Lot Essay
One of four paintings attributed to Canaletto acquired by the 2nd Duke of Newcastle and recorded in the catalogue made on his death in 1794 (see Catalogue of the Pictures being part of the Clumber Collection, 1872, introduction). The two smaller of these, regarded by Constable as studio works, form a pair of views on the Grand Canal (Constable, op. cit., nos.170.b.3 and 228.b.1). The larger two, accepted as autograph, are not a pair but are of identical size, the present picture depicting the Piazza San Marco and the other, now in the Norton Simon Museum, the Piazzetta (idem, no.66). Both are versions of smaller pictures in the series at Woburn Abbey