Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo

Part of album of drawings by Domenico Tiepolo with provenance as follows:

Possibly Francesco Guardi (1712-1793), Venice;

Horace Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (1717-1797), Strawberry Hill, Twickenham, Middlesex;

William Lygon, 8th Earl Beauchamp (1903-1979), Madresfield Court, Worcestershire,

His sale (Drawings by Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, The Property of the Rt. Hon. The Earl Beauchamp, D.L., J.P.), London, Christie's, 15 June 1965, lot 12;

Private collection;

with Katrin Bellinger, Colnaghi, London,

where acquired by the present owner

This subject was one to which Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo returned many times, creating numerous variations on the theme.  The group is dateable to circa 1770 and many are housed in various public and private collections. Thirteen were offered in the Beauchamp sale at Christie’s on 15 June 1965 and the greatest number is in the Print Room at Stuttgart.¹ There is only one known painting of the subject by the artist, in the Museo Stibbert, Florence, but it is horizontal in format and cannot be directly related to the drawings.²

The album of more than 160 sheets by Domenico Tiepolo from which this drawing originates was titled ‘DISEGNI A PENA DA CUADRETTI GIO: DOMENICO FIGLIO DI GIO: BATA’: TIEPOLO CON ALCUNI DISEGNI DEL SUDETTO’, while the inside back cover was inscribed in an 18th century Italian hand - possibly that of Domenico's uncle, the artist Francesco Guardi - ‘Questi Disegni Sono no.160. tutti Originali Costa Cechini 15 da Lire 22 L’uno.’ The title page of the album bore the bookplate of Horace Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (1717-1797). The album later entered the collections of the Earls Beauchamp, and was dispersed at auction in 1965.

^1. G. Knox, Tiepolo, exhib. cat., Stuttgart, Graphische Sammlung, 1971, pp. 57-62, cats. 44-56

^2. A. Mariuz, Giandomenico Tiepolo, Venice 1971, pl. 305