# The Prisons and the Bridge of Sighs [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [CANALETTO]() - Date: 1701-1750 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 47 x 77 cm ## Commentary Most likely completed in England in the late 1740s and rendered with the artist's customary attention to detail, this painting offers waterfront view of one of the most recognizable façades in La Serenissima: the Prisons of San Marco with the Bridge of Sighs. The public prisons of San Marco \(Palazzo delle Prigioni\), are among the most prominent buildings on the Venetian Molo. Around 1580, after a fire had destroyed the original prisons in the Doge's Palace, Antonio da Ponte was chosen to oversee their reconstruction and worked from the original designs of Antonio Palladio's contemporary, Giovanni Antonio Rusconi. Da Ponte's nephew, <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/c/contin/antonio/index.html'\)" href="/html/c/contin/antonio/index.html">Antonio Contin,</a> helped oversee the last years of construction and also built the Bridge of Sighs, which connected the prison to the Doge's Palace, both of which are visible in the present painting. The prisons included quarters for the nocturnal security police, a wing for women, cells for victims of the Inquisition, an infirmary and a chapel. ## Related artworks - [A Regatta on the Grand Canal]() - [Arrival of the French Ambassador in Venice \(detail\)]() - [Arrival of the French Ambassador in Venice \(detail\)]() - [Arrival of the French Ambassador in Venice]() - [Bacino di San Marco \(St Mark's Basin\)]() - [Campo San Rocco]() - [Campo Santa Maria Formosa]() - [Capriccio: a Palladian Design for the Rialto Bridge, with Buildings at Vicenza]() - [Capriccio of a Bridge Leading to a Fortress by the Venetian Lagoon]() - [Capriccio: River Landscape with a Column]() - [Capriccio: Ruins and Classic Buildings]() - [Capriccio: The Grand Canal, with an Imaginary Rialto Bridge and Other Buildings]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()