Lot Essay
The present picture was first published in the catalogue of the 1978 Pfäffikon and Geneva exhibition by Dr. Mauro Natale, who dates it c.1707 by comparison with 'The Entry of the Fourth Earl of Manchester into the Ducal Palace, Venice, on 22 September 1707' (City Art Gallery, Birmingham) and notes in its pastel tones the influence of Gaspare Vanvitelli, who had been in Venice in 1694.
Dr. Natale further points out that the view, taken from the Porta della Carta of the Ducal Palace and looking almost directly at the Loggetta
of the Campanile, is unique in Venetian vedutismo. With the Staircase of the Giants behind him, the viewer is placed at the symbolic centre from which the city's political power emanated, and, with the whole range of Venetian society represented in the staffage,
this serene vision of the city may have been intended to allude to the stability and equity of the Venetian state.
Only one other view painted along the same axis is known, that by Canaletto executed almost thirty years later (W. G. Constable, Canaletto, 1962, no.38 and pl.18; sold at Sotheby's, 2 July 1986, lot 122). In that picture, taken from much nearer to the Campanile, the view is restricted to four bays of the Libreria, the Procuratie Nuove and the Loggetta, and the figures, which are greatly reduced in number, lack the bustling activity of Carlevarijs's best work; the relationship between the two paintings clearly demonstrates, however, the debt which Canaletto owed to the father of Venetian view-painting
Dr. Natale further points out that the view, taken from the Porta della Carta of the Ducal Palace and looking almost directly at the Loggetta
of the Campanile, is unique in Venetian vedutismo. With the Staircase of the Giants behind him, the viewer is placed at the symbolic centre from which the city's political power emanated, and, with the whole range of Venetian society represented in the staffage,
this serene vision of the city may have been intended to allude to the stability and equity of the Venetian state.
Only one other view painted along the same axis is known, that by Canaletto executed almost thirty years later (W. G. Constable, Canaletto, 1962, no.38 and pl.18; sold at Sotheby's, 2 July 1986, lot 122). In that picture, taken from much nearer to the Campanile, the view is restricted to four bays of the Libreria, the Procuratie Nuove and the Loggetta, and the figures, which are greatly reduced in number, lack the bustling activity of Carlevarijs's best work; the relationship between the two paintings clearly demonstrates, however, the debt which Canaletto owed to the father of Venetian view-painting