The Piazza San Marco in Venice

Canaletto painted this crowded view of Saint Mark's Square around 1723, early in his career, before he became the painter every English visitor wanted a Venice picture from. There is a small detail that fixes the moment almost exactly. Look at the pavement. The old surface of the piazza was being torn up and relaid with a new stone design by the architect Andrea Tirali, a job that dragged on for years. Here the paving beside the arcades is already finished, but the central strip is still bare, which places the scene in 1723 or 1724. Canaletto took a high viewpoint to open up the whole square, the long facades running back to the basilica and the bell tower shooting straight up.