The barchessas of Villa Badoer  in Fratta Polesine reveal an unusual form: one might call it a gesture of embrace . Opening gently from the main volume of the villa, they curve forward, welcoming  those who approach — just as Palladio had already imagined in the grand vision for Villa Trissino at Meledo di Sarego. There are architectures that are not merely seen: they are felt , like breaths held within stone.They do not simply stand: they perform gestures .Among these gestu

«It is nothing more than a spiral staircase, but you never get tired of going up and down» , wrote Goethe in his Journey to Italy. There is one project, in Palladio's Four Books , only one "modern" project, not Italian. It is the double elliptical staircase of the Château de Chambord, in France. As everyone knows, Leonardo Da Vinci decided to end his career, and his life, at the court of the cultured and refined Francesco I, with the high-sounding title of premier peintre,

…and the subtle thread that binds him to the Serenissima There are figures who do not simply pass through history: they leave a fragrance as they go. Vincenzo Corrado  — cook, philosopher, and man of letters — lived between the 18th and 19th centuries as “Head of the Services of the Mouth”  to Prince Michele IV Imperiali.In the aristocratic halls of Naples, among the trembling candlelight and the silver reflecting quiet movements, Corrado did not merely cook: he directed.His

Giacomo Casanova is often portrayed as a Don Juan obsessed with sexual performance, a cynical and immoral dissimulator: this probably confuses the character with his caricature. The journey of the Venetian traveler has certainly blurred the tracks: adventurer, lover of more than a hundred women, exiled to a thousand trades, the man made his life a job. He says that Turin can offer everything you could want in terms of sex and love, but that being a very small city you are

Venice and Florence, for many centuries rivaled as two world capitals of art, references in all the great arts: in painting, architecture, sculpture, not to mention music. A magnificent challenge: on one side Giotto, Michelangelo, Donatello, Brunelleschi, Alberti, Leonardo Da Vinci, on the other Giorgione, Veronese, Tiziano, Bellini, Tiepolo, Tintoretto, Palladio, Scamozzi, Canova, Canaletto... to name a few. For all of them, the first question was: how to represent the uni

"Once upon a time, there was a young Tuscan shepherd who, to escape boredom, drew sheep on rocks . One day, he was admired by Cimabue , the most famous painter of the time, who asked him to become his pupil ." Whether you believe this legend or not, one thing is certain: Giotto learned so much from his master that he surpassed him. If we had to name just one of Giotto's works, for us it would certainly be the fresco decoration of the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua , named after th

A letter that seems similar to many others can surprise and turn out to be something very special and interesting. Like this Sicilian letter of 1836 addressed to Verona. The letter is addressed to a noblewoman from Verona , Countess Giulia Guarienti Buri , written by her son Girolamo . A private letter, a real family conversation. Girolamo tells some days of his journey in Sicily , five days that describe the itinerary from Palermo to Girgenti ; it seems written day by day, a

In 1506, the Venetian Pietro Bembo , an influential figure in the development of the Italian language, moved to Urbino . In Urbino he met at the refined court of Montefeltro Castiglione, Bibbiena... Having decided not to follow a political career in the Republic of Venice , and to devote himself to study. He did not succeed to settle in Rome, but, thanks to Elisabetta Gonzaga , he was received by the Duke of Urbino , where he lived until 1512. However, Bembo's stay in Urbi

The relations between Republic of Venice and Turin during the Italian Risorgimento . More than one hundred and fifty years ago, on February 18, 1861 , the first Italian parliament met in Turin, capital of a new state: Italy. The movement had been launched in the twenties of the nineteenth century by writers , artists and politicians anxious to unify the mosaic of states that had emerged from the irruption of Napoleon's armies in this geographical space. The democratic revolu