Saturday 22 August 2026 · JMuseo terrace

Under the summer sky

A journey through the stars, constellations and myths of the summer sky.

Scroll to relive the evening

Sold out: every place taken before the night
7:30 → 11:00 pm: from the guided tour to the last telescope
UAI: an evening by the Italian Amateur Astronomers Union

The evening

The terrace becomes an observatory

On 22 August the JMuseo terrace changed trade. Refractors on tripods, a Newtonian tall enough to need its own step ladder, counterweights to screw on and finders to align: the Italian Amateur Astronomers set their stations up while the sky was still bright. It is the part the public almost never sees, and it is the part that decides how the night will go.

Venus first, as the poster promised. Then the constellations and the Summer Triangle, with Vega, Deneb and Altair at its three corners. Below the terrace Jesolo was lighting up, the ferris wheel first, and above it hung the Moon. The programme said until 11, and until 11 the telescopes kept working.

A member of the Italian Amateur Astronomers Union fitting a telescope counterweight on the terrace, the sky still bright

Before

The telescopes take their places

Tripods open, tubes mounted, counterweights tightened. A telescope does not switch on like a lamp: it has to be balanced, aimed and focused, and that takes daylight. So the work starts long before there is anything to see.

A Newtonian telescope with its step ladder beside it on the terrace, in front of the lit Jesolo tower at blue hour

The wait

The sky comes on slowly

The blue deepens, the buildings light up and the first queues form beside the eyepieces. From up here the horizon is wide and the sea is a step away: night does not fall all at once, you watch it come.

How it went

The running order

7:30 → 9:00 pm

The exhibition, then Venus

Guided tour of the MOON exhibition and a panoramic terrace session by the Italian Amateur Astronomers Union, devoted to observing Venus.

9:00 → 11:00 pm

The summer sky

Welcome by UAI, introduction to the evening and observation of the summer sky with the astronomers' instruments.

Night

The Moon above the wheel

Then real darkness, and the view turns upside down: below, the seafront lights and the ferris wheel; above, the Moon and the stars of August. The audience sits down, and the stations keep their turns going to the last one.

The evening in pictures

Twenty-second of August, from the JMuseo terrace

Close-up of a refractor telescope objective, with the green sheen of its anti-reflective coating — The glass that does all the work.

An amateur astronomer looking into the eyepiece of a large Newtonian telescope, the audience behind him — At the Newtonian's eyepiece, finding focus.

A visitor looks into the telescope eyepiece while a boy waits for his turn — The turn of the one looking, and the one waiting.

A member of the Italian Amateur Astronomers Union showing a visitor how to approach the eyepiece — Nobody is left alone at the eyepiece.

An amateur astronomer pointing out a constellation with a green laser in front of the audience on the terrace — The green laser, drawing constellations on the sky.

A child building a paper astrolabe at the activity table, lit by a lamp — At the workshop table, an astrolabe to take home.

The dj set on the terrace with the Moon high in the blue twilight sky — Music on the terrace, the Moon already up.

The audience on the JMuseo terrace under the Moon, with the lights of Jesolo behind — The last turn, heads still tipped back.

The Moon stays at the JMuseo until 6 January.

Tickets The next evenings