Attributed to Francesco Guardi

Hans Bernhard Greve, Berlin, until 1909;
His sale, Berlin, Rudolph Lepke, 12 – 13 October 1909, lot 102 (the chalk lot number visible on the stretcher);
There purchased by the family of the present owner. 

J. Byam-Shaw, “Guardi at the Royal Academy”, in The Burlington Magazine, 97, January 1955, p. 15, under note 5;
A. Morassi, Guardi, Antonio e Francesco Guardi, Venice 1973, vol. I, p. 408, under cat. no. 525; p. 413, under cat. no. 555;
 A. Morassi, Guardi, I Dipinti, Venice 1975, vol. I, p. 408, under cat. no. 525; p. 413, under cat. no. 555;

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. Although this painting has been restored perhaps in the last 25 years, the restoration is misleading and not particularly effective. The sky has received almost all of the retouches, which are clearly visible under ultraviolet light. Although there is some thinness and the dark ground color in the sky has begun to be more apparent, thus giving rise to the need for retouches, the condition is not at all discouraging. There are barely any retouches in the darker colors of the foreground. It is particularly here that small and accurate retouches would be extremely effective. The work may be slightly dirty in the foreground, but it can be seen that even the thinnest details in the architecture are very much in evidence. As one would expect, there is some weakness to the darker profiles of the architecture as they extend against the sky, particularly on the left side, and there is some weakness in the gondolas on the canal and in some of the darkest colors of the foreground. The lining on this painting is probably at least 100 years old and is still effective. There is an unrestored vertical scrape in the paint layer in the lower right and another in the lower center; both of these are in the promenade going into the canal. Given the slightly discolored inaccurate restoration in the sky and the lack of focus in the restoration in the foreground, it is recommended that the work be completely cleaned and retouched more accurately. This would present the work in a considerably better way.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Unseen since its sale in 1909 (see Provenance), this View of the Rialto Bridge with the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi is known in two other versions by Francesco Guardi.  One, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, is of almost identical dimensions.  While that canvas has much the same staffage, the arrangement of clouds differs and it appears to depict an earlier moment in the day.¹  In the present painting, the sun is just beginning to set, casting more intense shadows, and the crepuscular light lends a pinkish hue to the clouds at right.  The Metropolitan painting is signed on the wall below the chimney, lower left, Fran.^co Dè Guardi, and is considered to date to circa 1760.  

A second and perhaps more celebrated version, executed on a monumental scale, was formerly in the collection of the late Lord Iveagh and now in an English private collection.²  While painted from precisely the same viewpoint, the Iveagh composition is extended at right to include the entire façade of the Fabbriche Vecchie and the beginning of the Fabbriche Nuove.  In a diary entry dated 25 April 1764, Pietro Gradenigo wrote of an exhibition in the arcade of the Procuratie Nuove, Piazza San Marco, Venice, for which Francesco Guardi submitted two canvases commissioned from him by an Englishman.³   One of the paintings described matches this very composition, though scholars remain divided as to whether the Iveagh or the Metropolitan Museum picture was that exhibited.  

Though unavailable for study through much of the 20th century and known only through the 1909 reproduction, James Byam-Shaw addressed the issue of this painting in his 1955 article (see Literature), suggesting it might be the pendant to a View of the Rialto from the Fondamento del Carbon in the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon (see fig. 1).⁴  The Gulbenkian canvas, signed in the same manner as the Metropolitan canvas, is identical in size to the present work.  While the Metropolitan painting has traditionally been paired with a View of Santa Maria della Salute, the pendant to the Iveagh picture is likewise a North-facing View of the Rialto from the Fondamento del Carbon, which sold at Sotheby’s London in 2011 for £26,697,250.⁵  This parallel pairing would seem to support Byam-Shaw's hypothesis.

A preparatory drawing for the composition depicting the Rialto Bridge and Palazzo dei Camerlenghi was at some point divided into two halves, presumably when it was removed from an album; one half is now preserved in the Musée Bonnat, Bayonne, and the other in the Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin.⁶   The sketch for the pendant view from the Fondazione del Carbon, meanwhile, remains intact in the Musée du Louvre, Paris.⁷  There is a marked crease in the middle of the Louvre sheet, suggesting it too was removed from the spine of an album.   The length of the Bayonne and Berlin drawings united is identical to that of the Louvre drawing and it seems likely therefore that the two originated from the same album.  Should this be the case, it would lend far greater credence to the argument that the two views were originally intended as pendants and conceived as such by the artist himself.

The composition is expertly foreshortened at left, a device unusual for the artist, and shows the architrave of the Palazzo Civran in close detail and stark light.  The artist depicts here the most lively stretch of the Grand Canal at Venice’s commercial heart, looking south toward the Rialto Bridge and Palazzo dei Camerlenghi.  The scene encapsulates the quotidian bustle of Venetian life: the water is crowded with gondolas ferrying passengers and cargo to and fro, and the river banks are alive with people.  Citizens cross the bridge from the Eastern bank, with its opulent palazzi owned by prosperous Venetians, to the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi, the seat of the financial magistrates and city's treasury.  To the west, meanwhile, are the erberie and pescarie (grocery and fishmarkets) frequented by ordinary citizens, housed within the Fabbriche Vecchie and Fabbriche Nuove, just out of view at right.

1.  Inv. no. 71.119, oil on panel, 21 by 33 ¼ in.; 53.3 by 85.7 cm., published A. Morassi, Guardi, I Dipinti, 2nd ed., Venice 1975, vol. I, p. 413, cat. no. 554, reproduced vol. II, fig. 530.
2. Oil on canvas, (48 by 80 ½ in.; 122 by 200 cm), published A. Morassi, op. cit., vol. I, p. 413 cat. no. 555, reproduced vol. II, fig. 529.
3.  P. Gradenigo, “Journal entry, 25 April 1764”, in Notizie d’Arte tratte dai notatori e dagli annali del N.H. Pietro Gradenigo, .  L. Livan (ed.), Venice 1942, p. 106. 
4.  A. Morassi, op. cit., vol. I, p. 408, cat. 525, reproduced vol. II, fig. 509; J. Byam-Shaw, op. cit.
5.  Sold London, Sotheby’s, 6 July 2011, lot 73; A. Morassi, op. cit., vol. I, p. 407, cat. no. 524, reproduced vol. II, fig. 510;
6.  Musée Bonnat, Bayonne, inv. 1241; 258 by 371 mm.; Kupferstichkabinett, Berlin, inv. 4206; 264 by 389 mm., both ink and sepia wash on paper.
7.  Musée du Louvre, Paris, inv. no. R.F.5211, ink and sepia wash on paper.