Christie’s roundel
Lot 65 THE PROPERTY OF A PRIVATE COLLECTOR

Giovanni Antonio Canal, il Canaletto (Venice 1697-1768)

A capriccio with a domed church, men at work on scaffolding by an arch

Closed7 July 2009

Price Realised

GBP 73,250

More Information

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Giovanni Antonio Canal, il Canaletto (Venice 1697-1768)
A capriccio with a domed church, men at work on scaffolding by an arch
black chalk, pen and brown ink
5¼ x 9 3/8 in. (13.4 x 23.7 cm.)

Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 11 December 1974, lot 72.
K.M. Karen.
The British Rail Pension Fund; Sotheby's, New York, 8 January 1991, lot 14.

Specialist note

The church on the left appears to be of Canaletto's invention. It is surrounded by little houses, and on the right men labour on scaffolding to repair a ruined arch. Canaletto's drawings can be divided into his strictly topographical views, preparatory drawings for paintings or engravings, and more free-style invented compositions based loosely on Venetian and Roman motifs of which this drawing is an example.
Links compared this drawing, which cannot be related to a painted composition, to the Capriccio with the Rialto Bridge in the British Museum (op. cit., no. 766, pl. 144), believing both to be late works, perhaps made after the artist's return to Venice in 1756.