Venezia 2050 dC … e venne l’acqua grandissima

by Paolo della Corte

On the night between 12 and 13 November 2019, the second highest water in history invaded Venice, causing extensive damage and sparking eternal controversy over what was not done
and what should have been done. Precisely in those days the latest issue of the journal Nature was also released with a study on rising seas and the resulting consequences. It is three times more catastrophic as it predicts an average rise of 10 cm by 2050. For that date the tide will eat Venice. And not even Padua and Treviso will be saved. I imagined the city as it might be in thirty years: submerged; and the Venetians like amphibians who move through the streets swimming, floating or immersed under water, it became amniotic fluid.
An idea that was born many years ago at the end of the 80s, when Federico Fellini often came to the city and met with my father who was supposed to think about and write the screenplay for a film about Venice. They were already talking about submerged buildings and amphibious inhabitants. So I had been looking for one for years
way to make their visions. I took advantage of a large aquarium located in the hall of the Hotel Aquarius, which would be opened in Campo San Giacomo dell'Orio in a few months, inviting about thirty Venetians to immerse themselves and imagine how they would have behaved in such an extreme situation.