Procuraties
Prokuratien (it. Procuratie di San Marco ) is the name for the Venetian building authority that has existed since the Middle Ages.
The office of Procurator in San Marco is very old. Initially it was only responsible for the administration and maintenance of the Dogenkapelle. In the period from the 14th to the 16th century, however, more and more new tasks were added, so that ultimately a large part of the internal administration and the political executive was handled by the procurators.
The Procuratori di supra were responsible for the original area, which concerned San Marco and the Piazza, and the Procuratori di Citra and the Procuratori di Ultra for matters on both sides of the canal . The procurators had to administer the assets of San Marco, they were active as executors of foundations, since the 14th century they were responsible for town planning and for the city administration and they gave construction contracts, for example, for apartments for pilgrims and sailors. The procurators each appointed a leading architect, the proto , for the construction projects.
Since the office was associated with great political influence and prestige, it was very popular. Many Doges held procuratorship prior to their election.
The offices of the procurators as well as rental apartments were housed in the buildings. The first floor contained shops that generated rental income for the procurators.
The old proxy offices
Until the middle of the 16th century, the seat of the procurators were the old procuraties (Procuratie Vecchie) on the north side of St. Mark's Square. The building was begun under Doge Sebastiano Ziani around 1172, rebuilt around 1204 for its function as an administrative building and remained in this form until the 15th century. It was rebuilt from 1512 under the builders Bartolomeo Buon and Guglielmo Grigi and completed under Jacopo Sansovino , who was proto from 1529 . The old procuraties were rebuilt on three floors after the fire of 1540. Despite the formal language of the Renaissance, the overall appearance reproduces the appearance of the previous building.
Sansovino closed the procuraties with a west wing to the church of San Geminiano, for which he designed the facade. This church was demolished under Napoleon.
The building has three floors, of which the two lower floors are divided by pillar arcades and column arcades. The individual floors are separated from each other by wide friezes.
The new proxy offices
The new procuratie (Procuratie Nuove) opposite the old procuratie were started under the direction of Vincenzo Scamozzi and completed around 1640 under Baldassare Longhena . The architectural model for the facade is the library built by Sansovino in the piazzetta, the Libreria Vecchia or Libreria di San Marco .
The new proxy offices were set up as his living quarters after the conquest of Venice by Napoleon. In 1810, under the architect Giuseppe Soli, the connecting wing, the so-called Ala Novissima or Ala Napoleonica , was built to replace the demolished Sansovino building and the Church of San Geminiano .
restoration
In 2017, the Assicurazioni Generali insurance group, as sponsor, commissioned David Chipperfield's Milan-based architecture firm to develop a project for the renovation and restoration of the old procuraties, which in January 2019 received permission from the monument authority ( Soprintendenza Archeologica, Belle Arti e Paesaggio per il Comune di Venezia e Laguna). The municipality of Venice issued the building permit on June 10, 2019.
For the first time, a large part of the old procuraties is to be made accessible to the public as an exhibition space; Improvement of the internal connection routes in the building, elevators, handicapped accessible access, renovation especially of the damaged third floor and technical modernization (including fire protection systems) are part of the project. It follows on from the renovation and restoration of the facades, which has been in progress since 2009, by the architect Gretchen Alexander Harnischfeger , the American wife of the Italian gun manufacturer Pietro Gussalli Beretta .
The restoration program also includes the restoration of the dilapidated Giardini Reali . This garden, laid out by Napoleon in 1806 between the New Procuration, which he made his apartment, and the basin of San Marco, is owned by the Italian state. In 2014, the state leased the Giardini for 19 years to the non-profit Venice Gardens Foundation , which is renovating it with the support of Generali . The architect in charge is Paolo Pejrone.
Remarks
- ↑ Assicurazioni Generali: Procuratie Vecchie a Venezia, parte il progetto di valorizzazione e rilancio dello storico compendio di Piazza San Marco. Ufficio stampa del Comune di Venezia, June 10, 2019, accessed on June 10, 2019 (Italian, English).
literature
- Manfredo Tafuri: Jacopo Sansovino e l'architettura del '500 a Venezia. Marsilio, Padua 1969.