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Gian Antonio Guardi and Francesco Guardi

Carlo and Ubaldo Resisting the Enchantments of Armida's Nymphs, 1750/1755

West Building, Main Floor — North Stair Landing West

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 250.2 x 459.8 cm (98 1/2 x 181 in.)

framed: 258.1 x 471.5 cm (101 5/8 x 185 5/8 in.)

Credit Line

Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund

Accession Number

1964.21.1

Artists / Makers

Gian Antonio Guardi (artist) Venetian, 1699 - 1761

Francesco Guardi (artist) Venetian, 1712 - 1793

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Provenance

Richard White, 2d earl of Bantry [1800-1868], County Cork, Ireland, who perhaps bought it in Italy c. 1820; by descent to Mrs. Shelswell-White. (Unspecified dealer, Dublin, as by Pellegrini, in 1955); (David Carritt for Geoffrey Merton, London), 1956.[1] (Thomas Agnew & Sons, London); purchased 1964 by NGA.

[1] The discovery of the series of Tasso paintings, of which this and NGA 1964.21.2 are part, is variously recounted in the early literature (see references). Only Antonio Morassi, "Aggiunta al Guardi: le cinque 'Storie' della Gerusalemme liberata", Emporium 131 (1960): 247; Fern Rusk Shapley, Catalogue of Italian Paintings, 2 vols., Washington, D.C., 1979: 1:232; and a few contemporary news accounts, for example, Giornale del Mattino 30 October 1959, mention the "Dublin dealer." The rest report that Carritt discovered them in "the shed of an old house in Ireland."

There is no evidence which of the Bantry residences originally housed the paintings, or when and where they were acquired. An unsubstantiated, and unlikely, rumor that the paintings were once at Versailles is variously reported in the NGA curatorial files. Francis J.B. Watson, "Guardi and England", in Problemi Guardeschi. Atti del convegno di studi promossi della Mostra dei Guardi. 13-14 settembre 1965, Venice, 1967: 212, speculated that the earl of Bantry may have acquired the paintings as works by François Boucher (1703-1770).

Associated Names

Agnew & Sons, Ltd., Thomas
Carritt, David
Merton, Geoffrey
Shelswell-White, Mrs.
Unknown Dealer
White, 2nd Earl of Bantry, Richard

Exhibition History

1960: Italian Art and Britain, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1960, no. 457, as by Francesco Guardi.

1969: In Memoriam, Ailsa Mellon Bruce, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1969, unnumbered checklist.

Technical Summary

The support is constructed of three lengths of coarse, plain-weave fabric joined horizontally. The lengths measure 92, 97, and 60 cm in width, with the widest at the top. The ground consists of a red layer with a second, overall gray layer that was used as a middle tone throughout. The composition was laid in with brown paint using a moderately narrow brush to draw outlines and with white paint using a wider brush to block out larger areas. This white paint has a low impasto visible through successive layers. The large reserves revealed in x-radiographs suggest that the composition was fairly well planned, although the reserves follow no precise outlines.

The paint was applied in layers, wet-over-dry, apparently beginning with the upper sky, then moving on to the lower sky and mountain ridges, next to the clouds, then to the figures, and finally to the still life and flowers. The drapery of the standing nymph was painted in two stages: impastoed white underpaint with an orange glaze over it. The figure of Ubaldo at left was painted with more levels of shading than other figures and in this sequence: sky, red drapery with brown shadows, yellow drapery, blue drapery, and white drapery with wet-into-wet black shadows painted on top of the flesh tones. His blue boots were painted from light to dark. The blue drapery of the seated nymph was added last and was painted from dark to light. In some areas a sharp object (perhaps a brush handle) was used to scratch lines into the paint. There are few artist's changes: Carlo's right arm was repositioned and the contour of the right shoulder of the standing nymph was changed by pulling a green glaze for foliage over it.

The original tacking margins are present. The two original seams are visible on the surface, as is the horizontal seam in the lining canvas. The vertical craquelure may have resulted from rolling. There are many tears, especially in the sky and in Ubaldo's red drapery, and losses in the figure of Carlo. Extensive abrasion to the glazes throughout has made some passages illegible. Inpainting with dots and dashes is present to a large degree in the figures. The inpainting has whitened, especially in the sky. The varnish is moderately discolored. The painting was most recently treated in 1959.

Bibliography

1959: Frohlich-Bume, Lili. "Die neuentdeckten Bilder von Francesco Guardi." Weltkunst 29 (1959): 7.

1959: Jeudwine, W.R. "A Guardi Rediscovery." Apollo 70 (1959): 173-175, repro.

1959: Muraro, Michelangelo. "Figure di Francesco Guardi." Emporium 130 (1959): 252, n. 14.

1960: Morassi, Antonio. "Aggiunta al Guardi: le cinque 'Storie' della Gerusalemme liberata." Emporium 131 (1960): 247-256, figs. 5-6.

1960: Muraro, Michelangelo. "Arte Italiana e Inghilterra." Emporium 131 (1960): 168-170.

1960: Muraro, Michelangelo. "The Guardi Problem and the Statues of the Venetian Guilds." The Burlington Magazine 102 (1960): 421-428.

1960: Pallucchini 1960, 134, 140, figs. 356-357.

1961: Pallucchini, Rodolfo. "La pittura veneta alla mostra Italian Art and Britain: Appunti e proposte." In Festschrift Eberhard Hanfstaengl zum 75. Munich, 1961: 81-83, figs. 5-6.

1964: Martini, Egidio. La pittura veneziana del settecento. Venice, 1964: 114, 274, n. 259, fig. 262.

1964: Pignatti, Terisio. "Nuovi disegni di figura dei Guardi." Critica d'Arte n.s. II, nos. 67-68 (1964): 60.

1965: Heinemann, Fritz. "Mostra dei Guardi." Kunstchronik 18 (1965): 240.

1965: Nicolson, Benedict. "The Guardi Brothers as Figure Painters." The Burlington Magazine 107 (1965): 472.

1965: Palluchini, Rodolfo. "Note alla mostra dei Guardi." Arte Veneta 19 (1965): 226.

1965: Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 64.

1965: Zampetti, Pietro, ed. Mostra dei Guardi. Exh. cat. Ca'Peasaro, Venice, 1965.

1966: Hannegan, Barry. "Guardi at Venice." The Art Bulletin 48, no. 2 (June 1966): 251.

1966: Levey, Michael. Rococo to Revolution. New York, 1966: 113-114, fig. 69.

1966: Morassi, Antonio. "Altre novità e precisazioni su Antonio e Francesco Guardi." Atti dell'Accademia di scienze, lettere e arti di Udine. 7th ser., 8 (1966-1969): 287.

1966: Pignatti, Terisio. "The Brothers Guardi." Art News Annual 31 (1966): 45.

1966: Watson, Francis J. B. "The Guardi Family of Painters." Journal of the Royal Society of Arts 114 (1966): 277-279.

1966: Zampetti, Pietro. "A proposito dei Guardi." Colóquio 39 (1966): 44.

1967: Mahon, Denis. "The Brothers at the Mostra dei Guardi: Some Impressions of a Neophyte." In Problemi Guardeschi. Atti del convegno di studi promossi della mostra dei Guardi. 13-14 settembre 1965. Venice, 1967: 91-99.

1967: Morassi, Antonio. "Antonio Guardi." In Sensibilità e razionalità del '700. Corso internazionale di alta cultura, 7, Venice 1965. Edited by Vittore Branca. Florence, 1967: 509-510.

1967: Watson, Francis J. B. "Guardi and England." In Problemi Guardeschi. Atti del convegno di studi promossi della Mostra dei Guardi. 13-14 settembre 1965. Venice, 1967: 212.

1967: Zampetti, Pietro. "Il problema dei Guardi: la ricerca della verita." In Problemi Guardeschi. Atti del convegno di studi promossi della Mostra dei Guardi. 13-14 settembre 1965. Venice, 1967.

1968: Morassi, Antonio. "Antonio Guardi as a Draughtsman." MD 6 (1968): 132.

1968: National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 57, repro.

1972: Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 98.

1973: Morassi, Antonio. Guardi: Antonio e Francesco Guardi. 2 vols. Venice, 1973-1975: 1:88-92, 320-322, nos. 68-69; 2:figs. 78, 80.

1974: Rossi Bortolatto, Luigina. L'opera completa di Francesco Guardi. Milan, 1974: 89-90, nos. 17, 21, repro.

1975: European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 168, repro.

1978: Knox, George. "The Tasso Cycles of Giambattista Tiepolo and Gianantonio Guardi." Museum Studies 9 (1978): 89-95, fig. 28-29.

1979: Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. Washington, 1979: 1:231-235; 2:pl. 157.

1981: Martini, Egidio. La pittura del settecento veneto. Udine, 1981: 547, n. 333.

1984: Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 348, no. 483, color repro.

1985: European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 194, repro.

1989: Pignatti, Terisio. Venezia. Mille anni d'arte. Venice, 1989: 333, color repro.

1992: Pedrocco, Filippo, and Federico Montecuccoli degli Erri. Antonio Guardi. Milan, 1992: 141-142, nos. 153-154, figs. 195, 197-201, color pls. 34-35.

1994: Martineau, Jane, and Andrew Robison, eds. The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century. New Haven, 1994: 452, cat. 191, color pl.

1996: De Grazia, Diane, and Eric Garberson, with Edgar Peters Bowron, Peter M. Lukehart, and Mitchell Merling. Italian Paintings of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1996: 147-157, color repro. 150.