Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo

Sotheby's New York, 6 July 1920, lot 41 (part of an album of 104 drawings by Giandomenico Tiepolo, to Colnaghi for £610)
Richard Owen, Paris
Celia Tobin Clark, San Francisco
Sotheby's London, 1 July, 1971, lot 64

Paris, Musée des Arts Décoratifs, 1921 (no catalogue)

E. Vetrocq, Domenico Tiepolo's Punchinello Drawings, exhib. cat.,  Bloomington, Indiana University Art Museum, 1979, no. S45
G. Knox, 'Domenico Tiepolo's Punchinello Drawings, satire, or Labor of Love?,' Satire in the Eighteenth Century, New York, London, 1983, p. 145
A. Gealt, Domenico Tiepolo, The Punchinello Drawings, Verona 1986, p. 188, no. 95, reproduced

The drawing is in good condition apart from some minor defects; there is some foxing, but mainly in the edges outside the image and a little pale staining also in the sheet edges. The paper color is also very slightly faded, but the overall impression is strong and fresh.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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This delightful and graceful scene is part of the very renowned series of drawings depicting scenes from the life of Punchinello, now scattered in public and private collections.  These drawings are the most sought after and collected of all Giandomenico's drawings, and according to Byam Shaw they are the latest in date and the most complete of the artist's surviving series.  The subject is based on the Neapolitan character of Pulcinella, first brought to life on stage by Silvio Fiorillo at the begining of the seventeenth century.  The character of Punchinello becomes famous quite early on in the Commedia dell'Arte, although he begins to be familiar in Venice only after the middle of the 18th century.  He subsequently became one the favourite subjects of both Giambattista and Giandomenico Tiepolo.  The series of drawings on this theme, for which no text or source has yet been identified, develops the subjects already painted, in monochrome, by Giandomenico in around 1793, in the so-called Camera dei Pagliacci, at the family villa at Zianigo.  Writing about the series, James Byam Shaw suggested: Perhaps the success which these fascinating scenes must have had, particularly with his more youthful neighbours at Zianigo, inspired the old man, at the very end of his life, to produce the series of drawings...and which he called on the title-page Divertimento per li Regazzi- an Entertainement for Children.' ¹

In the present humourous sheet a group of punchinelli gather around a deer to the left, while an elegant lady watches the scene, hiding behind her skirts two more scared punchinelli.  In the meantime a third one carries off a dog, while nearby another punchinello, unperturbed, is kissing a young nymph.

Giandomenico Tiepolo's Punchinello drawings first appeared, from an unrecorded source, in a Sotheby's London sale in 1920 (see Provenance).  At the time, it was indicated that there were 102 drawings in the series, but this number did not include the title page, now in the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, which in turn indicates that the series originally consisted of 104 sheets, meaning that one was missing at the time of Sotheby's sale.²  As pointed out by Byam Shaw, the series was possibly finished within the last year or so before Giandomenico's death in 1804.  At this point in his life, Giandomenico was borrowing a lot from his earlier compositions, especially from Scenes from Contemporary Life, and also from his father's drawings.  The numbering that is generally to be found in the wide margin at the top left may indicate the original sequence for the series, although Byam Shaw suggests that these numbers may have been written on the drawings after the artist's death by one of his family or another executor.³ 

¹ J.  Byam Shaw, The Drawings of Domenico Tiepolo, London 1962, p. 54

² Idem, The Robert Lehmman Collection, VI, Italian Eighteenth-Century Drawings, New York 1987,  p. 203, note 3

³ Ibid., p. 203