Life Amidst Death: Pruning Time on San Michele

Those many people who can only conceive of Venice as a symbol of death and decay have obviously never been behind the walls of the historic city, nor of those on the cemetery island of San Michele, where an old vineyard has been lovingly restored and is producing wine. You'll find a list of links to posts about such goings on and about the group responsible for them at the end of this post about the man who was the original driving force behind it: Flavio Franceshet. (6 March 2014)

 

 

 

 

Council of Elders, Sant' Elena

One of the great deprivations of American life is a social and economic environment which makes possible scenes like the above. Alas, the social and economic environment that gave rise to such scenes in Venice has largely been wiped out there as well. (15 September 2015)

Night Fishing

28 July 2016

Festa del Redentore: From a Boat in the Bacino of San Marco

19 July 2014

Festa di San Pietro di Castello, 28 June 2014

Conversation On the Grand Canal

1 April 2017: A water colorist afloat on the Grand Canal in a sandolo makes a point to a friend in a motorboat

Today Is the Festa della Salute: Here Are a Dozen Views from Past Years

2017

 

 

 

 

 

Today the Festa della Salute is being celebrated at the church of the Salute, which since July has been surrounded by scaffolding and shrouded beneath the acres of material used to conceal all renovations done in Venice from public view--and often to serve as billboards for sale, sometimes even long after renovations have been completed. 

These are images from prior years, a couple of which have not been posted before. For information about the festa and its rituals, both religious and culinary (in the case of the traditional dish of castradina seen in the last image below), look under the date of November 21 on almost any of the archive years in the right margin of this blog.

2013

2017

2013

2016

2016

2014

2016: water from Lourdes stacked in plastic bottles shaped like the Virgin Mary

2014: for Venetian kids, the festa is all about candy (of the cotton variety in this image) and balloons

2013

2016: some people worried about the health and well-being of the city itself

2013: homemade castradina, whose preparation etc is described here

Boys of Summer, Al Bacan

As our son starts school today in Toronto and summer officially comes to a close for him (and us), here's an image of him and his friends during the height of summer taken at il bacan, the sandbank extending eastwards off Sant' Erasmo, on 27 July 2021

Regata Storica 2020: The Races (18 Images)

 

I'm afraid it might seem to some that this has become a rowing blog, as the last three posts have had la voga alla Veneta as their subject, but this is the last in the series, as it features images of the adult races from yesterday's Regata Storica.

Our 12-year-old son and his partner did not place in their junior race, but they had a good time and our son was especially thrilled that before the competitions began he was able to row down a good stretch of the Grand Canal by himself (as well as race down it later with his partner).

The images are grouped in the order that the adult events took place: first, the Regate delle Caorline a Sei Remi, then the Regata delle Donne su Mascarete a Due Remi, then the Regata dei Gondolini a Due Remi. In the brief intervals between these races were a series of two boat heats--with the boats rowed backwards--between university teams from Ca' Foscari (in Venice), Roma, Padova, and Trento (and this is the order in which the teams finished). An image of this appears in this post after the six caorline man race and before the two man gondolini race.

Masks were mandatory along the route of the regate for spectators (not everyone kept them on, despite periodical reminders by police passing by in boats), and in the case of the university teams you'll see that the coxswains wore face shields to protect their crews from any germs their exhortations might carry with them (and a good thing, too, as the coxswain picture below, with the Ca' Foscari team, I believe, was particularly vehement).

Final results of the races can be found here.

I'll put up one more post about the Regata Storica, but the next one will focus on the pageantry rather than the rowing.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

This Year's Festa del Redentore: Music--Instead of Fireworks--In the Air (16 Views)

Venice's Festa del Redentore is famous for its midnight firework show--but not this year. In the wake of the corona virus crisis in Italy, and in acknowledgement of the ongoing danger it presents and the serious damages--both physiological and economic--it continues to cause, city authorities decided pyrotechnics would be inappropriate.

This year the origins of the festa in the plague of 1576 reasserted themselves, and the realities of the present dictated a more subdued and intimate approach.

The bridge across the Giudecca was set up as usual (as you can see above), and the religious festivities in the church were carried out as usual (though in accordance with social distancing guidelines). But the day-tripping and mass tourist crowds were absent, and the bacino of San Marco--typically packed by the afternoon with boats claiming their places for the firework display at night--was basically empty, but for law enforcement, some residents such as ourselves tooling around, and four decorated and illuminated barges carrying live musical acts, in the tradition of the galleggianti of old (as illustrated on the website of the Venice non-profit organization Arzanà, which is dedicated to the study, conservation, and restoration of the traditional boats of the lagoon).

(A complete list of the performers on the boats can be found here, and includes the ever-popular local band Furio e gli Ska-J). 

A mid-20th century example of a galleggiante from the Arzanà website entry on this kind of festival boat

One of this year's four roving galleggianti (at right above, and in images below) performs for diners on the Giudecca

A rain storm on Friday night left the Chinese lanterns lining both sides of the Giudecca Canal bedraggled--but their lights no less bright...

We strung our boat with some lanterns of its own.

The same gallegiante passes beneath the votive bridge...

While another makes a stop in front of La Zecca

A view of the lanterns strung from the Punta della Dogana taken on Friday evening, before the rains transmogrified them

Though no boats anchored this year in the bacino, some did moor along the Grand Canal, to eat dinner and enjoy the passing galleggianti

Other people, as is typical each year, set up their dinner tables on fondamente

Saturday afternoon, before any of the four galleggianti were launched, this mototopo with three lip-syncing ladies passed down the Grand Canal--but, as far as I could ascertain, they were shooting a music video rather than celebrating the festa.

 

The votive bridge on Friday evening