Scene of Contemporary Life: The Chaperoned Visit

Toward the end of his career, Domenico Tiepolo frequently depicted scenes of contemporary life, usually with a satirical or caricatural twist. In this drawing, a married lady in the company of her elegant chaperone pays a visit to a pregnant woman. Tiepolo frequently recycled his own inventions: he had previously depicted the couple at right in a fresco in his family's villa at Zianigo, and the pregnant woman reappears in a famous drawing-- Il Concertino, in the Museo Correr, Venice. -- Exhibition Label, from "Drawn to Greatness: Master Drawings from the Thaw Collection"