Holiday in Venice

“I had my dreams of Venice, but nothing that I had dreamed was as impossible as what I found.” – Arthur Symons

Firstly, to set the scene, this wasn’t a photography trip for me. It was part of a two week holiday and we also spent time in Milan, Turin and Verona. It was my first time in all of these cities. The photos I’ve shown here were taken on the move as we walked or took a boat from place to place. The sky was cloudy on the first day, overcast on the second and we had beautiful blue skies on the third. Venice is definitely a photography destination though and if you have plenty of time to find the best vantage points it’s a dream location. I’ve photographed places, scenes and characterful little corners that captured my attention but not with any particular theme in mind.

I'm writing this on the train leaving Venice for Milan after a three day stay in the watery city. I want to record my impressions of Venice while it's all still fresh in my mind. The first thing that struck me on arriving is that you don't have to go looking for the Venice you know from films and images if you come by train. As soon as you walk out of the station, the Grand Canal is thronging with boat traffic right in front of you. Between the station steps and the canal was a huge melee when we arrived. Porters offering to take your cases, selfie stick sellers and newly arrived travellers looking around to find the way to their accommodation.

We walked just a few yards from the station and straight away found a restaurant with a canal side view for a leisurely lunch. This is the view from our table.

The whole of our three day stay lived up to that first impression. Wherever you looked, there were canals, boats, gondolas, atmospheric alleyways and narrow streets, grand palazzos and shuttered flats with washing strung on practical washing lines. So much marble as well, in every colour and pattern, on the facades of buildings or on the pavements.

 I was more fascinated with the way people could live their day to day lives in this city and I relished wandering in the narrow back streets. I loved the picturesque-ness of it all, not in the way of grand churches and palaces but the uniqueness of streets on canals with washing hanging to dry and their day to day work boats moored below.

Here are some of the things I didn't expect though. There are no cars or motorised vehicles/carts of any kind. All goods are moved by boat or manpower. Every business, small or large, uses barrows or handcarts to move their wares through the streets. On a boat journey through the docks we saw DHL boats full of parcels and then later in the streets, we saw the DHL delivery man with his trolley full of parcels. At the post office water bus terminal we saw post workers with their loaded trolleys get on the boat to go to their delivery areas.

Also unexpected was just how many of the clichés are absolutely true and are hyper real. The gondoliers and gondolas are just as you would imagine but even more stereotypical and numerous. The church bells ring out all around on the hour or to call the faithful to service. And beautiful, quaint bridges over canals aren't confined to one area, they're everywhere.

It's a hard working city with a lot of physical work going on to cater for the residents and tourists. Goods are pulled and lifted, tables are set and cleared, gondolas are punted skilfully, construction goes on everywhere, boats are tied and untied from piers, everywhere there's a buzz but it's never frantic, it's just moves along at a busy pace.

Another thing that was unanticipated for me was that the night time photography I had envisaged, atmospheric views of twinkling lights on narrow canals, was severely limited. Venice by night is dimly lit (especially in comparison to London) and most of the small canals weren't lit at all except by a few lights from residents windows or from a passing boat. This was a holiday though, not a photography trip, so I was only taking shots of what we were passing on our way to and from places we wanted to visit. No doubt, if I searched on Instagram, I would find beautiful night photos of narrow canals and I'd feel a pang of envy but I won't look. I carried my tripod all around on one evening and only took one shot with it. Let me be very grateful for what I did find though which was lots of daytime scenes and these 3 night time shots which I’m happy with.

There are very few straight lines in Venice which can make straightening photos a little tricky. Most buildings are very old and some tilt alarmingly. I hadn’t expected the tower in St Mark’s Square to be leaning, so that was a surprise. As we looked around we could see that a few of the towers seemed to be leaning and later I overheard a tour guide say that there are six leaning towers in Venice.

One of our outings was to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection of modern art. I had gone there expecting to be wowed but strangely, the overall collection was not to my taste. A lot of the pieces were very busy, with sharp angular shapes and in one or two cases, were disturbing. A lot of it was produced in the 1940s though so I guess that reflected the emotions and events of those times. It's interesting though, as I more consciously study art, sometimes I find art that inspires me and sometimes I find art that’s interesting from a historical viewpoint but which doesn't trigger that gut feeling in me. Still the setting was beautiful and the view from the terrace on to the Grand Canal had the wow! factor. These are a few of those scenes and one taken through the very ornate windows. Ornate windows seem to be a Venice theme.

I did see an Andy Warhol painting (Flowers, 1964) which I hadn’t seen before. Funnily enough, when I was home and watching a documentary about Jean Michel Basquiat it appeared on a wall in one of the scenes. This is the one.

Flowers 1964 Andy Warhol

If you’re interested in the Peggy Guggenheim Collection I’ve since found that the website is excellent. You can search by any artist and it will tell you a bit about them and then list their works which the collection holds. I found I appreciated the art more when looking at it individually on screen rather than looking at it en masse in the collection galleries.

Don't underestimate the amount of tourists in Venice, even in October. We quickly decided to get out early in the morning, rest in the afternoon and go out again in the evening to miss the most of the crowds. The best value was the water bus which cost 45 euros for 3 days. They're very frequent and you can hop on and off with a multi day ticket. The locals seem to like standing near the disembarking points leaving seats at the front and back in the open air for tourists. Sitting in the front seat of the boat as it cruised swiftly along the waterways in the sunshine and marvelling at every new view was one of my highlights of Venice.

I can't talk about Venice without talking about the colours. On the grand canal, the buildings are painted in every colour and hue. In the back streets though, more in line with the other northern Italian cities we visited (Milan, Turin and Verona) the colours are shades of cream, yellow, terracotta, burnt orange and a faded muted red. I started to take photos of the surfaces and paint colours of the buildings quite late in the holiday and this is something I would like to do more of in the future to make up a colour card of each city or area.

It's similar to something I did with my "postcards" on social media which was trying to sum up a city or aspect of a city in five images.

Revisiting the colours of Venice, it made me think of one of my favourite paintings at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection. It’s called Sea = Dancer (1914) by Gino Severini. It actually seems more representative of Venice on a sunny day, with all the colours from pale cream through orange and red with the greens of the window shutters and the blues of the water.

To sum up my experience of Venice in 5 words or phrases it would have to be beauty, grandeur, canals, church bells, unmissable. No surprises there! It's all you would expect and more. If it's somewhere you've meant to go but haven't got around to yet, save up or splash out and just book it. I can’t believe I left it so long!