Then and now · Bellagio
Bellagio from the lake
Bellagio seen from the lake, with the bell tower and the hill of Villa Serbelloni. The lithograph, signed Falkeisen, dates from 1840 and was made from a daguerreotype, the process presented in Paris the year before; the photograph, taken from the water, dates from 2018.


What the two pictures show
The bell tower and the villa on the hilltop are where they were. In the lithograph the side of the hill above the village is farmed in terraces; in the photograph it is covered in woods and cypresses. On the shore, to the left of the bell tower, the photograph shows the long front of the Grand Hotel Villa Serbelloni, a hotel since 1873; on that stretch the lithograph has low houses.


