The Accademia
The Gallerie dell'Accademia holds the definitive collection of Venetian painting — not the greatest art in Italy, but the art that makes Venice comprehensible. Bellini's luminous altarpieces, Titian's extraordinary Presentation of the Virgin, Veronese's Feast in the House of Levi (originally a Last Supper, renamed after a run-in with the Inquisition), and Tintoretto's enormous canvases fill the sequence of rooms. Book in advance; visit on a weekday morning when the rooms are manageable. Allow at least two hours for the collection alone.
Peggy Guggenheim Collection
Peggy Guggenheim's palazzo on the Grand Canal contains the finest collection of 20th- century art in Italy — Pollock, Rothko, Kandinsky, Dalí, Magritte, Giacometti, and the works Guggenheim collected with the obsessive certainty of someone who understood what was happening before anyone else did. The terrace at the water's edge, with Marino Marini's Angel of the Citadel looking across the Grand Canal, is among the most pleasurable outdoor spaces in Venice. The museum café is expensive but the garden is among the best places in the city to eat a sandwich in peace.
The Zattere
The Zattere is Dorsoduro's southern quay — a long fondamenta facing the Giudecca canal where, on sunny days, the entire neighbourhood appears to be sitting in a row eating gelato. The Gelateria Nico, at the western end, has been selling giandujotto (a frozen block of chocolate-hazelnut mousse, served in a glass of whipped cream) since 1935. The light on the Zattere in the late afternoon is different from anywhere else in Venice: the canal is wide enough that the sun hits the water directly, and the façades of the Redentore on the Giudecca island opposite are in full, direct illumination.
Campo Santa Margherita
Campo Santa Margherita is the neighbourhood's living room — an elongated square with a fish stall at one end, a vegetable market in the morning, and by evening a dense concentration of bars serving the student population of Ca' Foscari university nearby. The atmosphere here is more relaxed and less expensive than almost anywhere in central Venice. The bacari on and around the square serve cicchetti until late. This is where to stay if you want to experience Venice operating for its own inhabitants rather than for visitors.
Updated