_Canaletto_[198] (Venetian: 1697-1768). _See 127._
The principal building is the Scuola of the religious fraternity of St.
Roch--"an interesting building of the early Renaissance (1517), passing
into Roman Renaissance," and, "as regards the pictures it contains (by
Tintoret), one of the three most precious buildings in Italy" (_Stones
of Venice_, Venetian Index). From the adjoining Church of St. Roch, the
Holy Thursday procession of the Doges and Officers of State, together
with the members of the Fraternity, is advancing under an awning on
its way to St. Mark's. Notice the carpets hung out of the windows--a
standing feature, this, in Venetian gala decorations from very early
times (see, for instance, No. 739).[199] Notice, also, the pictures
displayed in the open air--a feature which well illustrates the
difference between the later "easel pictures" and the earlier pictures
intended to serve as architectural decorations. "A glance at this
picture is sufficient to show how utterly the ordinary oil painting
fails when employed as an architectural embellishment. Pictures which
were to adorn and form part of a building had to consist of figures,
separated one from another, all standing in simple and restful
attitudes, and all plainly relieved against a light ground" (Conway:
_Early Flemish Artists_, p. 270). Apart from one of the conditions of
early art thus suggested, the picture is interesting as showing how in
the eighteenth century in Italy, as in the thirteenth, art was part and
parcel of the life of the people. Cimabue's pictures were carried in
procession; and here in Canaletto's we see Venetian "old masters" hung
out to assist in the popular rejoicing.