FILIPPO E FRANCESCO MAZZEI

VENICE, ITALY – FEBRUARY 16: on February 16, 2021 in Venice, Italy.
The tradition of the Carnival mask, which has ancient origins, was revived in 1980 with the restoration by the Municipality of Venice of important celebrations related to Carnival. And in the mid-eighties the first workshops of artisans who build Carnival masks in papier-mâché were born, such as the Ca’Macana and Kartaruga workshops. To produce a rigorously handmade papier-mâché carnival mask, it can take up to ten hours of work and a mask can cost up to 450 euros depending on its complexity. Venice is marking a second Carnival period upended by the covid-19 pandemic, after last year’s celebration was cut short by an abruptly imposed lockdown, as Italy struggled to curb the covid-19 outbreaks raging in the country’s north. This year, the festival was again called off due to continuing restrictions on public gatherings, leaving Venice’s streets and plazas eerily quiet at a time when they would be thronged with millions of tourists. (Photo by Marco Di Lauro/Getty Images)