Venice in the Age of Canaletto
This article originally appeared in DeSoto Magazine, February 2010. All rights reserved.
During any given year, many important exhibits come and go at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, yet the chance to showcase one of its permanent pieces is especially poignant when shown within the context of its creation.
Venice in the Age of Canaletto is a collaboration between the Brooks Museum of Art and the John and Mable Ringling Museum in Sarasota, Florida, each of which has a Canaletto in its permanent collection. Ringling's former assistant curator, Alexandra Libby, and Dr. Stanton Thomas, assistant curator at the Brooks Museum, collaborated and co-coordinated the exhibit during its three-year-long project assembly.
The Grand Canal from Campo di San Vio, an oil-on-canvas painting by Giovanni Antonio Canal (Canaletto's real name), is part of the Brooks Museum's permanent collection and is an impressive example of what the artist did best: scenes of Venice's famous waterway, the Grand Canal.
The Canal was Canaletto's favorite artistic subject and one that he could render with life, light, and a sense of realism often lacking in other works in other works of the era. Thomas says, "Canaletto's works — they kind of beguile you — as if they are photographs...and what we know of the decorative arts and the works of other painters...they are much more fantastical [than Canaletto's art]." Canaletto is best known for his portrayal of urban Italian life, depicting scenes of simple people going about their daily lives against the vast backdrop of ancient Roman buildings and landscapes. His "vedute," or view paintings, stand out because of their muted colors, contrasting greatly with other richly-colored, sumptuous creations of the eighteenth-century Venetian art. Thomas says, "One of the unique things about this exhibition is it is the first time, I guess outside of Venice, but really in a scholarly manner, that anyone's looked at Canaletto within the completely broad spectrum of the visual arts of Venice."
The most important component to the exhibit is what Thomas calls a "modern complement to the more traditional way of approaching the city." During the 1700s, Venice was the epicenter of lively culture and extravagant living, which consistently drew European tourists. "People would get on a gondola and they would go up and down the Grand Canal," says Thomas. "[It is] such a great way to see the sights, to see other people, and to experience the city as a tourist, maybe for the first time."
Upon viewing the exhibit for the first time, visitors will not only see a set of 1730s-era prints replicating the experience of traveling along the Grand Canal but most importantly, they are able to experience, first-hand, what it is really like to ride on the water up and down that great waterway. Filmmaker Ralph Leiberman helped create this experience by setting up two high-resolution video cameras on gondolas, shooting a continuous gondola ride, from one end of the Canal to the other. "It doesn't just capture the video image, but also the ambient sound. You have the sounds of the church bells ringing, the water sloshing up and down the gondola," Thomas explains. For those who have never been to Venice, the video footage, projected onto a huge single wall, acts as the introductory process to immediately immerse viewers into Venetian life.
Venice in the Age of Canaletto is a well-conceived, multi-faceted experience for museum-goers. It includes examples of what Thomas calls "pastel, confectionary-looking" gilded furniture, delicate porcelain objects, and mythological and religious paintings. It also features a pale blue and gold damask-covered room emulating the private interiors in which many of these painting were originally displayed, "recreating the luxury and why people went there [Venice]," Thomas explains.
A dazzling example of that decadent era comes in the form of a table decoration made of opaque white and colored glass entitled "Dessert Decoration in the Form of a Glass Garden," and it's just that. In the middle is a glass fountain, complete with glass flowerbeds and balustrades which, during that time, would have set up for the dessert course of a meal. "Cakes and sweetmeats would have been interspersed among that," Thomas points out. It gave guests the experience of walking through a garden and sharing "that sense of wonder, excitement and awe" when browsing the confections on the table.
Chief curator Marina Pacini is thrilled about the collaboration between the museums. "I love the fact that Stanton has, with his fabulous colleague, Alexandra Libby, put [Canaletto's work] in this bigger, wider context. It's such a rich group of objects that tell a wonderful story."
The experience would not be complete without an extensive, fully illustrated catalog that includes essays by art historians and photographs of works within the exhibit, which is available for purchase at the Museum store.
The comprehensive Venice in the Age of Canaletto opens Sunday, February 14, 2010, with a wide variety of events, including featured speakers, an Italian Opera series, Canaletto-themed Art for Lunch, and guided tours. For more information, visit Brooks Museum of Art online or call 901-544-6200.
