinetti to America’s Robert Rauschenberg and Benetton’s
Oliviero Toscani, the Biennale courts controversy at the many events
they organise during the year.
Literary
Notes
Venetian-born novelists are an obscure bunch, although many other
writers, such as Henry James, have used the city
as a backdrop for their novels. William Shakespeare
set Othello and Merchant of Venice here, while
Thomas Mann’s masterpiece, Death
in Venice (1912), is one of the most resonant portrayals
of 19th-century Venice, set in a particularly insalubrious Lido.
Jan Morris brings her richly woven prose
and evocative descriptions of the Divine Republic in her
Venice (1974). Other books worth seeking out for their
atmospheric descriptions of the city are Ian McEwan’s
The Comfort of Strangers (1981), Frederick
Rolfe’s The Desire and Pursuit of the Whole (1986) and
James Cowan’s A Mapmaker’s Dream (1996),
which centres on the famous map in the Libreria Sansovino.
More recent works include Margaret F Macdonald’s Palaces
in the Night (2001), a look at the artist Whistler’s
time in Venice, and David Rosand’s Myths of Venice
– The Figuration of a State (2001). Mary Laven’s Virgins
of Venice (2002) is a fascinating insight into life in
a Venetian convent in the Renaissance era. |
