History

Taken from: Sculpture Journal, Vol. V, 2001, pp. 7-32. Copyright Victoria Avery and the Public Monuments and Sculpture Association.

In 1569, the sculptor Alessandro Vittoria, a student of the great Jacopo Sansovino, purchased several spaces in Calledella Pietà in Venice for his workshop, or “bottega”. Exactly four hundred years later, in 1969, a Venetian Family started its own business in the same place, by opening the Hotel Bisanzio, a small hotel, which it has managed ever since. Alessandro Vittoria, with an artist’s eye seeking a better place to express his talents, chose these spaces because they have very unique qualities, the same that a visitor to the city can still appreciate: the Hotel Bisanzio is located on the Riva degliSchiavoni and overlooks Saint Mark’s Basin, just a stone’s throw from the city’s economic and cultural heart. Vittoria‘s work can be seen in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. During your visit to Venice, you can see also see them in the Churches of San Zaccaria, Santa Maria dei Frari and Santi Giovanni e Paolo or experience their fascination in the Doges Palace, the LibreriaMarciana or our historic gallery.