These images from 2015 are of a piano nobile whose grand appearance was
produced by an ingenious combination of authentic historical elements
(such as the stucco figures) and clever, skillfully-done simulations,
which upon closer inspection, readily revealed--in fact,
reveled
in--the modest contemporary materials of which they were constructed.
In
foregrounding their stagecraft the creators of the space remained true
to John Ruskin's dictum that missing historical elements should not be
replaced by modern simulations, whose aim is to fool the
unsuspecting into thinking everything they see is the real, historical
thing itself--as is the case of the extensively reconstructed facade of
the Basilica of San Marco, for example, and in most other famous sites of Venice as well. But in this case they did so with a sense of
whimsy (not really discernible in these photos) that Ruskin would never
have imagined.
