Simulation: Mondo Nuovo Painting
Welcome to Venice, the theater of the world, the eye of Italy. It is Carnival season. What you see before you is Giandomenico Tiepolo’s painting known as Il Mondo Nuovo. Look carefully at the crowd. Giandomenico is in there, too. He’s the man with the monocle, since to observe, to look, is his profession. His father, Giambattista, one of the greatest Venetian painters of the eighteenth century, appears in the crowd as well. The two artists are surrounded by strange characters. Some wear masks. We recognize the familiar hunchbacked figure of Pulcinella. Women and children crowd around. What are they all waiting for? What has captured their attention? It is the mondo nuovo, a popular attraction during Carnival in the squares of Venice. What does the child peering into the mondo nuovo see? Enter and find out. Here, inside this backstage view of the piazzetta, we are all tourists, and we are all spectators of both the Old and New Worlds.
