In 1807 Napoleon suppressed many churches and religious buildings, therefore, he collected all the artworks from them, and those he did not bring to the Louvre in Paris or to Brera in Milan, he placed them here at the Accademia di Belle Arti, inside the buildings of the former Church and Scuola Grande di Santa Maria della Carità, so that younger painters could see them to study their colors and their techniques.

The works of art left in town were enough to make the Accademia one of the most important galleries of Europe. Its masterpieces bear the signature of the great Venice artists who lived between the 14th and the 18th centuries, such as Tiepolo, Canaletto, Tintoretto, Tiziano, Paolo Veronese, Carpaccio, Giorgione, and more.