The Master of the Langmatt Foundation Views (Apollonio Domenichini) Active in Venice during the second and third quarters of the 18th Century

The Master of the Langmatt Foundation Views, thus named after a series of seven views of Venice in the Langmatt Foundation in Zurich, has more recently been identified as Apollonio Domenichini (Venice 1715-c.1770).  Domenichini, who was known amongst contemporaries as "Menichino", was a follower of Luca Carlevarijs and Canaletto and, like them, he established his reputation by painting views of Venice and its environs. His name is recorded in the registers of the fraglia (corporation) of Venetian painters in 1757 and he frequently appears as the painter of works being sent by the Venetian dealer and connoisseur Giovanni Maria Sasso to the Englishman John Strange during the second half of the 18th Century.

Villa Pisani, visible in the distance of this view, was built between 1735 and 1740 based on designs by the Paduan Girolamo Frigimelica (for the gardens) and the architect Francesco Maria Preti (for much of the building itself). The rooms inside the villa were frescoed by a number of the leading painters of the day, including Jacopo Amigoni, Jacopo Guarana, Sebastiano Ricci, Giuseppe Zais and Giambattista Tiepolo (whose Glory of the Pisani Family, executed in 1761-62, is one of the artist's last works in Italy, before his departure for Madrid).

The attribution and date of circa 1750 is due to Prof. Dario Succi, a copy of whose expertise, dated 20 August 2003, accompanies this lot.