AA-2026-3AED01
On the image
In the 1950s, the postwar European grand tour had been democratised just enough that small groups of travellers — some in hats, most with the slightly stunned look of people who have been told this is the most beautiful city in the world and are trying to feel it — gathered in the Piazzetta di San Marco in front of the Doge's Palace and the Basilica's ornate Gothic facade as a matter of itinerary obligation. Venice had been doing this to visitors for centuries, offering a skyline of domes, pinnacles, and marble saints that made every other city feel like it had underperformed, and the city was quite aware of this. The small crowd in the foreground mills with the purposeful aimlessness of a tour group whose guide has just said 'take ten minutes,' which is to say they are standing near something magnificent and mostly looking at each other. The whole scene has the quality of a duty being discharged: you were supposed to come to Venice, you came to Venice, and now there would be a record of it, filed between the Colosseum and the canals in an album nobody's grandchildren will ever quite finish looking through.
Visually related — by likeness
Tourists before the Doge's Palace and Basilica di San Marco, Venice, 1950s. 1950–1959. Archive & Atlas, Historical Image Library, AA-2026-3AED01. https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/tourists-before-the-doge-s-palace-and-basilica-di-san-marco-venice-1950s.
@misc{aaAA20263AED01,
title = {Tourists before the Doge's Palace and Basilica di San Marco, Venice, 1950s},
year = {1950–1959},
howpublished = {Archive \& Atlas, Historical Image Library},
note = {Accession AA-2026-3AED01},
url = {https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/tourists-before-the-doge-s-palace-and-basilica-di-san-marco-venice-1950s}
}TY - ART TI - Tourists before the Doge's Palace and Basilica di San Marco, Venice, 1950s PY - 1950–1959 PB - Archive & Atlas, Historical Image Library AN - AA-2026-3AED01 UR - https://thearchive.archiveandatlas.com/library/tourists-before-the-doge-s-palace-and-basilica-di-san-marco-venice-1950s ER -
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