This bulky book is disturbing. Some of the irritations are intended by the photographer Werner Pawlok and the authors of the guest contributions to this Venice illustrated book. Other things seem involuntarily slipped. That is precisely why “Dimore Veneziane” is so exciting. Because the band, even if you don’t always recognize it at first glance, seriously grapples with the contradictions in this city – and of course cannot resolve them.
The title can be translated as “Venetian homeland”. Pawlok and his colleagues are interested in using the breather that the corona pandemic has given the city in terms of overtourism to create a different picture of it. Away from the reduction to tourist hotspots and trimming the city to its instagrammability. Jane Da Mosto, who founded the organization We are here Venice, whose aim is to protect the city and the lagoon, sums it up: “Venice thrives and flourishes through the interest and support of the international community in in more ways than one, but it also requires the continued existence of a strong, resilient population. “
The interiors of the palaces tell their own story of the city
Pawlok made five trips to Venice during the pandemic, on which he mainly photographed what he calls “the inner workings” of this city: the interior of the palaces, mainly along the Grand Canal, also the interior of churches and museums. So that which tourists who are only in the city for a few hours (cannot) get to see. The Venice of the residents, both local and new.
However, Pawlok’s photographs, especially those of the interiors, are largely deserted. He justifies this with the fact that he can better visualize the interlinking of past and present, since it is not about individual, current residents, but about generations of people who created this city and left their mark. This argument is not completely convincing if the strong, resilient population of Venice, whose existence is indispensable for the continued existence of Venice not only according to Jana Da Mosto, only emerges indirectly through the way in which they furnish their apartments.
Venice has great potential as the city of the future – it has always been car-free
At first glance, Werner Pawlok’s photographs tend to reinforce the impression of a museum. However, it is precisely this that must be avoided at all costs, argues the architect and writer Sergio Pascolo. He sees the danger, should Venice fall back into the “tourist monoculture” after the end of the pandemic, that the city will no longer be a city at all, but only “one big open-air museum and mega holiday resort”. Venice could become one of the most attractive cities of the future – it has always been car-free.
If you look at Pawlok’s photographs as a meneteel, they actually get a great power: The absence of the residents can then be interpreted as a threatening prospect. The aesthetics of the photographs contribute to this, with an extreme emphasis on the red and yellow tones, shifting all these interiors, but also the outdoor shots, into the unnatural, fairytale-like. According to Sergio Pascolo, Venice has the stigma of a city that has fallen out of time. This can also be read from Pawlok’s recordings.
When Werner Pawlok stylized reality in this way, some of the things that Venice is suffering from become visible. Not by documenting the ugly sides and the fatal excesses. But by ultimately releasing the beauty of the city from the already fragile social contexts of the residents. And thus shows in shrill clarity what is in danger of being lost.
Werner Pawlok: Dimore Veneziane. The art of living Venice. Translated from the Italian by Barbara Neeb and Katharina Schmidt. Frederking & Thaler Verlag, Munich 2022. 320 pages, 98 euros.