Venice: Art and Life in the Lagoon City

"The most triumphant city I ever set eyes on," a French visitor exclaimed upon reaching Venice in 1495. Few contemporaries would have disputed the man's assessment, for during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries La Serenissima, the Most Serene Republic of Venice, was mistress of the entire Mediterranean. The wealth of the Orient sluiced through her canals, and her merchant princes amassed fortunes that exceeded those of many European kings.To their enduring credit, the merchants of fifteenth-century Venice lavished their commercial wealth upon a program of urban beautification that was without parallel in Western history. Andrea Palladio and Baldassare Longhena, the preeminent architects of their day, designed public buildings and private residences for the lagoon city's aristocracy--and Titian, Tintoretto, Carpaccio, Veronese, Tiepolo, and Guardi covered the walls and ceilings of those structures with surpassingly beautiful works of art. The result of their collective effort was an urban center of transcendent splendor and fabled wealth.Some 140 illustrations--more than one third in full color--supplement this absorbing history of Italy's fabled lagoon city. Works by every major Venetian artist are reproduced in color, and the text is further complemented by numerous modern photographs especially taken for this volume by Adam Woolfitt, the noted English photographer.A special section, Venice in Literature, assembles excerpts from the writings of Ezra Pound, Thomas Mann, Ernest Hemingway, Henry James, Mark Twain, and others--all reflecting the unique appeal of the city of St. Mark. A reference section--including chronology, a guide to Venice's noteworthy architectural landmarks, and a selected bibliography--concludes the volume.