UniCredit Bank has sponsored the Russian-Italian exhibition project titled “Panorama of Venice. Opening Up an Endless Horizon”, which is organized by the Schusev State Museum of Architecture, the Italian Institute of Culture in Moscow and the Querini-Stampalia Foundation (Venice) with the support from the Italian Embassy in the Russian Federation as part of the Russian-Italian Cross Year of Museums 2021-2022.

The exhibition will be held from 3 December 2021 to 27 February 2022 in the building of Aptekarsky Prikaz of the Schusev State Museum of Architecture at Vozdvizhenka str.,5. The project originated in Italy and was successfully exhibited from June to October 2021 at the Querini Stampalia Foundation Museum in Venice. It provides insight into how Venice, the “city on the water” that emerged on the islands, became the heroine of a special subject of art called “Panorama of Venice”, which had been developing over centuries.

The curators of the project are Giandomenico Romanelli and Pascaline Vatin, who thought up the Italian exhibition, studied the history of the Venice panorama genre in European engraving and painting, and also studied the unique panorama of the city by Giovanni Biasin, which is about 23 meters long. This panorama was created as a special art attraction for the 1887 National Art Exhibition in Venice, the forerunner of the renowned Venice Biennale of Contemporary Art.

“UniCredit is committed to support art and culture, which have a deep social value and are closely intertwined with the social function” comments Kirill Zhukov-Emelyanov, Chairman of the Management Board of UniCredit Bank. “Venice is not just one of the most beautiful and famous cities in Italy, where our Group is headquartered, it is also a very symbolic city for the Russian culture and art. Therefore, it is doubly gratifying that now visitors to the Russian museum also have the opportunity to learn more about the history of this unusual city and once again admire its beauty.”

In the Russian-Italian version of the exhibition, the panorama of Venice was complemented by paintings of vedutas from the collection of the Schusev State Museum of Architecture.  These works not only preserved the views of the city, but also captured the traditions of Venetian scenic painting by Giovanni Antonio Canaletto, Michele Marieschi, and other Venetian artists. Julia Ratomskaya from the Museum of Architecture joined the team of curators of the project for the Moscow exhibition.

The exhibition will show panoramas of Venice in the XV^th to XVIII^th centuries, which have long inspired the public to travel to the city on the water. With the help of advanced technologies, the Panorama of Venice by Giovanni Biasin will be recreated, and for the first time fragments of a copy of this panorama created by Giovanni Biasin and his son Vittorio for participation in the World’s Fair will be presented.

Visitors will see how ancient engravings influenced the illustrations of tourist guides, the appearance of panoramic lithographs with views of Venice, and illustrated maps of the unique city of the XVIII^th and XIX^th centuries. The project exhibits will demonstrate how the 1887 panorama of Venice by Giovanni Biasin became the forerunner of the European scenic cinema of the late XIX^th and XX^th centuries.