Photograph courtesy Museo
Correr
Venice: Museo Correr –
The Poetry of Light. The Poetry of Light - Venetian Drawings From
The National Gallery of Art in Washington exhibition at the Museo Correr, until
March 15, is curated by Andrew Robison. The superb exhibition brings together more
than one hundred and thirty extraordinary drawings from one of the most
important collections in the world. It
explores the art and myth of Venice, from the Renaissance to the 19th century.
On show are a host of great masters, from Mantegna, Bellini, Giorgione and
Titian to Veronese, Tiepolo, Piazzetta and Canaletto, together with a number of
foreign artists who fell in love with the city, including Callow and Sargent.
Above. Canaletto – The
Bucintoro at San Nicolo di Lido – 1765s/1766s – pen and brown ink with grey
wash over traces of graphite, tip of the brush with black wash, heightened with
a few touches of white gouache.
Gabriella Belli, director
of the Civic Museums Foundation and Andrew Robison, senior curator of the
Drawings and Prints Department of the National Gallery of Art of Washington.
The Poetry of Light. Bernardo
Strozzi – Hand Holding Empty Glove – 1630s – red chalk on oatmeal paper. As Mr.
Robison points out this elegant study is remarkably rare as only fifty drawings
of Strozzi survive. He didn’t make drawings for collectors, nor finished
studies in general, but only preliminary pen sketches or else chalk studies of
heads or bodily details, which he inserted as needed into paintings, which were
basically composed directly on canvas.
The Poetry of Light.
Vittore Carpaccio – Groups of Male Figures, The Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand
(verso) – c. 1514 – red chalk.
The Poetry of Light. In the exhibition a carefully selected nucleus
of one of the most important collections of drawings in the world, brought back
to the Lagoon for an unrepeatable investigation of the creativity of great
Venetian artists applied to graphic work: from Mantegna, Bellini and Carpaccio
to Giorgione, Lotto and Titian; from Bassano, Veronese, Tintoretto, Piazzetta,
Canaletto, Tiepolo and Guardi to the Venetian passions of “tourists” like James
McNeill Whistler, Rudolf von Alt, Edward Lear, Carl Friedrich Heinrich Werner,
William Callow and, above all, John Singer Sargent. This fascinating voyage
crosses four centuries of Venetian art, from the 15th century to the 19th,
revealing the drawing skills of the finest artists of their time. And as a
backdrop, there is always Venice: not merely as centre of artistic production,
but also as subject, as source of inspiration, a perennial legend.
Above. At the Press
conference projected on the screen; Giambattista Piazzetta – A Young Man
Embracing a Girl – c. 1743 – Charcoal on blue paper heightened with white
chalk.
Photograph courtesy Museo
Correr
The Poetry of Light. Preparatory
drawings, quick sketches to fix an idea, models and studies for studio work,
but also finished compositions, independent works able to offer a different
poetic formed of lines, shadows, chiaroscuro, highlights, the definition of
forms and movements, the translation of sentiments and visions, and the
exploration of the infinite possibilities of light.
Above. Francesco Guardi – An Elegant Couple, a
Gooseboy, and a Gentleman – c.1780 – pen and brown ink with brown and gray wash
over black chalk.
Photograph courtesy Museo
Correr
The Poetry of Light. –
John Singer Sargent – Gondola Moorings on the Grand Canal - 1904s/1907s. –
watercolor over graphite on thick wove paper.
The Poetry of Light.
Domenico Tintoretto – Venetian Ships Attacking Constantinople – 1598s/1605s –
brush and tempera over some squaring in charcoal on dark brown paper.
Andrea Bellieni and Mattia
Agnetti
The Poetry of Light.
Maurice Brazil Prendergast – Caffe Florian – 1898/1899 – watercolor over
graphite on heavy wove paper.
The Poetry of Light. William Stanley Haseltine – Venetian Fishing
Boats in Morning Light – 1871/1874 – pen and brown ink with watercolor and
gouache over graphite, with white heightening on blue-gray wove paper.
