Space/light/peace: Tomba di Brion
October in Venice is considered a transitional month, just before the arrival of the cold Winters and with the arrival of the ‘acqua alta’ season, you witness the island slowly transform from the ‘themeparkesque’ persona it adopts for the duration of the Biennale to a more calm, normalised and slightly eerie version of Venice, more reminiscent of the Venice portrayed in the 1973 Nicolas Roeg film, “Dont Look Now”.
Spending more than the customary ‘few days’ in Venice so prevalent in our culture of city breaks and omni-present cruise ships on the lagoon, one tends to begin feeling rather claustrophobic and suffocated by the flurry of tourists combatting for space with the locals in these narrowest of walkways, not many places to escape from the frenzy and rushed energy that is so engrained in the identity of this spectacular and bizarre island, especially during the Biennale. For many of the invigilating staff like ourselves and those from other pavilions who are spending anywhere between 4 weeks to 3 months working in Venice, most take advantage of their days off to escape the noise of Venice for a short while, be it a day trip or even for several days if time permits.
The more time spent exploring the island and increasing your familiarity with what may at first feel like an indecipherable labyrinth of paths and routes, the less time is spent studying a map and street signs, you begin to feel at ease with the space and start to see not just the grandiose of Venice but the Alison, part of our October team, on one of her days off had been planning to visit some architectural works of Carlo Scarpa, which are readily visible throughout Venice. I had already been vaguely aware of Carlo Scarpa and had a rudimentary familiarity of his aesthetic style, however it was upon looking through the book, “Carlo Scarpa: An Architectural Guide”, that piqued my interest and made me want to deeper understand his work. What was particularly exciting was that his work existed predominantly in Venice and so offered the chance to discover and visit some of his works in person.
The work of Carlo Scarpa, once you happen upon it, is quite easily recognisable in its juxtaposing style to the familiar and typical Venetian architecture, though is often conspicuously hidden throughout the city. He often took on smaller commissions and renovation work throughout Venice, which include; a now disused ticket booth for the Biennale at Giardini, renovations to several parts of the University of Venice building and the Venice architecture University, renovations and remodelling of residential houses and museums and of particular note is the construction of the Olivetti showroom situated on the Piazza Di San Marco. However there was one location in particular that we where all intrigued to visit and drawn to most as it is often considered on of his most accomplished and grandest works, the fact that its location is situated on the outskirts of the small town of Castelfranco, 30 miles North West from Venice on the Italian mainland, provided us with the opportunity for a trip away from Venice.
Il Tomba di Brion is a private burial ground for the Brion family within the existing municipal cemetery , commissioned by Onorina Tomasi Brion, widow of the founder of the Brionvega company. Several discrete elements comprise the Brion family burial site: A sloped concrete enclosing wall, two distinct entrances, a small chapel, two covered burial areas (the arcosolium for Giuseppe and Onorina Brion, and one for other family members), a dense grove of cypresses, a prato (lawn), a private meditation/viewing pavilion separated from the main prato by a separate and locked entrance, and a heavily vegetated reflecting pool. Uponn entry