Gabriel Bella: Bella la vita a Venezia

The exhibition presents the complete collection of paintings by Gabriel Bella, the artist whose paintings depicted the life of eighteenth-century Venice. The title plays on three narrative threads: “Bella” as both adjective and the artist’s name; “life”, because the everyday life of the city becomes the true protagonist; and “Venice”, which through these images continues its centuries-old tradition of self-representation, propaganda, and the construction of the collective imagination. This body of work is capable of exalting Venetian magnificence while narrating, through images, the political myth of the Serenissima. It is not a random assemblage, but a unified iconographic project, probably developed in the 1780s.

The 69 canvases are exhibited alongside engravings and volumes from the Library’s historical collection, as well as audiovisual materials — including selections of films from the Istituto Luce and a film programme dedicated to an illustrious contemporary of Gabriel Bella, Giacomo Casanova, in the year marking the 300th anniversary of his birth — which broaden the reading of the historical context and open up contemporary resonances.