Francesco Guardi
Watermark: letters "FV" with three stars above. Each star has six points, watermark crosses two chain lines.
Watermark: countermark: V or A with bent crossbar, centered between chain lines.
This drawing, which depicts the bucintoro ferrying the doge to San Niccolò al Lido to celebrate the Feast of the Ascension, is a late work, perhaps datable to the mid-1780s. Uncharacteristically painstaking in execution, it may have been created as an independent work of art or, perhaps, in preparation for a print. --Exhibition Label, from "Tiepolo, Guardi, and Their World: Eighteenth-Century Venetian Drawings"
Inscribed at lower left, in pen and brown ink, "S. Nicolo de Lido D0.I S. Servolo D0. 3 malamoco D0.5 / S. Lasero D0. 2 Chiosa D0. 4 e", a key serving to identify sites numbered from 1 to 5 on the drawing.
Straus, Herbert N., former owner.
Straus, Herbert N., Mrs., former owner.
Ryskamp, Charles, ed. Nineteenth Report to the Fellows of the Pierpont Morgan Library, 1978-1980. New York : Pierpont Morgan Library, 1981, p. 196-197.
Stampfle, Felice, and Jacob Bean. Drawings from New York collections. III: The eighteenth century in Italy. New York : Metropolitan Museum of Art : Pierpont Morgan Library, 1971, no. 196, repr.
100 Master drawings from the Morgan Library & Museum. München : Hirmer, 2008, no. 30, repr. [Kurt Zeitler]