Seeing Venice

"Venice is so much more than canals, bridges, gondolas. It is an unbroken sequence of ever-changing moods; festive; frivolous, elegiac and melancholy, forever foreign yet totally intimate." -from Seeing Venice Take a luminous journey deep into the heart of hidden Venice, with Frederick Franck as your guide. His quietly evocative drawings and descriptions bring to vivid life the city of islands, La Serenissima, the Queen of the Sea, "that most human of cities," Venice. Franck explores cafes, alleyways, and the myriad moods and characters of the Venetians, providing an enlivening glimpse into a city he sees as a microcosm of creation, "an immense and living indoor and outdoor studio." "Frederick Franck is one of a rare and precious breed--an authentic troubadour whose lyricism is pure in word and image. He quietly roams our materialistic world and shows us that even here, even now, there is hope for our soul." -Jacob Needleman, author of Money and the Meaning of Life "Frederick Franck is the rarest of human beings, a true eclectic--in touch with the perennial...and with all his drawings, his beautiful, compassionate drawings " -Robert Aitken Roshi, author of Taking the Path of Zen Frederick Franck's sculpture and artwork are in the permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum, the Tokyo National Museum, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and other public and private collections. He is the author of over thirty books, including the perennial classic The Zen of Seeing and the award-winning Pacem in Terris: A Love Story, as well as What It Means to be Human, recently published by St. Martin's Press. It has appeared in Chinese and Spanish translations. At 93 years of age, he continues to be actively engaged in art, writing, and the search for meaning in this world/