Venice, from the Porch of Madonna della Salute
Gondolas and sailboats float on the Grand Canal as water, sky, and buildings melt into the same light: the brightest of Turner's oil paintings of Venice. Full commentary ↓
Couldn't load the puzzle image.
Turn on piece outlines to see piece positions on this picture too
Drag the pieces into place · When zoomed in, drag an empty spot to move around
You can also play with a keyboard — Tab to the board, thenSpace pick a piece, Arrow keys move it (with Shift for small steps),Esc deselect, R rotate a piece (Shift+R the other way)
Venice, from the Porch of Madonna della Salute is an oil painting by Joseph Mallord William Turner (ca. 1835) in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. It measures 91.4 × 122.2 cm.
In the pictureIn the right foreground is a white marble column, and beyond it the Grand Canal opens out. Black gondolas and sailboats float on the water, and palaces and bell towers line both banks. The sky is a bright cream, and the water reflects that sky exactly. The details of the buildings are blurred; only light and color remain.
BackgroundTurner painted it around 1835, after his second trip to Venice in 1833. It is a view toward the entrance of the Grand Canal from the porch of the Salute church, and one of the Venetian pictures he showed at the Royal Academy in London. Turner was moving toward his late style of dissolving forms in light, and in this painting the buildings and boats still remain recognizable.
Puzzle tipAs a puzzle it is difficult because most of the colors are light and pale. Pick out the pieces whose colors stand out first, such as the black gondolas, the white column, and the red sails, and join the buildings by the dots of their windows and their rooflines to build the banks. The sky and water are almost the same color, so fix the horizon (the base line of the buildings) first, then divide above from below.
- Artist
- British, London 1775–1851 London
- Classification
- Paintings
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 91.4 x 122.2 cm
- Credit line
- Bequest of Cornelius Vanderbilt, 1899
Source: The Metropolitan Museum of Art ↗
In these collections: Sea and Waterside Masterpiece Puzzles
Stories about this work
- Klimt, Modigliani, Rousseau, Turner: How Four Paintings Differ as Puzzles
Klimt's only full-length portrait of a child, Modigliani's last model, the jungle of a Rousseau who never saw one, and Turner melting form into light. How four very different painters differ as puzzles.
