Madonna

Details

FRANCESCO GUARDI (VENICE 1712-1793)
Madonna
signed 'F Guardi' (on the reverse)
oil on canvas
17 ¼ x 14 in. (43.3 x 35.1 cm.)

Provenance

Giacomo Favretto (1849-1887), by whom bequeathed to,
Dr. Marcon, Vicenza (according to Fiocco, 1925, loc. cit.).
Dr. Antonio Tecchio, Vicenza.
Anonymous sale [The Property of a Gentleman]; Christie's, London, 1 December 1978, lot 17.

Literature

G. Fiocco, 'Guardi as a Figure Painter', The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, XLVI, May 1925, pp. 225 and 229, pl. 1.
G. Fiocco, 'Il Ridotto e il parlatorio del Museo Correr', Dedalo, VI, January 1926, p. 538.
V. Lasareff, 'Francesco e Gianantonio Guardi', The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, LXV, August 1934, p. 53, pl. 1.
E. Arslan, 'Per la definizione dell'arte di Francesco, Gianantonio e Niccolò Guardi', Emporium, XXIII, July-December 1944, pp. 12, 14, 18, 20, 22.
M. Goering, Francesco Guardi, Vienna, 1944, pp. 29 and 79, fig. 50.
M. Muraro, 'Novita su Francesco Guardi', Arte Veneta, III, 1949, p. 126.
F. de Maffei, Gian Antonio Guardi: pittore di figura, Verona, 1951, pp. 50-51, 72-73, 78, 101.
R. Pallucchini, La pittura Veneziana del settecento: Lezioni tenute nell’Università di Bologna durante l’anno accademico 1951-52, II, Bologna, 1954, p. 193.
G. Fiocco, 'Il problema di Francesco Guardi', Arte Veneta, VI, 1952, p. 107, no. 4.
C.L. Ragghianti, 'Epiloghi Guardeschi', Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. Lettere, Storia e Filosofia, XXII, 1953, pp. 75-76, 82 and 93, .
V. Moschini, Francesco Guardi, Milan, 1956, p. 10.
M. Muraro, 'An Altarpiece and other Figure Paintings by Francesco Guardi', The Burlington Magazine, C, January 1958, p. 8.
M. Muraro, 'Figure di Francesco Guardi', Emporium, CXXX, 1959, pp. 245-246.
R. Pallucchini, La Pittura Veneziana del Settecento, Venice and Rome, 1960, pp. 131 and 135.
T. Pignatti, 'Gian Antonio Guardi', in Pittura in Europa, Milan, 1961, p. 138.
A. Morassi, Antonio e Francesco Guardi, Venice, 1973, I, pp. 145, 148 and 154, no. 187; II, fig. 209.
L.R. Bortolatto, L’Opera Completa di Francesco Guardi, Milan, 1974, pp. 118-119, no. 503, illustrated.

Exhibited

Venice, Palazzo Grassi, Mostra dei Guardi, 5 June-10 October 1965, no. 67.
Venice, Palazzo Ducale, Dal Ricci al Tiepolo, 7 June-15 October 1969, no. 117.

Conditions of sale

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Lot Essay

Better known for his capricci and vedute, this painting is one of a small group of intimate depictions of the Madonna by Francesco Guardi, who started his career as a figure painter in his brother Antonio's workshop. Giuseppe Fiocco, who was the first to publish the painting in 1926, summarised its identifying features as follows: 'the type, somewhat Tiepolesque, but painted with vigorous brush-strokes and with pigment that is liquid and dense like lacquer, perhaps more suited to the grace of the bauta than to the humility of the Virgin' (1925, op. cit., p. 229).

The work is directly comparable to a Madonna sold in These Rooms on 8 December 2021, lot 171, and a preparatory drawing was recorded in the Zwicky collection by Morassi (A. Morassi, Guardi: Tutti I Disegni, Venice, 1975, no. 132). The dating of Guardi's figure paintings has proved somewhat difficult; Morassi compares the handling of the present work to a pair of Organ Shutters in the Ringling, Sarasota, which have been variously dated from the 1740s to the 1780s/90s (see Morassi, 1973, op. cit., p. 147).

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