Ca' Rezzonico

History

Ca' Rezzonico stands on the right bank of the Grand Canal of Venice, at the point where it is joined by the Rio di San Barnaba. The site was previously occupied by two houses, visible in early paintings of Venice in 1500, which a century and a half later were in a sad state of decay. They belonged to the Bon family, one of Venice's patrician clans. In 1649 the head of the family, Filippo Bon, a Procurator of the city and patron of the arts, decided to transform the two houses into a single large palazzo on the site. For this purpose he employed Baldassarre Longhena (1597-1682), the greatest proponent of Venetian Baroque, a style slowly replacing the Renaissance and Palladian architectural style. Longhena was the designer of the famous dome of the Church of Santa Maria della Salute, a Venice baroque landmark. By 1661 Longhena had combined the two earlier structures, and work had begun on the facade facing the canal, and had reached as high as the first, or Noble, floor. However, neither architect nor client was to see the completion of the Palazzo Bon: Longhena died in 1682, and Filippo Bon saw his finances ruined by the cost of the palazzo. He was forced to halt the work.

Filippo Bon died in 1712, and the unfinished palace, already decaying, was inherited by his sons and then grandsons, but none had the funds to complete the construction. In 1750 The Bons offered the unfinished palazzo to Giambattista Rezzonico, a banker and fabric merchant from Lombardy, whose family had bought a title of Venetian nobility in 1648, during the War of Candia with the Ottoman Empire, when the Venetian state coffers were depleted. Rezzonico paid 60,000 gold ducats for the unfinished building. Municipal inspectors examined the building, and concluded that most of the structure was a ruin, in danger of collapse. Only the rear part of the building, completed up to the second floor, had a roof and could be saved. Rezzonico hired the most prestigious architect of his time, Giorgio Massari (1687-1766), who had built the churches of the Jesuits and the church of the Pietà in Venice, as well as the palazzo of the Grassi family, which faced the Rezzonico palace on the other side of the Grand Canal. …

The ground floor and courtyard

Visitors typically arrived by gondola at the main entrance, opening onto the Grand Canal. The building is narrow and deep, with the facade on the canal only three rooms wide. Visitors passed through the entrance, and down a long corridor to the courtyard, where a fountain is placed, with the coat of arms of the Rezzonico family. The entrance to the streets of Venice is behind the fountain. From the ground floor, visitors climb to the Piano Nobile by the staircase of honour, which has marble balustrades decorated with statuary by Giusto Le Court. Le Court was the leading sculptor in Venice in the late 17th century, and worked closely on many projects with the first architect of the building, Longhena.

Piano Nobile

The Palazzo's ceremonial rooms are located on the piano nobile. The largest and most impressive is the grand salon or ballroom, fourteen by twenty-four meters in size, at the rear of the building. This room, created by Massari, is of double height, and appears even higher because of the trompe-l'œil architecture painted on the walls and ceiling by Girolamo Mengozzi Colonna (not by Pietro Visconti, as long believed). The centerpiece of the ceiling, painted by Giovanni Battista Crosato, depicts Apollo riding his carriage between Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas. The coat of arms of the Rezzonico family, with a double-headed eagle, also is prominently displayed on the wall of the ballroom facing the entry door. The two enormous chandeliers made of wood and gilded metal, from the mid-18th century, are among the few fixtures that date to the original period of the building. The ballroom is now decorated with 18th century statues by Andrea Brustolon, including a statue of an Ethiopian warrior carved of ebony.

The Salon of the Allegory, a room decorated to commemorate the 1758 marriage of Ludovico Rezzonico, the nephew of Pope Clement XIII Rezzonico, and future procurator of San Marco, to Faustina Savorgnan, is also on the Piano Nobile. The ceiling has a large fresco by Giambattista Tiepolo and his son, Giandomenico Tiepolo, depicting the groom and his bride ferried by Apollo's chariot. It was one of the last works of Tiepolo in Venice, before his departure for Madrid in 1762. Tiepolo completed the work on the ceiling in only twelve days on the scaffolding. The Tiepolo fresco, like the paintings in the Grand salon, is framed by trompe-l'œil paintings of architecture, including a false balustrade, by Girolamo Mengozzi Colonna, who also did the painted frames in the Grand Salon. The painting depicts the bridal couple in a chariot, being led by the sun god, Apollo. Other allegorical figures include cupid blindfold, a flight of putti and doves, the figure of Fame, holding a trumpet; the three graces on a cloud; a bearded old man with a laurel crown symbolizing Merit; and a lion, the symbol of Venice, along with coats of arms of the two families. …

Second floor galleries

The second (third, in U.S. use), or upper floor, contains a series of galleries displaying Venetian paintings and decorative arts from the 18th century. Several major paintings by Canaletto are on display, including Architectural Caprice and two views of the Grand Canal, painted in 1719-20 during his youth. They marked the beginning of his famous series of Venice scenes. They were purchased for the museum by the City of Venice in 1983. Another large-scale depiction of the port The festival of Saint Martha by Gaspare Diziani, is also on display, along with several celebrated scenes of life in Venice during the period by Francesco Guardi.

The Parlor Hall takes its name from Francesco Guardi's painting: The Parlor of the Nuns at San Zaccaria (1740-1745) exhibited in the hall with – The Foyer of Dandolo's palace in San Moisè. The fresco of the ceiling entitled: Conjugal Concorde crowned by Virtue in the presence of Justice, Prudence, Temperance, Fame, Abundance is a work of Costantino Cedini (Padua, 1741 - Venice, 1811), member of the Guild of the painters of Venice and professor at the Academy of Fine Arts of Venice. The fresco was originally in the palace Nani in Cannaregio. It was transferred in the 1930s to its current location. The frame surrounding the fresco is older than a century ago and is due to the quadraturist Antonio Felice Ferrari (1667 - 1720).

Other Venetian artists whose works can be seen on this floor include Cima da Conegliano, Alvise Vivarini, Bonifacio de' Pitati; Tintoretto, Schiavone, the Bassano family, Paolo Fiammingo, Lambert Sustris; Padovanino and Carpinoni, Pietro Vecchia, Giovanni Segala, Palma il Giovane, Bernardo Strozzi, Francesco Maffei, Giovan Battista Langetti, Pietro Liberi; Balestra, Niccolò Bambini, Piazzetta, Nicola Grassi, Pietro Longhi, Rosalba Carriera, Sebastiano and Marco Ricci, Pellegrini, Amigoni, Antonio Marini, Zuccarelli, Zais, Giuseppe Bernardino Bison, Natale Schiavoni, Ippolito Caffi, Mancini, and Emma Ciardi.

A section on the second floor contains rooms with of frescos by Giandomenico Tiepolo, son of Giambattista Tiepolo, which were originally in the Villa Zianigo, near Mirano.

The hallway …