The Many Venices

Across four walks between June and September, The Many Venices invites participants to rediscover the lagoon through the perspectives of communities that have shaped the city across centuries, from the African continent, Bangladesh, and the Middle East to contemporary migrant networks that continue to transform Venice today.

Each walk is guided by a guest connected to the editorial universe of wetlands books, whose work explores overlooked histories, cultural exchanges, and lived experiences across the lagoon. Moving through calli and streets, neighborhoods, shops, and workshops, these itineraries reveal a Venice often hidden from view: a city built through encounters, movements, and crossings.

The program opens with wetlands editorial director Luca Cosentino, who will lead a walk through Cannaregio and Castello, tracing the historical entanglements between Venice and African routes, drawing on some of the itineraries explored in the book African Venice / Venezia africana (S. Bassi and P. Kaplan, wetlands, 2023). 

Social anthropologist Megnaa Mehtta (UCL, London) will guide participants through the contemporary Bangladeshi communities of Venice, visiting places, businesses, and everyday spaces that form one of the largest Bangladeshi diasporas in Italy.

In September, italo-rwandese writer and activist Marilena Delli Umuhoza will offer an intergenerational walk through the historic center, opening a conversation on interracial perspectives and shared urban spaces, with a route designed to welcome participants of all ages, including younger audiences. It is a kids friendly walk. 

The program concludes with artist and glassmaker Mulaye Niang, who will lead a walk through Murano, retracing the places that marked his first steps as a glass artisan and reflecting on the dialogue between Senegalese glass traditions and Venetian craftsmanship, that he has since brought together in his own atelier.

The project is co-curated with Wetlands, the Venice-based publishing house that in 2023 released African Venice / Venezia africana, a guide to the city that traces Venice through itineraries exploring its historical and contemporary connections with the African continent — from migration routes and African communities living in the lagoon today to the presence and representation of Africans in Venetian art and architecture. The program also connects voices from across the Wetlands editorial constellation: authors who contributed to African Venice, upcoming writers such as Meghna Mehta, whose anthropological research Banglascapes of Venice will be published in 2027, and the broader perspectives opened by Afterwords, the series edited by ethiopian writer Maaza Mengiste, dedicated to writers of Africa, the African diaspora, and a world in crisis.

• June 5 | Walk with Luca Cosentino (Castello-Cannaregio)
• June 17 | Walk with Megnaa Mehtta (Mestre)
• September 19 | Walk with Marilena Delli Umuhoza (Venezia Centro storico)
• September 25 | Walk with Moulaye Niang (Murano)