Arts in Venice: The Shape of Water

The Arts in Venice Summer School ‘The Shape of Water’ is a unique inter-university project that offers students a multidisciplinary program in the historic city of Venice and in its surrounding lagoon.
Conceived within Study in Venice - a network made up of the four higher education institutions of Venice (Venice Academy of Fine Arts, Benedetto Marcello Music Conservatory, Iuav University and Ca’ Foscari University) – the programme aims to welcome students from the Humanities who want to better understand a unique and fragile city like Venice, and with an interest in Arts, meant in a broad sense, from Music to Contemporary Art, from Architecture to Geo-Anthropological History.
The topic of the 2024 edition of the Summer School will be water, the key element to decipher the city built on the lagoon.
The Shape of Water is an experimental, multidisciplinary training project that aims at welcoming diverse students from all over the world who wish to experience Venice together, in order to draw inspiration from it and build an original narrative vision of the lagoon city.
Students will be guided by professors from the four partner institutions on a journey combining the hands-on exploration of the city with guided tours and university lectures on Archaeology, Architecture, Art and Music History, Performing Arts and Environmental Science. All participants will attend workshops to combine the skills acquired during the lectures and field study activities into an artistic performance or artifact. At the end of the Summer School, students are expected to work on a final project according to their academic backgrounds and personal interests, which will let them develop some of the inspirations they got during the two-week program.
Masterclasses for musicians will be held also with internationally renowned artists and concert opportunities in Venice will be provided for the most outstanding participating music students.

Course leader

Stefano Riccioni (Programme Director)

Target group

Applicants must have regularly enrolled at any University/Academy/Music Conservatory for the 2023/24 academic year in undergraduate, postgraduate or PhD programmes.