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Francesco Guardi - The Doge of Venice Attending the Shrove Thursday Festivities in the Piazzetta [c.1775]

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Francesco Guardi - The Doge of Venice Attending the Shrove Thursday Festivities in the Piazzetta [c.1775]

Over the centuries a simple public festival developed into a magnificent state ceremony in which the reigning doge participated from his neighboring palace. The festivities reached their zenith in the 18th century during the lifetime of the painter Francesco Guardi. This painting conveys a lively impression of the proceedings. The square is filled to the very edges with spectators sitting on grandstands or watching from the balcony of St. Mark’s. On the Piazzetta stands a temple specially erected for the occasion and richly decorated with statues and coats of arms. On the stage to the left, acrobats wearing yellow costumes, mostly young Venetians, are building a human pyramid. The two long ropes hanging from the top of the Campanile announce the traditional climax of the festivities. The Flight of the Turk or Flight of the Angel involved an acrobat climbing up the right-hand rope (secured to a boat in the Bacino di San Marco) to the top of the bell tower before making his way precariously down the other rope to the grandstand in front of the Doge’s Palace.

[Musée du Louvre, Paris - Oil on canvas, 67 x 100 cm]

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