Welcome back “Detourism: Venice newsletter”, the newsletter prepared by the Tourism Office of the Town of Venice which is sent free of charge to hundreds of subscribers every week, providing valuable food for thought and insights on the history, art and culture of Venice.
We are proud to publish some selected contents of such newsletter (see previous post: “Detourism for the Up and Down the Bridges“). On our website, in several episodes, we will only present some samples (see all posts in our archive page “Detourism Newsletter“), but the invitation addressed to all the friends of the Up and Down the Bridges is to fill in the online form proposed by the Town of Venice to receive it directly in their email box every week.
Special thanks to the Councillor for Tourism for having enthusiastically welcomed this new important collaboration between TGS Eurogroup and the Tourism Office of the Town of Venice and for giving us the precious opportunity to publish on the pages of this blog some extracts from this newsletter, both in Italian and in English.
As previously announced, (see post “Detourism: Venice’s neighbourhood”), we are currently discovering all Venetian neighbourhood, one by one! Following San Marco, Castello and Cannaregio. it’s now time to move on to San Polo district. Enjoy the reading!
As you walk through the narrow streets of San Polo you’ll be passing by high-density buildings, housing, shops, bars and restaurants. This is one of the earliest inhabited parts of Venice.
San Polo is also home to the Rialto Market, the liveliest part of the Serenissima, where locals come to do their food shopping and stop off for a drink (Venice’s Spritz Aperitif is a not-to-be missed Venetian tradition) and bite at one of the bars in the maze of side streets. The Rialto Market – Pescaria (fish market) and Erbaria (fruit and vegetable market) – has been taking place here for nearly 1,000 years.
San Polo has a very high concentration of artworks. Don’t miss the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, a well known spot but at the same time quite off the beaten path. Tintoretto worked here for over twenty years and decorated the building with more than sixty vast canvases.
Also worth seeing is the colossal basilica of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari. A large Gothic church, its assets include Canova’s pyramid mausoleum, Giovanni Bellini’s Madonna with Child triptych in the sacristy, and Longhena’s Doge Pesaro funereal monument. Upstaging them all, however, is Titian’s 1518 Assunta (Assumption) altarpiece. Titian himself has his memorial here.
In San Polo there is the birthplace of Venice’s greatest writer, the playwright Carlo Goldoni. Also known as Ca’ Centanni, the building is a small palace dating back to the 15th century, converted into a museum in 1953.
The Ponte delle tette (Tits Bridge) is one of the Venice bridges with the most unusual names. In the past, this area was a designated red light zone, within which the prostitutes used to air their breasts on the balconies of their houses.
As ever, numerous treasures are also scattered among the minor churches. San Cassiano houses a masterpiece by Tintoretto, The Crucifixion, one of the most startling pictures in Venice. Adjacent to the sacristy, there is a beautiful chapel, an 18th century hidden gem, embellished with polychrome marbles and precious stones.
Discover all walking tours in San Polo on the “Venezia Unica” web site!
[source: La newsletter di Venezia, N° 24/2020 del 06.07.2020]
[picture by Didier Descouens / Wikimedia Commons]
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