Venice and the Ottoman Empire

Vittore Carpaccio, Portrait of Doge Leonardo Loredan, 1501–5, tempera and oil on panel, 26.4 × 20.1 in., Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia – Museo Correr, Cl. I n. 0043

This cross-cultural exhibition explores the relationship between two interconnected European empires over four centuries: the Republic of Venice and Ottoman Empire (circa 1400–1800). Through 190 works representing diverse media, Venice and the Ottoman Empire documents interactions between the two rival Mediterranean states across multiple cultural arenas—political, diplomatic, economic, artistic, technological, and culinary.

More than half of the exhibition works come from the vast collections of Venice’s civic museums (Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia). Highlights include paintings by Gentile Bellini and Vittore Carpaccio and an array of Venetian and Ottoman textiles, ceramics, metalwork, glassware, armor, printed books, woodcuts, and leather wares.

The Venetian loans are joined by a trove of objects salvaged from a major Adriatic shipwreck—the large Venetian merchant ship Gagliana Grossa that sank en route from Venice to Istanbul in 1583. These spectacular items, destined for trade in the Ottoman world, have never been exhibited outside of Europe.