Casino Venier

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Figure 4

When games of chance became increasingly popular and widespread, more and more patricians started to convert part of their palaces into a ridotto. Casino Venier is located between the Rialto bridge and Piazza San Marco in the Mercerie. (Figure 1, 2) The owner of this Casino is a cultured and refined noblewoman, Elina Priuli Venier. During the late 1700s, women of noble origins had exclusive rooms, where their husband could not have access, and the women and their guests had a certain freedom of action, including whoever they wanted.1 Observing and being observed are the main theme in this building. The layout of this ridotto shows a sense of secrecy. Hidden in the marble floor of the entrance hall, there is a peephole that allows someone upstairs to monitor who is about the enter. (Figure 3, 4) This might be related to the fact that Elina Priuli Venier’s husband was against the game as a procurator, while she owned the ridotto.2 This peephole is an excellent tool to protect the intimacy of this place. The ridotto is located on the first (above the ground level) of four floors, with a dark entry from the sottoportico and a secondary entrance in the calle di Mezzo, both with a convenience stair, with the second one being an “escape exit.”3 When there is an unfriendly approach to this building, the guests of the ridotto could be informed by means of the peephole and evacuate from the room quickly.  “Behind the entrance staircase there is a small room decorated with gilded wooden grates: this is probably the hall of the musicians who, hidden, played for the guests, and whose music spread through the grilles.”4 Even the musicians were hidden away from the streets in order to create a pure entertaining space. Behind that is also the idea of control embedded in the culture of Venice.