Fortunately, I woke up feeling a bit better this morning. I’m still sniffing and snivelling but the throat is hardly sore at all, though I’m still coughing a lot. At least I didn’t need to spend the day in bed. It was a very warm and sunny day too, a real treat for a change! We set off late, as usual, and walked across to San Pietro island to pay a visit to the church of San Pietro Di Castello, where we have never been before, and which I mentioned in an earlier post.
The island of San Pietro was one of Venice’s earliest settlements, and it was originally occupied by a fortress - hence the ‘Castello’ part of the church’s name. The original church was probably founded in the 7th century and was the cathedral for Venice until 1807. It was originally not dedicated to St Peter but to a couple of Byzantine saints. A new church dedicated to St Peter was built in the 9th century, but that was destroyed by fire in 1603. The current San Pietro replaced it, and it was built to a Palladian design.
The free-standing campanile, of which I posted a photograph last Friday, predates the cathedral by more than 100 years, as it was built in 1482, though the cupola was added after the new church was completed.
Inside, the church has a great many baroque embellishments, which were produced in the mid 18th century. There are some quite dark and ugly paintings, in my opinion, though are a couple of interesting ones. Above one of the side chapels there is a late Veronese, St John the evangelist with St Peter and St Paul. Even that one is dark and hard to photograph because of reflections. I had to take the photo from one side, and it’s still dark.
Another chapel houses a painting by Luca Giordano, but the reflections are so bad you can’t really see it, and the chapel which houses it is stuffed full of baroque statues.
The high altar is quite amazing, being designed to include an assortment of statues, as well as being embellished with polychrome marble.
The vault is decorated with ceiling paintings, as are the side altars.
Other things I found interesting were an ancient chair, claimed to be the chair of St Peter from Antioch, but probably assembled in the 13th century using an ancient funerary stele.
It has has inscriptions on it from the Koran in Sufi script!
In one of the side chapels there is a mosaic based on a Tintoretto cartoon, whilst in front of it is a fragment of Roman mosaic, which is claimed to be from the original church.
As we left, we passed something that probably wins the prize for world’s most uncomfortable chair - for more than one reason!
We walked to the nearest vaporetto stop, and took a boat round to San Marco, which was incredibly crowded. As it was such a lovely day, the tourists were out in force and it was quite difficult to get through all the crowds of people.
This is the Basilica of San Marco. I managed to find a path through the crowds and find an un-crowded area to take this photo.
The queues for the Basilica and the Doge’s Palace were very long, so we decided to visit the Correr Museum which I don’t recall having visited before. The museum is housed in a 19th century royal palace, and there are various different collections. I had unfortunately forgotten to put on my back brace as my back felt very comfortable this morning, but this was a mistake. The museum does not have many seats, so I’m afraid I rushed past some of the collections in order to get to the paintings. I’m afraid I paid little attention to the Canova collection or to the Venetian history section or to the archeological section, and only briefly paused at the section on arms and armour. The library is particularly stunning though.
I was also amazed to see Marco Polo’s will - though I couldn’t read it!
The paintings are on the upper floors and are displayed chronologically. I was quite taken with this coffin-reliquary, dating from around 1290.
This is an odd story. This is the coffin-reliquary of the blessed Juliana, who established a nunnery in 1222 on the island which later became the Giudecca. Her body was discovered in 1290 to be uncorrupted 30 years after her death, and the nuns had this coffin-reliquary made to display her body.
The section on early paintings contained quite a few by Veneziano, and this rather strange one by Giambono, dating from around 1443.
The Virgin looks rather sly, I think, and I’m afraid I think the baby Jesus looks completely drunk. I’m sure that neither interpretation was quite what the painter intended!
We passed on to later painters, and I really liked this one by Pieter Bruegel the younger.
The label gives only his dates of 1564 - 1638, rather than the date of the painting. And I have no idea why every painting I photograph is squint!
I also enjoyed one in the manner of Hieronymus Bosch, though as it was behind glass, it was hard to see and impossible to photograph. There were a couple of beautiful Bellinis, but as I’ve already posted one of the Virgin and child, here is a portrait one.
It seems to be called Portrait of St Fortunato, and dates to 1475.
After the paintings, we passed into the restored Imperial Apartments, the sumptuous rooms of Sisi, the Empress Elizabeth, laid out in the 1830s and the 1850s. This one is described as the Dining-room for weekday lunches.
As one who eats most lunches, weekday or other, crouched over an iPad on any handy chair, I was almost speechless! I can’t quite imagine what the dining room for formal evening meals might have looked like.
We were quite tired by then, so repaired to the café for coffee and repose. I was able to take a good photo of San Marco from the window of of the café.
Most of the crowds had by then dispersed so the square was almost empty.
It being almost closing time, we left and made our way to the nearest vaporetto stop, catching the number 1 for Arsenale so as to walk back to the flat.
No comments:
Post a Comment