It will be the water procession on the Grand Canal with masked figures that will open on Sunday the 2024 edition of the Venice Carnival, dedicated to one of its most famous citizens, Marco Polo, whose death marks the 700th anniversary.
“To the East, the surprising journey of Marco Polo” is the theme chosen this year by the Venice City Council and Vela Spa, the organizer of the events, for the party, the prologue of which is already on Saturday January 27th. The stalls selling Venetian specialties will take place in the popular Canareggio district, while in Dese on the mainland there will be a parade of allegorical floats.
This year the opening of the event coincides with Remembrance Day. To respect this commemoration, the official opening events are scheduled for Sunday 28th and are limited only to the general programming of family shows on the 27th. Therefore, on Sunday the boat procession will take place with hundreds of participants and with the 'giant Panthegana' .
To open the 2024 Carnival Balls and commemorate the “Venetian Festival”, the protagonist is the tradition of rowing between hundreds of masked rowers, as well as the shows organized by street artists in the fields.
The party reaches its peak from Saturday February 3rd and Sunday February 4th, as well as on the days of Fat Week (from Thursday 8th to Tuesday 13th). A journey through the colors and emotions of live entertainment for a total of more than 80 companies, 200 artists and 1000 daily show repeats.
But Venice is a perpetual box full of surprises. Since it is a door over which there is an arch decorated with a marble frame and decorated with bas-reliefs depicting animals and plants in the Byzantine style, which may have been plundered by the Venetians in Byzantium in the attack of 1204. This picture is offered at the San Barrio by Giovanni Grisostomo, in the old Sabionera courtyard, former sand deposit for construction, recently renamed “Second Court of Milion” because here are the houses and warehouses of the Polo family, the merchant uncle of Messer Marco Polo , who went down in history through the memories of his travels to the East collected in the book “Il Milione” and whose death this year marks the seven hundredth anniversary.
The entire area was devastated by a terrible fire in 1597 and only a few ruins remain of the old Polo Houses, which were demolished in 1678 to make way for the Theater of San Giovanni Crisostomo, sponsored by the patrician Grimani family and built in 1597 Malibran was renamed in the 19th century in honor of the famous soprano María Malibran. However, according to the research of the historian Giuseppe Tassini, this preserved medieval portal was precisely the entrance to the Polo domus.
You can still see it. “It is a real disaster, it is the ugly graffiti that unknown writers painted in the basement of Marco Polo's house,” denounces the Venetian actor and director Alessandro Bressanello, who lives in an apartment in the courtyard of Milion and possibly was saved from the fire of 1597 because it is located directly above the old portal: in fact, the Milion Court is quite far from the main pedestrian routes of the city center.
Especially at night, when the lighting is poor, it is a no-man's land, and the Sotoportego is often dirty, in addition to the markings painted on the plaster and on the old supporting pillars – which fortunately saved the marble decorations of the entrance arch – and gives off the smell of a latrine. Before the eyes of tourists and history lovers who visit it during the day, a spectacle of decay and neglect of a corner of ancient Venice is presented.
“I hope that on the occasion of the celebrations of the 700th anniversary of Marco Polo's death, someone will think about cleaning it, because so far it has only been announced by the Masegno and Ninzioleti Volunteer Association, which has promised to intervene in March.” “Bressanello shoots. Venice is like that.