Most of my postcards are quite old, but this one is more recent (in comparison to the others). 1981 doesn’t seem that long ago to me because I was a teenager then! But to many people I guess it’s still vintage! (What does that say about me??)
The photo quality certainly looks more like the ’70s or ’80s. You can see from the banner hanging on the Rialto Bridge that the Palazzo Ducale was showing an exhibit of Venetian “vedutisti” or landscape painters. I always choose postcards that include gondolas. I wonder if any of the gondoliers pictured here are still alive? The guy on the right looks a little like one of the gondoliers I know, but maybe it’s his father!
I asked a couple of my students from Germany to help me decipher and translate the writing on the back. We believe it says “Aus Jesolo senden liebe” or “From Iesolo sending love.” The next bit is near inscrutable. What do you all make of it?
For the postscript, my students thought it said, in translation, “My card from Paris in May …something something… Here there are many nice people.” “Menschen” is underlined. Is there a secret meaning there? Maybe the sender met a particularly nice man? I can’t make out who the sender is, so it’s hard to make sense of the message let alone any coded message!
This postcard went to Vienna, Austria, to the Family of E. Dobner on Anzengruber strasse 54. According to Google, this is what the place looks like.
Meine Karte aus Paris von Mai kam hoffentlich an? Das Wetter sehr schön hier. viele Menschen.
Not difficult to read.
Thank you for providing this text! Since I don’t speak German, deciphering handwriting in another language is more difficult for me. Can you read the name of the sender?
The postcard was sent in 1981 but the picture was taken in 1967. The Mostra “I vedutisti veneziani del Settecento” at Palazzo Ducale started in June 1967. See the catalogue by Pietro Zampetti, Ed. Alfieri, Venezia 1967.
You are a super sleuth! Thank you for providing these details about the show and the postcard. How did you know the year of the photo?
If the photo shows on the Rialto bridge the sign of an exhibition held from June to October 1967, the photo must necessarily have been taken in that period of time. Not before and not after.
Text:
Hopefully my postcard from Paris in May has arrived. The weather is very nice here. there are a lot of people.
Postcards always leave the reader wanting more. They are like getting a sliver of chocolate when you want the whole bar.
So true! They’re so enticing with their tidbit of a life and a story.