When I hear the voice of Venice, my mind wanders into that nebulous space where time momentarily stops and I am quietly propelled into an intimate dialogue with my own free floating thoughts. The voice of Venice thankfully reminds me that there is an arena in which fantasy and reality can collide, coexist, and comfortably accommodate contradictions. Venice, for me, is a metaphor for unexpected creative possibilities. This notion never fails to captivate me.

Spatially, Venice amplified the joy of unanticipated, variegated pleasures inherent in experiencing architecture. What a delight it is to feel the opening and closing of space as you amble down a narrow, noisy cobblestone street at the canal’s edge, which miraculously transforms into the enormous expansiveness of Piazza San Marco. This, of course, is always in the context of savoring a series of sensuous changes in scale- from the tiniest mosaic tile to the vastness of the surrounding sea.

Temporally, Venice embodies similar aesthetic contradictions. While it is the living history of handcrafted costumes and masked balls hiding surreptitiously behind thick, textural stone walls, it is simultaneously the contemporary global exchange of cutting edge artistic critical thought emanating from the continuous cycle of Art and Architecture Biennales.

Whether frivolous or substantial, Venice is a place where, at any moment, something mysteriously intriguing may happen. It is the native soil of an open-ended spirit of creative opportunity. Knowing that this free space exists, situates me in the expansive realm of inventive ideas that is the essence of my artistic process. For this, as an architect, I am most thankful.

Braverman, Louise. Essay in Dream of Venice Architecture, edited by JoAnn Locktov. Canada: Bella Figura Publications, 2016.