Venice: The Bacino looking west c. 1734
Pen and ink, over free and ruled pencil and pinpointing | 26.8 x 37.5 cm (sheet of paper) | RCIN 907454
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A drawing of the Bacino in Venice. In the centre is the Dogana and the church of Santa Maria della Salute. To the left is the Giudecca canal. On the Giudecca is the church of the Redentore, and at the far left, part of the church of San Giorgio Maggiore. On the right is the Molo, the Zecca, the Libreria, the Palazzo Ducale and the Campanile. Many boats, barges and gondolas are depicted on the Bacino.
As there is no connection between the foreground and the distant buildings, it is difficult to identify the intended viewpoint, though it appears to be close to that of the two other drawings of the Bacino. This is therefore essentially an enlarged version of the left two-thirds of the other drawings, eliminating the less picturesque buildings to the right of the composition, and swinging the Riva around a little further to fill the entire lower portion of the sheet (a feature that it shares with a number of related paintings). It is not entirely clear what Canaletto’s model was for some of the details - the façade of the Libreria, for example, is here more meticulously drawn than in the other drawings or the Venice Sketchbook, and Canaletto must have used a number of different pictorial sources to compile the image.
The drawing of the figures, and the crispness of definition of the buildings, of this and RCIN 907453 are close to the Grand Canal drawings of around 1734, and both may be dated to the same period. What appears to have been a reaction between the ink and an early mounting paste has caused the ink to fade more around the edges of the drawings.
Catalogue entry adapted from Canaletto in Venice, London, 2005Provenance
Purchased by George III from Consul Joseph Smith, 1762
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Medium and techniques
Pen and ink, over free and ruled pencil and pinpointing
Measurements
26.8 x 37.5 cm (sheet of paper)
Object type(s)
Subject(s)
Other number(s)
RL 7454