Gallerie dell'Accademia

This museum is one of the world's greatest museums and one of the city's top attractions. It is housed within the Scuola della Carita (1343), Convento dei Canonici Lateranensi (1561) and the Church of Santa Maria della Carita in the Dorsoduro Quarter. It began as Venice's art school, Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia but became independent in 1879. The approach to the museum entrance is via the wooden arch of the Ponte dell'Accademia.

The art work in the museum collections is displayed chronologically and some sections are arranged in thematic groups throughout 24 rooms. The pieces are all from the 18th century or earlier. The artists featured were all major influences on European art as a whole. Some of the highlights of the museum include da Vinci's Vitruvian Man (1487); Giorgione's The Tempest; Lorenzo Lotto's Portrait of a Young Man; Carpaccio's Crucifixion and Glorification of the Ten Thousand Martyrs of Mount Ararat; Mantegna's St George and Paolo Veronese's The Feast in the House of Levi. Other featured artists include Bellini, Pacino di Bonaguida, Carriera, Michele Giambono, Francesco Guardi, Pietro Longhi, Rocco, Tiepolo, Titian and Veronese.

You can see works by the earliest recorded Venetian artists like Paolo Veneziano, in fact the museum gives you a pretty good lesson in the history of Venetian art up until the 18th century.