Venice, The Piazza San Marco; Venice, The Bacino di San Marco, looking East with the Doge's Palace and the Riva degli Schiavoni; Venice, The Riva degli Schiavoni, with the Palazzo della Zecca and the Biblioteca Marciana, the church of Santa Maria della Salute beyond; and Venice, The Grand Canal, looking North, with the Rialto Bridge

A student of the Accademia di Pittura in Venice, Giuseppe Bernardino Bison was imbued with the 18th-century Venetian tradition, leading one scholar to describe his oeuvre as 'a last flowering of the Venetian Settecento' (G. Knox in J. Byam Shaw and G. Knox, The Robert Lehman Collection: Italian 18th Century drawings, New York, 1987, p. 18). The early part of Bison's career was spent working as a decorative painter, producing designs for La Fenice, as well as decorating the walls and ceilings of villas and palazzi in the Veneto. Around 1800 he settled in Trieste, where he decorated the Palazzo Carciotti (circa 1805) and the Palazzo della Vecchia Borsa (circa 1808). In 1831 Bison moved to Milan, where he remained, active mainly as a scenographer making stage designs for the Teatro alla Scala among other theatres. A prolific and fluent artist, he also painted many smaller-scale works, mainly intended for sale to collectors. Like the majority of Bison’s much sought-after views of Venice, this set of four canvases are based on Canaletto's first great series of Venetian vedute, that were engraved by Antonio Visentini between 1728-35, and published under the title Urbis Venetiarum Prospectus Celebriores.  The attribution to Bison has been confirmed by Fabrizio Magani.