Giovanni Antonio Canal, Il Canaletto* (1697-1768)

A Capriccio of a Pavilion and a ruined Classical Arcade on the Lagoon, with Travellers crossing a wooden Footbridge, Levantines in the Foreground

Details

Giovanni Antonio Canal, Il Canaletto* (1697-1768)
A Capriccio of a Pavilion and a ruined Classical Arcade on the Lagoon, with Travellers crossing a wooden Footbridge, Levantines in the Foreground
oil on canvas
19 x 32in. (50.2 x 83.2cm.)

Provenance

Private collection, England.
with Julius Bhler, Munich, (Altvenezianischer Malerei, 1931, no. 13).
with Jacob Heimann, Milan.
Anon. Sale, Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, April 8, 1939, lot 82a ($570).
Anon. Sale, Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, Jan. 22, 1948, lot 71 ($975).
with Newhouse Galleries, New York, from whom purchased by the present owners in 1971.

Literature

W.G. Constable, Canaletto, 2nd ed. revised by J.G. Links, 1989, II, p. 468, under no. 512 as a replica.
P. Stein, in P.C. Sutton, catalogue of the exhibition, Prized Possessions: European paintings from Private Collections of Friends of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, June 17-Aug. 16, 1992, p. 130, under no. 17 as an autograph replica.
J.G. Links, A Supplement to W.G. Constable's 'Canaletto' (to be published in February 1998), no. 512.

Lot Essay

The present painting is characteristic of Canaletto's work in England in the first half of the 1750s both in style and tonality. Three painted variants in an upright format, larger but with the left part of the composition omitted, are known: one in an oval format is in an English private collection (Constable, op. cit., ed. 1989, revised by J.G. Links, II, no. 511a), another is in in the Baltimore Museum of Art (ibid., no. 511c), and a third was sold at Christie's, London, Dec. 8, 1995, lot 76 (380,000=$577,000). Another version of the present painting, also in a horizontal format, is on loan from the Morrison Collection to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (ibid., no. 512); this has an inscription on the relining canvas indicating that it was originally signed on the back and dated 1754. THe Baltimore version is the only one which may date from earlier than Canaletto's English period.

As noted by William L. Barcham, Canaletto's 'lagoonscapes' focus on the immediate foreground, with the only recession into space in the present painting being a glimpse of open sea and sailboats framed by the archway of the arcade (W.L. Barcham, The Imaginary View Scenes of Antonio Canaletto, PhD. dissertation, New York University, 1974).