Carole Robb is one of a number of talented British artists who studied at the British School in Rome during the 1970s. Like Stephen Farthing (b.1950) and Christopher Le Brun (b.1951), she rejected abstraction in favour of a figurative style informed by old master painting. This drawing is part of a group of fourteen works (E.3719 to 3732-2004) that illustrate Robb's journey through Rome to Tivoli, and the Veneto, that she undertook in 2003/4. As such, it constitutes a contemporary uprise to the V&A's numerous Grand Tour watercolours of Italy, dating from the 18th and early 19th centuries.

The title of this mixed media gouache painting connotes the image of the most famous district of Venice, San Marco. However the abstracted blocks of grey and black colour obscure its immediate recognition. The mark in the centre right is identifiable as the Bell Tower. Beneath that to the right, shorter vertical strokes suggest the distinctive architecture of the Doge’s Palace. San Marco is seen from across stormy water, from the Giardini where Venice’s international art fair the Biennale is staged. In the right foreground long blocks of solid colour suggest a pontoon while receding to the right is the form of a lurching gondola. The gondola may be heading towards the series of posts in the middle left which guide vessels to the island city from the lagoon.