The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century

by Jane Martineau (Editor), Andrew Robison (Editor)

Venice, home of Tiepolo, Canaletto, Piranesi, Piazzetta, and Guardi, was the most artistic city of eighteenth-century Italy. This beautiful book examines the whole range of the arts in Venice during this period, including paintings, pastels and gouaches, drawings and watercolors, prints, illustrated books and sculpture.

The book begins with an introduction by Andrew Robison and a general introduction to Venetian art by Michael Levey. Essays by other eminent authorities then discuss the international taste for Venetian art and major aspects of the art of the period. The essays are followed by a catalogue that discusses and reproduces many of the finest works of the time along with biographies and critical discussions of the artists. The selection of works emphasizes the beauty, quality, distinctiveness, variety, balance, and unity of Venetian art. It includes altarpieces by Tiepolo, Piazzetta, and others that demonstrate the importance of profoundly serious and grand religious art; it presents the finest examples of history paintings and allegories, views and landscapes, architectural fantasies, decorative paintings, and portraits; and it offers a large selection of particularly fine graphic art, for many of the greatest painters―including Marco Ricci, Piazzetta, Canaletto, and Tiepolo―also devoted themselves to printmaking, book illustration, and designs for stage sets and the decorative arts, and often found greater freedom for their fantasy in such works.

Genres: Art, History

528 pages, Hardcover

First published January 31, 1994

Reviews

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read through all the sections on the major artists in 2011. Loved it! Didn't want to part with the book. But it wasn't mine. I came away with a particular appreciation for Piranesi and Bellotto, two 18th century Venetian artists with significantly different visions, Piranesi being my favorite. Their visions represent a contrast between fantasy and realism, Piranesi creating etchings of structures and places transformed with additions of his own imagination. Bellotto, on the other hand, was the careful precisionist of realism, replicating landscapes and urban-scapes with a perspective so accurate, it is conjectured that he used a 'camera obscura' to achieve this.

Piranesi's etchings were the product of 'dreams', familiar objects and places stretched, expanded, modded into entities more marvelous than their originals. But they were not impressionistic! They were realistic renderings of the unreal. It was the content, not the style that was fantastical. Take an afternoon and read up on this exotic Venetian innovator. Peruse through his works.