View to Basilica del Santissimo Redentore #1

I had wanted to visit Venice for many years, both personally and photographically. The Basilica del Santissimo Redentore was firmly on my must list, so seeing it across the water in the quiet of an August morning felt like the beginning of a long-delayed conversation with the city. This is the first photograph I have published from the trip, and it holds the Venice I encountered before most visitors were awake.

Choosing August, at the height of the tourist season, was either brave or mad. I’m still not sure which, although I enjoyed the hustle and bustle of the streets once the city was fully awake. The early mornings were a completely different experience. I was up at 6am for sunrise and, for those first few hours, Venice belonged mostly to the porters running between the boats and the occasional jogger. The contrast with what came later in the day was striking.

Planning for the Redentore

Whenever I visit somewhere new, I spend a lot of time researching beforehand. I create a map of places that might be interesting to photograph and rate them Must, Maybe or Unlikely. It gives me a framework without becoming a fixed itinerary. Once I arrive, the plan remains open to change as I learn how a location actually feels and inevitably discover things I could not have anticipated.

The Redentore survived that process rather comfortably. Designed by Andrea Palladio and commissioned by the Venetian Senate as a votive church during the plague that struck the city between 1575 and 1577, it is one of Venice’s most important Renaissance buildings. Its great dome and luminous classical façade make it an obvious subject, but I was equally interested in its relationship with the lower, warmer buildings of Giudecca surrounding it.

I have also been working on embracing cloudless skies rather than treating them as something that must be avoided. Here, the clear sky became an essential part of the photograph. Its scale gives the Basilica room to breathe, while the high-key treatment allows the pale stone to appear almost luminous against the quieter browns and terracottas on either side.

Four minutes of stillness

The more immediate challenge was the canal. Boats were passing frequently, churning the water and occasionally bringing people into the frame. I deliberately used a four-minute exposure to remove that activity. The boats and passing figures disappeared, while the agitated surface of the canal became a smooth plane of colour.

That decision was not about technique for its own sake. It was a way of preserving how Venice felt during those fleeting hours before the city properly woke. The finished photograph does not try to make Venice grander or busier than it was at that moment. The Basilica is imposing, but the vast sky, quiet water and low surrounding buildings give the image a sense of restraint.

For a brief period, the Redentore seemed to have the whole stretch of water to itself. That stillness, and the contrast with the Venice I experienced later in the day, is what I wanted to hold onto.

You can find more images from Italy in my Europe & Beyond portfolio or in my Manmade & Travel portfolio.