The Wykehamist
huge single-panel sacra conversaziones – and Titian’ s Pietà. Considered by many to be his last painting, the Pietà was left incomplete at Titian’ s death in 1576. Its rawness and emotional power was heightened by this incompletion, and by the roughly applied, thickly layered paint in many places. It was a popular subject to sketch. Next we visited the Church of San Sebastiano, which was decorated with extensive works by Paolo Veronese. The all‘ antica church boasted a particularly splendid painting at the high altar, amongst others. Having already walked enough to earn our lunch, we established our meeting spot outside the Frari church before dispersing in the usual fashion for some memorably fun meals. Conscious of EACR’ s famous“ worst piece of tourist [ tat ] you can find” competition, we made time to prowl around the souvenir shops, looking for anything especially ghastly( more on that later). It was with great anticipation that we made our way back to the piazza outside the Frari to reconvene with the group. Personally, this was the church I was most looking excited about for the whole trip; Titian’ s Assumption of the Virgin – quite possibly my favourite painting of the entire Renaissance – was here. And it did not disappoint. Upon entering the imposing brick building, the painting shone at us from almost 100 metres away: seemingly suspended in the air, illuminated by six bays of natural light, it dominates the space. Up close, one can’ t help but be transfixed by it. We fittingly spent more time here than in any other church on the trip. Next came the Scuola San Rocco – a boastful façade with a splendidly self-indulgent interior. Virtually every wall and ceiling inside the building’ s halls held a Tintoretto. The scale, the extravagance, the attention to detail, the wealth – it was all“ so beautiful and vulgar – really Italian,” as put by Venice Trip 2025 commentator EACR. On our walk to the next scuola, we passed a brief interlude in the church of San Giovanni Crisostomo- home to a Bellini painting which the poet R F Langley wrote a wonderful ekphrastic poem on( creatively named The Bellini in San Giovanni Crisostomo). Those of us lucky enough to be taught by ATHL enjoyed reading it aloud and drawing comparisons between the text and the painting, as we had done at Il Redentore a few days prior. The Scuola San Giorgio was a stark contrast from the San Rocco: modest in size and presence, and( relatively) conservative but powerful in decoration. Splitting into two groups, we enjoyed looking at the famous panels by Carpaccio( whose use of a distinct shade of red the dish was named after – not the other way round), while some capitalised on the upstairs chamber’ s acoustics by testing their voices. Walking back to the hostel, we finally stopped to enter the Basilica di Santi Giovanni e Paolo – a most impressive structure we had walked past several times every day of the trip. We were then graced with an impromptu lecture on Verrocchio’ s Colleoni sculpture( another of the Art Historians’ studied works) from EACR, though this was hilariously interrupted by vernacular eight and nine year olds playing football within the fencing around this work of seminal artistic importance. Last-minute shopping( niche perfumes for some, Italian ham for others) followed by one final setmenu supper marked a lovely end to the day.
Anton Oliver: On the morning of the fourth of April, the song of the native water ambulance bird( Avis Medica Veneta) reminded us that it the last day that we would spend under the Venetian sky, and the day we would return to England. Ready to make the most of it, and fuelled with the aboveaverage espresso from the hostel machine,
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