Jim Regan - Site Reviews
Save Venice
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Still, there is only one case where these threats to history involve an entire city, and Save Venice documents the work of one organization in preserving the artworks and architecture of this center of the Italian Renaissance.
Save Venice Inc. was founded in 1967, in response to the damage done by a severe flood during the previous November. In the ensuing 30 years, the organization has funded more than 100 restoration projects on the city's art and architecture, and the site -- by way of showing 'where the money went', and encouraging further donations -- highlights nine of the operation's latest and greatest achievements.
In design, Save Venice makes heavy and varying use of frames, usually to good effect. An index frame -- always present down the left side of the browser window -- uses a simple change in background color to clearly divide the site into two main sections. The first of these sections presents 'the facts'; Who We Are, How To Participate, Contact Info, along with site credits and requirements. (The requirements suggest a minimum 832x624 pixel screen -- a fairly unusual default which points to a probable Macintosh heritage -- but scrollbars do appear for any frame that shrinks below its optimum size.
Also included in the upper Index is a 20 image Picture Book of the city, and two maps -- one contemporary and one dating from 1500 -- which indicate the locations of the nine featured restorations. The lower portion of the Index offers 'tours' of said restorations, which range from the Doge's Palace to the historic Jewish Ghetto, and while most of these tours are limited to still images and text, the first specimen -- the early-Renaissance Church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli -- is so thorough and interactive that you'd actually have to be on location to get a better look around.
The Santa Maria 'home page' opens with a history, a photograph of the church exterior, and a detailed and labelled cutaway drawing of the structure. Click one of the labels, and a new window opens, containing more images and detailed information. (The illustration itself can also be opened in two higher resolution versions.) Click on the Miracoli home page's photograph, and the site loads a QTVR panoramic tour of the church interior. While the page still displays the cutaway image to help visitors orient themselves, the VR panorama offers several 'hotpoints' (the bullseye icon will change to a hand and globe) which allow movement to additional VR vantage points within the church. Finally, the tour is rounded out with interior and exterior stills, and pre- and post-restoration comparisons.
As mentioned above, pages for the other restorations are not dealt with in such detail, (though hopefully, all future additions will be) but they still offer plenty to see (abundant stills, all of which link to full-frame copies) and learn (such as the fact that the Basilica San Marco was built in 828 to house the body of Saint Mark - after Venetian merchants stole it from its tomb in Alexandria). Until you can get there yourself, this isn't a bad substitute. Save Venice can be found at http://www.Savevenice.org/.
Jim Regan provides 'Today's Links' to the e-Monitor. He lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.