Riva degli Sciavoni

A topographical cabinet card showing a view looking along the Riva degli Sciavoni in the direction of the Piazza San Marco. The building on the far-right was the Hotel Royal in the nineteenth century; today it is the world-famous Hotel Danieli.

Photographed by Carlo Ponti of Venice.

Carlo Ponti studied photography in Paris in the 1840s. In 1852, he obtained a license to produce and sell photographs in Venice. He ran the first of the big photographic businesses in the city, producing albums with architectural views of great artistic sensitivity. He was also the inventor of camera lenses suitable for panoramic photography.