The splendid fifteenth-century Gothic palace seemed to have been damaged for the umpteenth time by Venice's high water. Careful restoration work has handed it back to the city and its visitors as a permanent museum to chronicle the extraordinary life and works of Mariano Fortuny
by Marco Muggiano
On the night of November 12, 2019, Venice found itself under water. An Acqua Granda ("high water") which also invaded the fifteenth-century Palazzo Fortuny. Water doesn't make exceptions for such ancient structures. The wooden plank floor appeared to be doomed, and overall, the damage was immediately extensive. Today that accident that seemed to be fatal has been laboriously (and expensively) filed away, and this splendid Gothic jewel has been reborn as a permanent museum on the circuit of the Fondazione Musei Civici Venezia with the aim of telling the story of the life and works of Mariano Fortuny, the last owner who later donated it to the city.
It was he, a brilliant and fascinating 20th-century artist-designer born in Granada, Spain, who redeemed it from a state of decay and dilapidation. Over the years, he began the work of restoring the building: he cleared the apartments, adapted the rooms, bringing back balance and proportion. Thus, what was once a small atelier dedicated to textiles is now a cultural center devoted to the visual arts: painting, sculpture, lighting design, photography (don't miss Robert Mapplethorpe and Peter Greenaway), and clothing. All this thanks to his exceptional life.
As a young man in Paris, he took painting lessons with Benjamin Constant and sculpture lessons in Rodin's atelier. In 1889, he moved to Venice where he discovered himself as a painter, engraver, bookbinder, sculptor, photographer, architect and inventor. He made his own paints and dyes and manufactured his own brushes. With the "Fortuny dome", he revolutionized stage lighting and theatrical scenography. With his wife and muse, Henriette Negrin, he also made an entrance into the fashion world with "Delphos," a dress made of the finest silk pleats and glass beads. Indeed, the couple is credited with the invention of pleating, with its patent in 1909 (one of more than 50 by Fortuny). It was successful all over the world. In the 1920s and 1930s, his clients included actresses Sarah Bernhardt and Eleonora Duse, dancers and stage designers Isadora Duncan, Lillian Gish, and Martha Graham. As an interior designer, Fortuny furnished the home of Consuelo Vanderbilt and the gaming room of the new Hotel Excelsior in Paris.
Now the testimony of such a colorful and exquisite life resides permanently in the building that bears his name.
The rearrangement of the exhibition was curated by Pier Luigi Pizzi, director and set designer, with Gabriella Belli and Chiara Squarcina of the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia.
San Marco 3958, Venice
Phone +39 041 5200995
fortuny@fmcvenezia.it