Lavish art: Palaces
As I walked along the Grand Canal, I stepped into the finest Venetian palaces. In the Ca’ Sagredo and Gritti palaces, both luxury hotels, I spotted the famous “terrazzo alla veneziana”, or Venetian mosaic. This floor is made by throwing chips of precious stones in mortar. The craftsmen, or “terrazzieri”, do not follow a pattern: their expert hands mix shapes and colours in such a way that the outcome is amazing. They remind me of Jackson Pollock, dripping paint on the canvas. In the floor of the Pisani Moretta palace, I found a daisy enclosed in lapis-lazuli, black bardiglio stone, red French marble, and white marble recovered from ancient columns. The merchants of the Serenissima must have brought materials from all over the world to build such a marvel. The artisans who made it, Domenico and Giacomo Crovato, are the ancestors of a family of “terrazzieri” that still works today.