The Sublime Boat. A royal stage on water

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1 The Sublime Boat. A royal stage on water The Bucentaur of the King of Sardinia, the last existing 18th century Venetian boat in the world, was commissioned by King Vittorio Amedeo II. This Reggia on the water was the brainchild of the brilliant architect Filippo Juvarra. Now fully restored, the most incredible and enchanting artifact crafted for the House of Savoy will be on display after years of painstaking conservation work. This sumptuous boat, once a symbol of power that also offered a floating retreat for the Court, will be on show for the first time in the monumental Great Stables of the Reggia di Venaria. The Royal Peota (or state Galley) will be on display in an exceptional staging by famed stage designer Davide Livermore that will give visitors the chance to admire from up close the hull and the sumptuous engravings and painted decorations in an inspiring baroque setting. The Bucentaur of Savoy is currently the only remaining example of the ancient ceremonial boats of Venetian manufacture. The Peota is the property of Palazzo Madama - Museo Civico d Arte Antica di Torino, that has granted the temporary loan to the Reggia di Venaria. The Council for the Promotion of the Artistic and Cultural Heritage of Turin (Consulta per la Valorizzazione dei Beni Artistici e Culturali di Torino) has promoted and funded the restoration project with 250,000 euros, a project that was entrusted to the La Venaria Reale Conservation and Restoration Center. JUVARRA STABLES Organization: Consorzio di Valorizzazione Culturale La Venaria Reale

2 The Bucentaur of Savoy Turin s Bucentaur - an ancient term that described the magnificent state galleys of the Doges of Venice - is a sumptuous ceremonial boat that was used for river navigation. For the House of Savoy it was a powerful symbol of royal power that provided a stage on water for ceremonial rituals celebrating the Court. The Bucentaur survived because early on it became a precious museum piece. Based on the flat hull that made it suitable for navigation in shallow waters and on its single-deck framework, the Savoy Bucentaur can be classified as a Peota. It was commissioned by King Vittorio Amedeo II of Savoy in 1729 as a Reggia on water and a prestigious symbol of power that was fashionable among European Courts (similar boats were commissioned also by King François I of France and the Houses of Este and Gonzaga). The project was possibly connected to the acquisition of the Royal title by the House of Savoy in 1713, when Vittorio Amedeo II became king of Sicily and, in 1720, King of Sardinia, and finally gained a much coveted access to the sea. The project was probably the brainchild of the famed Court Architect Filippo Juvarra, who at the time was contributing to the creation of a grandiose international image of the House of Savoy through major architectural projects - like the expansion of the Reggia di Venaria and the construction of the Stupinigi Hunting Lodge. The Peota was constructed in Venice in the squeri (or boatyards) where smaller boats - like gondolas, pupparini, sandoli, and other typical Venetian boats - were built and repaired (the Bucentaur of the Doges was built in the boatyards of the Arsenale). Today the Savoy boat is the only remaining example of the excellence of Venetian craftsmanship in the construction of ceremonial boats with their painted and sculpted decorations, since the last Bucentaur of the Doges was destroyed by fire in The Peota of Savoy is almost 16 meters long, 2.60 m wide, and the mast is 12,20 m high. The rich decoration is the work of the Venetian artist Matteo Calderoni and consists of an engraved and gilded sculpted group located at the bow, depicting Narcissus surrounded by old bearded men that symbolize the rivers Adige and Po. At the stern end, another sculpted group depicts two sea horses and a central tiller in the shape of a dragon, while nereids,

3 tritons and marine gods make up a gilded frieze in bold relief that runs the length of the hull. The tiemo (or cabin) is around 5 m long, covered by a wooden roof supported by 12 pillars forming 9 windows fitted with crystal glass and decorated wooden shutters. The boat is equipped with benches for the members of the Court and a gilded table for the monarchs, but originally there were also two small thrones that are now lost. The roof of the tiemo is decorated at one end by the royal insignia and the overall decoration consists of paintings by a Venetian artist depicting The peace between Pope Nicholas V and the Duke of Savoy Amedeo VIII. By renouncing the papal throne in 1449 Amedeo VIII prevented a schism and earned the House of Savoy considerable benefits and ecclesiastical privileges, that were later confirmed with the Concordat of 1727 signed between Benedict XIII and Vittorio Amedeo II. The words FERT and OPPORTUNE are found at the corners and refer to the triumphs and the mottoes of the House of Savoy. The Bucentaur of Savoy was paid for by the Piedmontese administration and its cost exceeded 34,000 liras of Piedmont, roughly equivalent today to 3 million euros. It was an outlandish amount if compared, for example, to the purchase in 1741 of the art collection of Prince Eugene of Savoy-Soissons, consisting of around 200 paintings of the finest quality (around 90,000 liras of Piedmont or 9 million euros today). The value of this ceremonial boat becomes even clearer when one considers that the same amount was earned by the King s Physician over a period of 15 years, and it is equivalent to the earnings of the Court s cabinet maker Pietro Piffetti over a period of 100 years. The Peota of Savoy arrived in Turin after 32 days after being drawn by animals up the Po river. On September 4, 1731 it was entrusted to the concierge of the Castle of Valentino accompanied by a gondola and a burchiella, a freight boat transporting the decorations and the framework to be assembled. The Bucentaur was the protagonist of crucial events: it was first used by King Carlo Emanuele III in 1734 for river navigation. It was later employed for the wedding in Turin of Carlo Emanuele IV to Marie Clotilde of Bourbon in 1775, Vittorio Emanuele II to Marie Adelaide of Austria in 1842, and Amedeo of Aosta to Maria Dal Pozzo della Cisterna in In 1869 the first King of Italy, Vittorio Emanuele II, donated the Bucentaur to the City of Turin that in 1873 added it to the collection of the Municipal Museum. Thus the Peota left the boathouse of the Valentino to reach Palazzo Madama, where it remained until the year 2000, at which time it was transferred to Laboratorio Nicola Restauri, a restoration laboratory in Aramengo d Asti. In September 2011 it was brought to the "La Venaria Reale Conservation and Restoration Center for a complex restoration, promoted by the Council for the Promotion of the Artistic and Cultural Heritage of Turin, in view of a special display. While at the Municipal Museum of Turin, a request was turned down to exhibit the boat at the Italian General Expo in Turin in Only a poster of the event remains with a depiction of the Peota. It was later displayed at Palazzo Carignano in the context of an exhibition of Piedmontese Baroque (May-Oct. 1937) and at Palazzo del Lavoro, in Turin, for an exhibition of antiquities (May-June 1982).

4 Boatyards in Venice The bare hull of the Bucentaur of Savoy was built in a boatyard of Burano: from there it was transferred to Venice to the Rio dei Mendicanti - that is home to boatyards to this day - where it was entrusted to the finest marangoni (or carpenters). It was subsequently richly decorated by Matteo Calderoni with sculptures, engravings, gilding, paintings and tapestries with the help of other masters like Antonio Corradini - who designed the Venice Bucentaur in and by Egidio Goyel - the author of the splendid oriental-looking tiller of the Peota of Savoy. The squero (originally from the dialectal term squara that described the tool used to build boats) is the traditional boatyard where smaller boats were built and repaired. The San Trovaso squero is located along the canal of the same name and dates back to the 17th century: it is one of the very few remaining boatyards in Venice to have been preserved, but today only gondolas are manufactured or repaired here. The House of Savoy and the Serene Republic of Venice For the inauguration of this special display, the Bucentaur of Savoy will be introduced by an exhibition titled I Savoia e la Serenissima (the House of Savoy and the Serene Republic of Venice) organised by the Research Center of Venaria Reale, that illustrates the political and cultural context in which the spectacular boat was created. The Peota can be regarded as a symbol of the centuries-old relations between the House of Savoy and the Republic of Venice: a story that is little known but important to understand the history of Northern Italy and the country as a whole. Between the 16th and the 17th century Turin and Venice were the great capitals of Northern Italy, a role that they would lose only after the French occupation. While Turin recovered its position during the Restoration, and would later lead the process of national unification, Venice lost its primacy over Lombardy and the Veneto territories to be replaced by Milan (that was made a capital by Napoleon and remained so under Austrian rule). It was only when Austrian rule ended in 1866, that Venice would eventually regain the freedom it had enjoyed for centuries. The Alpha and the Omega - the starting and ending points of the narration - will be two dates that best illustrate how the role of the two States as major Italian powers evolved between the 16th and the 19th century. The starting point is the title of Venetian patrician that was bestowed upon Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy and his descendants in 1574 (earning him the right to sit on the Great Council of Venice) on the occasion of a famous journey the Duke undertook to the Venetian capital. The narration ends in Turin in 1866, where a delegation from Venice arrived to request to join Italy and the subsequent entrance of Vittorio Emanuele II in the Venice Lagoon. The story will be documented through political themes, like the military

5 alliance between the two States against the Turks (from the battle of Lepanto to the War of Candia) and the clash between Charlotte of Savoy and the Venetian Caterina Cornaro over the throne of the Kingdom of Cyprus. Special emphasis will be placed on architectural similarities (consider the treatises of Palladio and Scamozzi that were dedicated to the Dukes of Savoy) and artistic affinities, with works by Titian and views by Canaletto, all the way to Hayez. Masterpieces on show will include works by late 16th-early 17th century Venetian masters from the Savoy collections (with superb and grandiose canvases by Veronese and Bassano painted for Carlo Emanuele I and restored for the occasion by the La Venaria Reale Conservation and Restoration Center) and the authors of the sumptuous decorations of Savoy palaces in the 18th century (from Sebastiano Ricci to Francesco Trevisani and Giovan Battista Crosato), under the close supervision of the Court Architect Filippo Juvarra, who also participated in the project of the Bucentaur of Savoy. La Venaria Reale - Communication & Press Office ph.: comunicazione@lavenariareale.it andrea.scaringella@lavenariareale.it