Everything remained as it was: the Empire-style furniture, the silver objects, the Renaissance bronzes, the rococo chandeliers, the velvet armchairs. On the walls, male nudes by Gilbert & George, the eccentric British artist duo, hung alongside the iconic 1999 portrait of Italian gallerist Massimo De Carlo, bound in silver duct tape and displayed like a painting by his fellow compatriot and artist Maurizio Cattelan.

On a sunny February morning, the tall windows overlooking the Grand Canal in Venice were opened. Though cold and immense, the apartment inside the palazzo had not changed since November 2023, when its owner – Italian collector, exhibition curator and jeweler Attilio Codognato – died at the age of 85. "It's as if he just stepped out to buy cigarettes," his son Mario said, standing before the disorderly, stacked art books devoted to Michelangelo, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Jeff Koons…

The Codognato name is well-known to insiders for its baroque jewelry crafted from gold and precious stones. In the ballroom of the family apartment, a cardboard triptych from the 1970s by Robert Rauschenberg stood beside felt-plate sculptures by Robert Morris – and even an ordinary broom, displayed next to its 1965 photographic reproduction by Joseph Kosuth.

After spending long hours exploring the Biennale, Attilio was introduced to art through the American visual artists of the 1960s and 1970s. Yet, he always returned to the French artist Marcel Duchamp. In the reading room, an entire wall is dedicated to his works: sketches of urinals and handwritten letters to André Breton. The day he took his daughter, Cristina, to the Louvre for the first time, she was left speechless in front of the Mona Lisa: "But Dad, where is her mustache?"

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