The particular morphology of this tip of "land of water", the splendid position of the villas, the "staying around" of parks and gardens, the "mingling" of the lagoon between valleys and countrysides, the physical and mental move that this itinerary implies, all this constitutes a "place of imagination" where the boundaries between elements dim, almost disappear at the eyes of those who live the dream of passing the open doors of these villas.

THE HISTORY
The villas that create the landscape of the Brenta canal - from the Malcontenta of the Foscaris to the royal palace of the Pisanis - privilege a recreational function, dissociating it, in some way, from the more typical and characteristic typology and structures of the Venetian villa, which tends to unite and harmonize the requirements of "comfort" and of "utility".
In Venice, the recognizable origin of the structure of the villa with garden goes back to the end of the 14th century, to the thriving of the humanistic circles like the one of Leonardo Giustinian, politician and poet, who boasted with his correspondents Guarino, Pietro Tomasi, etc. of his "domum positam Muriani cum horto et domuncula vineali". Of Murano, about one century later, Pietro Casola - who stopped in Venice on his pilgrimage to Jerusalem - exalted, in 1494, the "belli zardini" (beautiful gardens). Scoto, on the other "isola della Zuecca" spoke out his admiration "ai molti giardini, et vaghi edifici" (for the numerous gardens and the lovely buildings". These situations really give a particular imprint to the lagoon banks of Venice: at the same time, they are architectonic urban episodes that may be interpreted as the realization of the refuge, as a flight from the commercial heart of the city.
The graphic sources make it possible to visualize opportunely the villas and the gardens, built for the permanent requirements of the literary hotium, of the absorbed and high-minded conversation and of meditation. Their structure presents a modest architectonic and figurative evidence for what concerns the front façades, while they are fully articulated towards the open space of the hortus. The back façade, as a matter of fact, normally presents a porch overhung by a loggia on the first floor. From the porch an embowered passage divides the flowerbeds, leads to a well or a fountain and ends at the foot of a little wood.
The composition of the villa-garden re-proposes faithfully in the Brenta Riviera the lagoon model. We easily may notice how the choice and the combination of the elements of the garden obey to a symbolic intention, on which even the interaction of these elements depends, since it must meet the requirements of the practical function of comfort. In other words the chosen plant species (especially laurel) and of the fountain, represent, so to speak, a reference to the Parnassus and an allusion to Eden; the orchards and their disposition help to create areas of shade and of rest, deputed to quiet promenades from the house to the open spaces and to the rest in the rural peace for high-minded meditation.
As time went by, these assets were emphasized: the villa became, progressively, a sumptuous residence for meetings, where prestige had to be evident. With the growing of the outer (pronai, sumptuous gables, colonnades) and inner spaces (halls and stairs) there was also a pompous widening of the gardens. At the same time, as the halls of the residence were adorned now by frescoes that exalted and glorified in an Olympic style the noble dignity of the owner and did no longer reproduce the georgic and bucolic myths, so - almost like in a dialogue with these - statues were erected to populate the open spaces and to guide the way of the guests through the garden. The frescoes and the statues obey to a precise iconographic plan that realizes, unlike the former cozy universe of measured conversation, fabulous Armida's gardens or splendid and sumptuous Elysian Fields. The use, inside the buildings, of elements to which Palladio had given decorum and harmony, obeys to a different syntax and another kind of composition. According to Costa, in about two centuries from the lagoons to Padova, along that Brenta canal that Palladio himself, with his Malcontenta, had definitively transformed from a mere commercial way into a residential parade, grew "almost a borough of the city of Venice". Carlo Goldoni called it a "small Versailles", hinting at the great villa and at the magnificent gardens built for Almorò Pisani, indeed an imitation of the Palace of his friend Louis XIV.
Lionello Puppi

Info for the visit:
Associazione Echidna
Tel. +39 340 7615862 - email villeaperte@libero.it