San Marco Basilica was the focus of public religious life, but the scores of other Venetian churches are an essential element of the city’s landscape. Their campaniles, rarely perpendicular, punctuate the skyline; their ornate facades grace the squares, from the delicate Gothic of Madonna dell’Orto (c. 1350, rebuilt in the early 15th century) and the restrained elegance of the early Renaissance at Santa Maria dei Miracoli (1481–89) to the Baroque flamboyance of San Moisè (1668).

The most impressive churches are those of the medieval mendicant orders, the Dominicans and Franciscans. The Dominican church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo (San Zanipolo in the Venetian dialect; founded in 1246 and consecrated in 1430) is of rose-coloured stone, its vast interior designed for the large congregations of urban poor whom it served. As a burial place, it was favoured by noble families; a number of doges lie there, commemorated by richly wrought sepulchral monuments. The church’s altarpieces, painted by Titian and Giovanni Bellini, were partially destroyed in a fire in 1867, and for masterworks it can no longer rival the Franciscan Santa Maria dei Frari (founded c. 1250, completed c. 1443), whose enormous Gothic mass rises in the densely settled area west of the Rialto. Titian’s Assumption (1516–18) stands over its high altar, and the church and sacristy display a magnificent collection of Venetian religious paintings from the High Renaissance.

In contrast to these great Gothic churches, and indeed to the small parish churches enmeshed in the urban fabric, are the church of La Salute and the Palladian churches seen across the water from San Marco. All serve a monumental as much as a religious function. Santa Maria della Salute (begun in 1631/32 under Baldassare Longhena and consecrated in 1687), erected in thanksgiving for release from plague, occupies a spectacular site where the Grand Canal opens into the San Marco Basin. Its mass of brilliant white marble rises majestically above the Gothic palaces of the Grand Canal. The churches of San Giorgio Maggiore (1566, completed in 1610), Il Redentore (1577–92), and Le Zitelle (1582–86) were all designed by Andrea Palladio; their Roman Classical facades were intended to be seen across the waters of the Giudecca Canal. San Giorgio and La Salute turn the open lagoon in front of San Marco into an aquatic extension of the piazza. Il Redentore is linked to Venice proper by a temporary bridge every July on the Feast of the Redeemer, when illuminated boats fill the Giudecca Canal and there is a display of fireworks.

Painting

Just as the city’s architecture reflects notions of Venice as a place for public ritual, so too Venetian painting evokes the “myth of Venice.” The magnificent art treasures of the republic now grace churches, palaces, and galleries throughout the city. Early paintings were heavily influenced by Byzantine traditions, as can be seen in the religious icons of Lorenzo and Paolo Veneziano and in the taste for mosaic patternings and vibrant colour and the love of light that are characteristic of the Venetian school. Painting styles evolved in concert with broader European tastes, and in the 18th century much of the work became more frivolous, even voluptuous, no longer addressing serious themes. Nonetheless, the sense of sparkling colour, the contrasts of light and shade, and the reflective intensity of sky, stone, and water so immediately apparent on the streets and canals of Venice reverberate through all its artistic productions.

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The enduring theme of Venetian culture is Venice itself. From the late 15th-century townscape paintings by Vittore Carpaccio and Gentile Bellini to the High Renaissance Madonnas and saints in landscapes by Giovanni Bellini, Giorgione, and Titian, the Mannerist canvases of Paolo Veronese and Tintoretto, and the rich early 18th-century townscapes of Canaletto, G.B. Piazzetta, and Francesco Guardi, Venetian painting returned constantly to themes celebrating the city, its great families, its legends, its saints, and its victories. Venetian art was more often than not political art; like all cultural life in Venice, it was subordinated to the interests of the state.

Music

Colour and splendour reflecting civic pride are evident in Venetian music too. The works written for several separate choirs by Giovanni Gabrieli and Claudio Monteverdi for San Marco Basilica echoed around its Byzantine interior with stirring effect. After the opening in 1637 of the San Cassiano Theatre (Europe’s first public opera house), the commercial flair of Venice’s patricians, allied to the secular ambitions of choirmasters of San Marco such as Monteverdi and Francesco Cavalli (both noted opera composers) and Giovanni Legrenzi, made Venice the operatic capital of Europe.

Vocal and instrumental traditions were strengthened in the 18th century when four ospedali, orphanages run by churches, incorporated conservatories of music. Antonio Vivaldi was master of music at the Santa Maria della Pietà Hospice between 1703 and 1741. Venice’s opera house, La Fenice Theatre, built in 1792, became a major Italian music centre. The structure was severely damaged by fire in 1996. The premieres of Gioachino Rossini’s Tancredi (1813) and Guiseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto (1851) and La Traviata (1853) at La Fenice were witnessed by their composers. Many foreign composers also developed a special attachment to the city.