Lot Essay
Field Marshal Count Johann Matthias von der Schulenburg (1661-1747), for whom the present picture was painted, ranks with Consul Smith as one of the most remarkable patrons and collectors in Venice in the eighteenth century. Between 1724 and his death in 1747 he amassed over nine hundred pictures, including works by almost all of the leading Venetian painters of his day, an achievement made all the more exceptional by the fact that he did not start collecting until the age of sixty-three.
Born into a Saxon family closely related to the Hanoverian dynasty, Schulenburg chose a military career and served in most of the great wars of Europe of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, fighting for the Austrians in the Hungarian campaign against the Turks, 1687-8, for the House of Savoy, for Augustus the Strong of Saxony against Charles XII of Sweden, and in the Wars of the Spanish Succession, leading the infantry under the command of Prince Eugene at Malplaquet. His brilliant defence of Corfu against superior Turkish forces in 1715 and 1716 earned him the admiration of Europe, and particularly of the Venetians, in whose employ he was to remain for thirty years. He established himself in Venice at the Palazzo Loredan, San Trovaso, and in 1724 began his collection in style by buying from a dealer, Giovanni Battista Rota, no less than eighty-eight paintings, most of them formerly in the collections of the Dukes of Mantua. Ably advised by Pittoni and subsequently Piazzetta, Schulenburg's purchases accelerated in the 1730s and in 1735 he began to send crates of pictures back to his estates in Germany. Unmarried, he bequeathed the whole of his collection to his nephew with the request that it be preserved intact. About 150 pictures were sold at Christie's on 12-13 April 1775 and many have been included in London sales since 23 June 1982, but the collection is particularly well documented and can to a large extent be reconstructed (see, above all, Binion, op. cit.; for shorter analyses of the marshal's activities as patron and collector, see A. Binion, From Schulenburg's Gallery and Records, The Burlington Magazine, CXII, no. 806, May 1970, pp. 297-303, and F. Haskell, Patrons and Painters. Art and Society in Baroque Italy, New Haven and London, 1980, pp. 310-15).
Antonio Guardi seems to have enjoyed a closer relationship with Schulenburg than any other artist, as, in addition to the individual payments he received for specific commissions, the painter - uniquely - was paid a monthly retainer by the marshal. Schulenburg's account books survive for the period May 1730-13 April 1745 and these list the regular payments of this salary, which was set at 1 zecchino 5 lire per month until March 1736; it was then raised to 1 zecchino 10 lire and subsequently in May of the same year to 2 zecchini 16 lire, presumably on account of the amount of work done. Guardi was employed principally as a copyist. His copies of Veronese's Marriage Feast at Cana now in the Louvre and Madonna and Child with Saints in the Accademia and of a Bassano Nativity, presumably that in S. Giorgio Maggiore, are all lost, but many have survived, included those of Titian's Accademia Saint John the Baptist (Dublin), Veronese's Uffizi Holy Family with Saint Catherine and the infant Saint John the Baptist (Seattle) and of the Tintoretto School Fortitude and Temperance in the church of the Madonna dell'Orto (sold at Christie's, New York, 11 Jan. 1991, lots 47 and 48; see Pedrocco and Montecuccoli degli Erri, op. cit., nos. 34-6 and 40, colour pls. X and XI, figs. 49-53 and 57). He was also requested to execute copies of works by contemporaries, including Sebastiano Ricci, Piazzetta and Rosalba Carriera, and in 1742-3 delivered no less than forty-three 'quadri turchi' based on engravings after Vanmour (for which see the catalogue of the exhibition at the Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, 28 Aug.-21 Nov. 1993, nos. 1-3 and 5-38).
Schulenburg liked portraits, whether of himself to send to other people or of members of the royal houses of Europe to display on his own walls to show his powerful connections. Guardi produced for him at least forty, of which twenty were of the marshal himself (see, for instance, Pedrocco and Montecuccoli degli Erri, op. cit., no. 41, colour pl. XII, fig. 58). Most of the others were by necessity based on works by other artists, such as that of the Empress Elisabeth Christine of Austria after Liotard sold in these Rooms, 11 December 1992, lot 18. That picture formed part of a group of 'cinque ritratti della Casa d'Austria' and the present painting is listed in the inventories with five other portraits of members of the royal house of Spain, of which four also survive (ibid., nos. 51-2 and 54-5, figs. 68-9 and 71-2), the missing portrait being that of the present sitter's wife. Those of Philip V of Spain and his Queen, Elisabetta Farnese, follow Louis-Michel van Loo's paintings at Versailles; the prototypes of the others have not been identified. Morassi's statement, loc. cit., 1960, that the six portraits were paid for on 30 June 1741 was due to a misinterpretation of the documents, as Sir Denis Mahon was the first to observe, loc. cit. The marshal's account books do, however, record payments for 'due ritratti del Re e Regina di Spagna' on 2 October 1745, of six zecchini for 'due ritratti di D. Filippo [Duke of Parma and younger brother of the present sitter] e sua sposa' on 5 December 1745 and of 6 zecchini for 'due ritratti del Pr. d'Asturias e sua consorte' (presumably the present picture and its pendant) on 23 January 1746 (see Binion, op. cit., p.179).
The quality of the present picture is singled out for comment by Morassi, Mahon and Pedrocco
Born into a Saxon family closely related to the Hanoverian dynasty, Schulenburg chose a military career and served in most of the great wars of Europe of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, fighting for the Austrians in the Hungarian campaign against the Turks, 1687-8, for the House of Savoy, for Augustus the Strong of Saxony against Charles XII of Sweden, and in the Wars of the Spanish Succession, leading the infantry under the command of Prince Eugene at Malplaquet. His brilliant defence of Corfu against superior Turkish forces in 1715 and 1716 earned him the admiration of Europe, and particularly of the Venetians, in whose employ he was to remain for thirty years. He established himself in Venice at the Palazzo Loredan, San Trovaso, and in 1724 began his collection in style by buying from a dealer, Giovanni Battista Rota, no less than eighty-eight paintings, most of them formerly in the collections of the Dukes of Mantua. Ably advised by Pittoni and subsequently Piazzetta, Schulenburg's purchases accelerated in the 1730s and in 1735 he began to send crates of pictures back to his estates in Germany. Unmarried, he bequeathed the whole of his collection to his nephew with the request that it be preserved intact. About 150 pictures were sold at Christie's on 12-13 April 1775 and many have been included in London sales since 23 June 1982, but the collection is particularly well documented and can to a large extent be reconstructed (see, above all, Binion, op. cit.; for shorter analyses of the marshal's activities as patron and collector, see A. Binion, From Schulenburg's Gallery and Records, The Burlington Magazine, CXII, no. 806, May 1970, pp. 297-303, and F. Haskell, Patrons and Painters. Art and Society in Baroque Italy, New Haven and London, 1980, pp. 310-15).
Antonio Guardi seems to have enjoyed a closer relationship with Schulenburg than any other artist, as, in addition to the individual payments he received for specific commissions, the painter - uniquely - was paid a monthly retainer by the marshal. Schulenburg's account books survive for the period May 1730-13 April 1745 and these list the regular payments of this salary, which was set at 1 zecchino 5 lire per month until March 1736; it was then raised to 1 zecchino 10 lire and subsequently in May of the same year to 2 zecchini 16 lire, presumably on account of the amount of work done. Guardi was employed principally as a copyist. His copies of Veronese's Marriage Feast at Cana now in the Louvre and Madonna and Child with Saints in the Accademia and of a Bassano Nativity, presumably that in S. Giorgio Maggiore, are all lost, but many have survived, included those of Titian's Accademia Saint John the Baptist (Dublin), Veronese's Uffizi Holy Family with Saint Catherine and the infant Saint John the Baptist (Seattle) and of the Tintoretto School Fortitude and Temperance in the church of the Madonna dell'Orto (sold at Christie's, New York, 11 Jan. 1991, lots 47 and 48; see Pedrocco and Montecuccoli degli Erri, op. cit., nos. 34-6 and 40, colour pls. X and XI, figs. 49-53 and 57). He was also requested to execute copies of works by contemporaries, including Sebastiano Ricci, Piazzetta and Rosalba Carriera, and in 1742-3 delivered no less than forty-three 'quadri turchi' based on engravings after Vanmour (for which see the catalogue of the exhibition at the Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, 28 Aug.-21 Nov. 1993, nos. 1-3 and 5-38).
Schulenburg liked portraits, whether of himself to send to other people or of members of the royal houses of Europe to display on his own walls to show his powerful connections. Guardi produced for him at least forty, of which twenty were of the marshal himself (see, for instance, Pedrocco and Montecuccoli degli Erri, op. cit., no. 41, colour pl. XII, fig. 58). Most of the others were by necessity based on works by other artists, such as that of the Empress Elisabeth Christine of Austria after Liotard sold in these Rooms, 11 December 1992, lot 18. That picture formed part of a group of 'cinque ritratti della Casa d'Austria' and the present painting is listed in the inventories with five other portraits of members of the royal house of Spain, of which four also survive (ibid., nos. 51-2 and 54-5, figs. 68-9 and 71-2), the missing portrait being that of the present sitter's wife. Those of Philip V of Spain and his Queen, Elisabetta Farnese, follow Louis-Michel van Loo's paintings at Versailles; the prototypes of the others have not been identified. Morassi's statement, loc. cit., 1960, that the six portraits were paid for on 30 June 1741 was due to a misinterpretation of the documents, as Sir Denis Mahon was the first to observe, loc. cit. The marshal's account books do, however, record payments for 'due ritratti del Re e Regina di Spagna' on 2 October 1745, of six zecchini for 'due ritratti di D. Filippo [Duke of Parma and younger brother of the present sitter] e sua sposa' on 5 December 1745 and of 6 zecchini for 'due ritratti del Pr. d'Asturias e sua consorte' (presumably the present picture and its pendant) on 23 January 1746 (see Binion, op. cit., p.179).
The quality of the present picture is singled out for comment by Morassi, Mahon and Pedrocco