Francesco Guardi

Overall condition good. Some light water staining top left. Some light wrilkles in paper towards top and left edges. A few very small tears in left margin. Ink and wash on recto, and ink and chalk on verso extremely fresh and strong. Hinged at top to modern backing sheet. Sold in a decorative modern gilt frame.
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This drawn capriccio appears to be a preparatory study for a painting by Francesco Guardi, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, which has a very similar composition.¹ Dating from the artist's mature period, the canvas is one of three large capricci that Guardi executed circa 1778-80 for a sitting room in the castle of Colleredo, Montalbano, where they remained until 1906; all three are now all in the Metropolitan Museum. The three canvas are, however, different in format from the present drawing, having segmented, arched tops, to fit into their stucco frames. The drawing is, instead, rectangular in shape, although the studies for decorative rocaille details on the verso may perhaps relate to the design for the painting's original frame.  Decorative designs of this type are rather rare in Guardi's work, but those that do survive - which may, of course, be only a small proportion of those that he made - bear witness to the artist's interest in the sort of broader decorative schemes that were so popular with his Venetian patrons.² 

Lot 142 below may possibly be a pendant to the present work.  

1.  See Dario Succi, Francesco Guardi, Milan 1993, fig. 91
2.  See Antonio Morassi, Guardi, I Disegni, Venice 1975, figs. 458-76