Are you lolling comfortably? Then I’ll begin by reporting that I have just been in splendid Edinburgh where at the Queen’s Gallery I went to see the current exhibition of some of Her Majesty’s collection of Canalettos. The exhibition Canaletto and the Art of Venice continues there until 21 October. You can get an online taste of it, and of the marvellous painter’s wondrous talents, on YouTube.

A lifelong admirer of Canaletto but also a lifelong republican and socialist I went to the Queen’s Gallery with mixed feelings.

I fume a little at the way the filthy rich (like the Royal Family) own such a disproportionate share of the world’s beautiful things. This is why some of us agonise over whether we can bear to go to the current Cartier exhibition, of the jewellery of the obnoxiously rich, at the National Gallery.

How wrong it seems that Her Majesty the Queen, reliably reported to be a philistine, has more Canalettos than one could poke a stick at while I, an aesthete, don’t have a single one. Does she ever give her Canalettos a glance? If I had but one I would ogle it every day and every day would find in it (for Canaletto’s paintings teem with busy Venetians, and their lively dogs) something new.

But leaving my bristling republicanism at the Queen’s Gallery’s cloakroom I gambolled into the exhibition and had an uplifting and educational morning.

I say educational because, having admired Canaletto for more than 60 years I learned something about him, at this exhibition, I had never known.

I had always supposed that his lustrous paintings of Venice were "photographic" in the sense that they were faithful depictions of Venetian places, of its grand canals and grand buildings, exactly as they really, truly were.

But no, the exhibition shows how he rearranged Venice to suit what he thought best suited his paintings.

A scholarly reviewer, making the same discoveries at the same exhibition (albeit when it was staged in London before going on to Edinburgh) has trilled that “Canaletto started out as a theatrical scene painter, and, while his paintings may appear topographically faithful to the last brick, Canaletto, like the crafty set designer he was, thought nothing of moving buildings and whole stretches of canals and shifting perspectives to create a more pleasing view or incorporate all the elements required by a client.

“Canaletto mastered … the [genre of] capriccio, in which the artist was encouraged to give free rein to his imagination in merging the real and the fantastical.”

My already considerable admiration of Canaletto has been deepened by this discovery of his audacity.

We are suddenly all aware of the notion of “fake news” and here we have Canaletto’s partially-faked Venice. Can we forgive him?

Yes, we can. And I have decided that what Canaletto did is a liberating example for us all.

For example Canberra painters of Canberra (across the years I have, as a celebrity, opened oodles of your exhibitions, often shuddering at your inhibited daubings) might, imitating, Canaletto, now feel free to rearrange Canberra to make paintings of it more interesting.

Painters, instead of depicting Lake Burley Griffin as the lonely, dreary, city-estranged watery waste it actually is could line its shores with Canberra suburbia, perhaps even with dilapidated but picturesque Queanbeyan.

I see the CBR Brave ice hockey warriors (leading the league this season! Be proud, Canberra!) painted as playing a match outdoors on a frozen Lake Burley Griffin, with, in the background and along the lake’s banks, Floriade’s host of a million Technicolor bulbs in full bloom.

I see Tuggeranong’s Hyperdome, inexplicably a favourite subject of Canberra artists, put up on the pedestal of Mount Ainslie where all can see it.

I see bold acrylic paintings in which genteel but dull suburbs (Yarralumla leaps to mind) are made more diverse by having Fyshwick bordello shopfronts arranged along their snob boulevards.

I see the Captain Cook Memorial Jet installed in Civic where teeming, umbrella-sporting pedestrians, giggling at the fun of it all, have to dodge the cascades from its 150m spout.

I see … but, Canberra artists, you get my drift, don’t you? Canaletto’s illustrious example can set you free.

Meanwhile my discovery about Canaletto’s creativity has me thinking, remorsefully, of how my long, long career in journalism was spoiled by my unhealthy obsession with (largely) reporting the truth. If only I had known of Canaletto’s audacity and had let him be my role model.

Retired now, how I regret my wasted years of reporting the dull truth of what was said in the federal parliament and the even more dull truth of what was said in the ACT Legislative Assembly. It tortures me with remorse to think how I might, using a little Canalettoesque flair, have made those forgettable gibberings seem as magical as the Grimms’ fairy tales.

Yes, it is too late for me but I urge young journalists to be more creative, to imitate Canaletto, to overcome the tyranny of truth, to put facts (always the spoilers of a good story) in their proper place.