Peggy Guggenheim Collection

Listen first. Water slaps against stone steps just below you. A vaporetto engine hums past, and a gondolier calls out somewhere along the Grand Canal. Then you notice the building itself. It is low and pale, only one storey high, almost modest among the tall palaces that line this stretch of water. That modesty is the first clue. This house was never meant to look like this at all.

You are standing at Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, in the Dorsoduro district of Venice. Work on the palace began in the eighteenth century for the Venier family, one of the old noble houses of the city. The plans called for a grand facade to rival its neighbours. But the money or the will ran out, and only the ground floor was ever finished. For generations, Venetians knew it as the unfinished palace.

Look down near the waterline along the canal front. You will see a row of carved stone lion heads. They give the palace part of its name — dei Leoni means of the lions. Locals say the Venier family once kept a real lion in the garden. It is a good story, though it is hard to prove. Either way, the stone lions have watched the canal traffic for a very long time.

In 1949, an American woman bought this half-built palace. Her name was Peggy Guggenheim. She came from a wealthy New York family, and her uncle Solomon founded the Guggenheim museum in New York. Peggy took a different path. She spent years in Paris and London among painters and poets, and she began to buy modern art with real conviction. Often she bought directly from the artists, and often before the rest of the world cared.

The Second World War nearly ended her collection. As German troops approached Paris, she worked to ship her paintings out of France. She made her way to New York, and in 1942 she opened a gallery there called Art of This Century. It became a meeting place for European Surrealists in exile and for young American painters. One of those young painters was Jackson Pollock. Peggy gave him a contract and an early solo show. That support helped launch his career.

After the war, she turned back towards Europe. In 1948, her collection was shown at the Venice Biennale, the city's great international art exhibition. For many Italians, it was a first real look at abstract and Surrealist art from abroad. Soon after, she settled here for good. From the early 1950s, she opened her home to visitors in the summer. Guests wandered through her living rooms while she lived among the paintings.

That is the surprise many visitors miss. These galleries were once a private house. The rooms you walk through were a dining room, a bedroom, a sitting room. In her bedroom hung a silver bedhead made for her by the American sculptor Alexander Calder. It is still in the collection today. Try to picture it — breakfast beneath a Picasso, dogs asleep on the floor, artists and writers drifting in from the canal.

The collection covers the restless first half of the twentieth century. Cubism, which broke objects into angled planes, is here through Picasso and Braque. Abstraction appears in works by Kandinsky and Mondrian. The Surrealists, who painted dreams and strange logic, are well represented, from Magritte and Dalí to Max Ernst. Ernst was more than an artist on her walls. For a few years in the 1940s, he was also her husband.

As you move through the rooms, watch for the sculpture by Constantin Brancusi called Bird in Space. It is a tall, thin form of polished metal. It shows no feathers and no wings, only the idea of upward motion. Look too for René Magritte's Empire of Light. It shows a dark street lit by a lamp, under a bright daytime sky. Stand in front of it for a moment. The longer you look, the stranger it feels.

Now step out onto the terrace facing the Grand Canal. Here a bronze horse and rider stand with arms spread wide towards the water. This is The Angel of the City by the Italian sculptor Marino Marini. The rider is naked and openly male. According to a popular tale, the most revealing part was cast separately, so it could be removed. People say Peggy unscrewed it when religious visitors passed by on the canal. True or not, the story fits her sense of humour.

From this terrace, the view runs up and down the Grand Canal. Across the water stand palaces of the opposite bank, their windows flashing in the light. Peggy was known for travelling the city in her own private gondola, at a time when few residents still kept one. Imagine her setting off from these steps, sunglasses on, a small dog beside her. She became a familiar figure in Venice, and the city came to treat her as one of its own.

Behind the palace lies the sculpture garden, shaded and green, with gravel paths underfoot. It is a calm place after the canal. In one quiet corner, you will find a small plaque set into the wall. Peggy Guggenheim died in 1979, and her ashes rest here. Beside her are buried her many beloved dogs. Their names are listed on a stone nearby, and she called them her babies. Few museums in the world keep their founder so close.

Today the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation runs the collection, linking this house to the museum her uncle founded in New York. Yet it still feels personal, like a home with very good taste. Before you leave, stand for a moment in the garden or at the terrace rail. Listen again to the water and the boats. The lions are still at the waterline. The palace is still unfinished. And somehow, that unfinished house turned out to be exactly the right size for one woman's remarkable eye.