In response to the great floods
of 1966 in Venice and Florence, the former British
ambassador to Italy, Sir Ashley Clarke, founded
the Italian Art and Archives Rescue Fund to bring
help to Venice and Florence, which was flooded at
the same time. This became the Venice in Peril Fund
in 1971, having already restored the late Gothic
church of the Madonna dell'Orto in the relatively
remote quarter of Venice called Cannaregio.
We are a registered charity (not for profit organisation)
under British charities law, which, as part of the
Association of private organisations for Venice
has the status of a Non-Governmental Organisation
in operational relations with Unesco.
The Flooding Issue
The question of what climate change and sea level
rise may mean to Venice has recently become a vital
topic of concern to Venice in Peril.
In 1998 Venice in Peril organised a symposium in
London called "High Water Warning: Cities at
Risk" to which it invited five international
experts in climatic change to discuss the risks
posed by rising sea-levels. The final communiqué
pointed out that both London and Rotterdam had spent
millions to protect themselves from flooding, and
it urged the Italian government to come to a speedy
decision over the protection of Venice.
Most international climatologists, such as Sir John
Houghton, former Chairman of the Royal Commission
on Environmental Pollution, Britain’s representative
at the Kyoto Conference, a Patron of Venice in Peril
and speaker at the above “High Water Warning”
symposium, believe that sea levels will be 20-60
higher by 2100 and this will apply as much to the
Adriatic as to the big oceans. This, added to the
fact that Venice is already 23 cms more under water
than it was in 1900 due to a combination of subsidence
and a rise in the levels of the lagoon waters, means
that the city will be uninhabitable at the end of
this century unless new methods of protection from
the water are installed. In addition, there is the
reality that Venice is still as undefended from
a storm surge as it was in 1966 when 100% of the
city was flooded. A prototype for mobile barriers
(MOSE) at the three openings from the Adriatic into
the lagoon exists, and the present Italian government
has now declared that they will be built. A great
deal of uncertainty still reigns over climatological
and ecological issues involved and may still lead
to a great deal of argument in political and other
circles and consequent delay pressing ahead with
the protection of Venice. For this reason, Venice
in Peril set up a
Fellowship
at Cambridge in 2001 into the existing state
of research on the matter.
Conservation work: help
to the most needy
From the first, as well as star monuments such
as the lavish Gothic entrance to the Ducal Palace,
the Venice in Peril Fund has liked to help the
less famous churches, because these are less likely
to attract public money.
The work is carried out by the specialists of
the Superintendencies, the local organs of the
Italian ministry of culture, and paid for by the
Fund. By 2000, it had enabled twenty-three buildings,
monuments and works of art to be restored. Sometimes
people ask us why Venice still needs our help;
surely Italy is now a rich country, they say.
But Italy has an enormous artistic patrimony to
look after. There are seventy-nine churches in
Venice alone, and 85,000 in the whole of Italy
(not including the monasteries and convents).
Sometimes a relatively small sum from the Fund
has primed the pump for a project, or made up
for a seasonal shortfall in public funding. Sometimes
the Fund pays for all the work, as at the Madonna
dell'Orto, and for worthwhile extras which
might otherwise not take place. In that particular
case, Venice in Peril made it possible for chemists
and biologists to collaborate on the repair of
the ornamental brickwork and sculptures of the
façade. Chemical analyses of the material
were carried out first so that the best methods
of conservation could be selected.
How to restore housing
for the people?
The Fund is also very aware of the broader, underlying
dangers to the city, of which the socio-economic
decline is one. The population is down to 58,000
from 150,000 in the 1950s. The reasons for this
are complex, but one is the difficulty of finding
living quarters that are affordable and modernised.
The Fund has therefore worked with the famous architectural
university of Venice and the town council in designing
the conversion into three flats of an ordinary vernacular
building which belongs to the Comune.
The aim has been to show that an historically sensitive
adaptation can actually be cheaper than the brutal
stripping out of the interiors. When the conversion
work has been done by the Comune, the whole project
will be published as an example of best practice.
A conference on this subject, organised by Venice
in Peril, took place in Venice in May 2002.
Significance of The Venice
in Peril Fund in the European context
Help across nations
The Venice in Peril Fund, born out of the great
floods in Florence and Venice in 1966, was and is
the expression of the centuries-old British admiration
and love for Italy. That disaster led to dozens
of private citizens sending in money. The British
were rapidly followed by other nations in setting
up committees for Venice, and these now all operate
under the aegis of Unesco there. The last mayor
of Venice, Paolo Costa, was kind enough to describe
these committees as his extra-territorial “council”
, and while, of course, that is true only to a limited
extent, it shows that our efforts are appreciated
and it is recognised that we have a role in speaking
for Venice outside Italy.
The private sector helps
the public
When Venice in Peril was set up, it was an almost
new concept in Italy for a private body to help
in a public responsibility. Now, 40 years later,
this idea has taken root as part of the civil society
and, indeed, it is seen as the way forward at a
time when the the State is trying to roll back its
commitments, particularly in the cultural field.
