Francesco Albotto

With Frederick Mont, New York, by 1962;
With Newhouse Gallery, New York;
From whom purchsed by the family of the present owners.

R. Toledano,  Michele Marieschi, l'opera completa, Milan 1988, p. 86 cat. no. V.13.5 (as by Michele Marieschi);
D. Succi, Marieschi tra Canaletto e Guardi, Torino 1989, reproduced  p. 190 fig. 230 (as Francesco Albotto);
M. Manzelli, Michele Marieschi e il suo alter-ego Francesco Albotto,  Venice 1991, p. 79, cat no. A.11.5 (as by Francesco Albotto);
R. Toledano, Michele Marieschi Catalogo ragionato, Milan 1995, p. 82 cat. no V.18.c (as by Michele Marieschi);
F. Montecuccoli degli Erri & F. Pedrocco, Michele Marieschi La vita, l'ambiente, l'opera, Milan 1999, under cat. no. 154 (possibly by Marieschi);
M. Manzelli, Michele Marieschi e il suo alter-ego Francesco Albotto, Venice 2002, 2nd ed., pp. 118-119, fig. A.11.05 (as by Francesco Albotto).

The following condition report has been provided by Simon Parkes of Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc. 502 East 74th St. New York, NY 212-734-3920, simonparkes@msn.com , an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting has been recently restored and should be hung as is. The canvas has an old lining which nicely stabilizes the surface. The paint layer is clean. There is no abrasion or discoloration in the buildings or the foreground evident at all and this is an unusually well preserved portion of the picture. As one would expect from a picture of this period, the sky has become a little grainy and there are a few spots of retouching here and there which even out the palette, yet these are not in any great concentration. The condition throughout this painting is extremely good.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

One of the primary sights of the city of Venice, the Basilica of Santa Maria della Salute was the masterpiece of Baldassare Longhena, the preeminent architect of the Venetian Baroque.  It was erected at the commission of the city government to commemorate the relief of Venice from the outbreak of the plague that devastated a large part of Northern Italy from 1629-31.  Nearly a third of the republic's population was lost in the epidemic, and the site for the church, at the intersection of the Giudecca and Grand canals, was at the very heart of the city, a constant reminder to citizens and visitors alike of the deliverance of the Serenissima from what would be one of the last great outbreaks of the disease.

This painting exemplifies the attributional questions that still exist within the corpus of Albotto's work and that of his master Michele Marieschi.  The very high quality of the painting has lead some scholars to suggest that it is, in fact, a work of Marieschi himself, rather than Albotto; this difference of opinion is clearly reflected in the publication history of the present work (see literature).  The view itself, an almost direct, full-frontal portrait of the Salute, was indeed a specialty of Marieschi, one which he replicated a number of times.¹  Some of these Marieschi views, such as the example in the Art Institute, Chicago (inv. 1946.375), depict in the foreground of the composition the quay on the opposite side of the canal, with figures and gondole in the front plane of the picture.  In this, they relate more closely to an engraving of 1741 by Marieschi of the view.  Manzelli, however, publishes at least one view by Marieschi of the Salute as portrayed in the present composition, as if seen from inside a boat on the canal (or in fact, perhaps more accurately somewhat above the water so as to render the full impact of the church's exceptional architecture) with the busy traffic of the waterway crowding the front of the canvas.²  He gives a number of this second type also to Albotto, however, including the present work.  Toledano, on the other hand, considers the present work to be by Marieschi himself, and dates it to circa 1735.

 

1.   Toledano op. cit., p. 81, under cat. no. V.18a notes that the image is derived from a print by Carlevaris, presumably the image of the church from that artist's highly influential Le fabriche e vedute di Venezia (1703) where the building is shown a similar manner.
2.  Sale: Christie's, London, December 11, 1984, lot 89; cf. Manzelli, op. cit., p. 54, cat. no. M.11.3, reproduced.