Michele Marieschi

Commissioned or purchased for Henry Howard, 4th Earl of Carlisle (1684-1758), of Castle Howard, Yorkshire;
By descent to George James, 9th Earl of Carlisle (1843-1911), by whom sold in 1895 or 1897 to G. Donaldson, or in 1898 to Duveen;
Acquired shortly afterwards by Alfred Beit (1853-1906);
By inheritance to his brother Sir Otto Beit 1st Bt. (1865-1930);
By whom given to a member of the Guinness family;
By descent until sold to the present owner in 1968.

The following condition report is provided by Hamish Dewar, who is an external specialist and not an employee of Sotheby's.UNCONDITIONAL AND WITHOUT PREJUDICEStructural ConditionThe canvas has been lined and this is ensuring an even and secure structural support and hasnot adversely affected the surface textures and impasto.Paint surfaceThe paint surface has an even varnish layer.Inspection under ultra-violet light shows minimal retouchings. These are around the framingedges, most of which are covered by the framing sight edge, a few small spots in the sky andsome very thin lines filling craquelure in the dark hull of the boat in the lower right of thecomposition. There is also an area of inpainting on the upper left corner and turret of thefacade of the Doge's Palace. It is very encouraging to note that the fine details of the painting are intact with no evidence of over-cleaning or abrasion.SummaryThe painting is therefore in excellent and stable condition and no further work is required.
"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."

This lively view of the Molo is one of a pair of Venetian vedute acquired by Henry Howard, 4^thEarl of Carlisle (1696-1758) for his seat, Castle Howard (fig. 1), which he succeeded to in 1738. It formed part of a remarkable assemblage of over forty Venetian views by Canaletto, Bellotto, and Marieschi bought to decorate the “Blue Caffor Room”, later known as the Venetian Room, at Castle Howard. The pendant to this painting was sold London, Christie’s 6 July 2010 lot 43 for £1,400,000 (fig. 2).

Little is known of Marieschi’s early training although it is probable that he began his artistic career as a stage designer. His first recorded work in Venice was a 1731 set design for the setting of Carnival Thursday in the Piazzetta, prepared for the impresario Francesco Tasso.  His early painted works took the form of capricci and vedute influenced by the work of fellow Venetians Luca Carlevarijs and Marco Ricci. Marieschi’s painting of vedute was further encouraged by the success Canaletto had with the genre. His paintings differ from those of his contemporaries however in his more theatrical compositions, exaggerated perspectives, atmospheric colour and animated handling of figures. Marieschi’s first recorded vedute date from 1736 and were executed for Johann Matthias, Graf von der Schulenburg (1661-1747). He then executed a set of six vedute in 1738 for the palace of Sanssouci, Potsdam and in 1741 completed a set of twenty one etchings of views of Venice.

The present painting depicts the Molo with the Bucintoro moored to the right. The gondolas in the foreground are populated by Marieschi’s characteristic lively figures and on the far right the composition is framed by the vertical mast of an incoming boat.  This was one of Marieschi’s most refined and elegant compositions and as was his practise he repeated the view in at least six other autograph versions.¹ Each composition is highly original in the way Marieschi varies the placement of figures and boats and in his choice of perspective.  The viewpoint from which the composition is painted is one popularised by Canaletto on a number of occasions, most notably in the Bucintoro returning to the Molo on Ascension Day in the Royal collection.² Canaletto’s composition was engraved by Visentini in 1741 and the view was etched by Marieschi in the same year.

There are relatively few paintings by Marieschi that can be associated with individual commissions or specific patrons and this painting, with its illustrious and complete early provenance, is a rare example of such a work. Charles Howard, 3^rd Earl of Carlisle (1669-1738) was heir to large estates in Cumberland and Yorkshire and was a man of considerable energy and ambition. He chose Sir John Vanbrugh as architect for his new mansion and work begun at Castle Howard in 1700. Vanbrugh’s realisation of Carlisle’s vision was soon recognised, with Blenheim, as one of the outstanding achievements of the English baroque. Charles Howard had begun the tradition of Venetian patronage at Castle Howard when he employed Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini and Marco Ricci to contribute to the interior decoration.  His eldest son, Henry, Viscount Morpeth went on the Grand Tour 1714-15 and returned to marry Lady Frances Spencer in 1717.  He succeeded as 4^th Earl of Carlisle on his father’s death in 1738 and inherited the magnificent Castle Howard. Although the building and interior decoration was complete, bar the West wing, the house lacked a commensurate collection of pictures to adorn its grand interiors. The 4^th Earl was soon to remedy this. In the year of his father’s death he took his ailing son Charles, Viscount Morpeth to Italy where they were recorded in Venice in November 1738, in Rome by the spring of 1739, in Florence in June and in Leghorn in the summer where they set sail for England.  In Rome Carlisle ordered a set of six architectural capricci from Panini, and in Venice he obtained paintings from both Canaletto and Marieschi, for what was to later become known as the Venetian Room at Castle Howard (fig. 3). Carlisle’s staunch Whig allegiance may in part explain his interest in acquiring views of the monuments of an aristocratic republic but he was also following the example of his wife’s half-brother, successively 5^th Earl of Sunderland and 3^rd Duke of Marlborough, and her other half-brother-in-law, John, 4^th Duke of Bedford, both who had ordered a major series of views from Canaletto.

Professor Dario Succi dates the set of Marieschis bought for Castle Howard to 1733-4 while Ralph Toledano favours a later dating of 1735.³  Arguably however the paintings cannot date before 1738 if they were in fact commissioned by Lord Carlisle, as the extent of the series implies. The size of the series was unparalleled in Marieschi’s career and this in part explains the extremely high calibre of the paintings at Castle Howard. It is possible that Carlisle ordered the present painting and its pendant, as well as works by Canaletto, on his visit to Italy in 1738. Marieschi had already achieved considerable prominence in the city by this date. Carlisle is known to have acquired at least some of his Venetian views through the agent and antiquary Antonio Maria Zanetti the Elder (1680-1767) who was a known associate of Marieschi’s. In a letter to Carlisle written on the 3 June 1740 Zanetti states that the Earl had already received a group of Venetian views executed by a painter “qui est le plus bon home du monde, et qui en est aussy abil, que Cannalletto, au quell presentment on paye seulment le nom, et la renomée”.⁴ Zanetti might have been referring to either Michele Marieschi or Bernardo Bellotto: eighteen pictures by the former were at Castle Howard and a series of at least twelve by the latter, many of which were destroyed by fire in 1940. Charles Beddington identified the pendant to this picture as that listed as number 13 in a schedule of eighteen pictures at Castle Howard and the present painting can be identified with number 6 on the same schedule: “Vedute della Piazza di. S. Marco con la Cecca/ Palazzo Ducale, Ponte della Paglia, e Prigioni” (fig. 4).⁵

It can be assumed that both this painting and its pendant were among the Venetian views sold by George, 9^thEarl of Carlisle (1843-1911) who was a landscape painter himself, but appeared to dislike the Grand Tour taste of his predecessors. Other Venetian views removed from the house at the same date include a pair of Bellottos now in the Louvre, sold to Colnaghi’s in 1985 and two other paired canvases of the same size as the present lot sold to the dealer George Donaldson in 1895 and 1897. Three more went to Duveen in 1898 and a further eleven Venetian views of the same size were sold in London at Christie’s, 18 February 1944, lots 10-14. After its removal from Castle Howard this painting, with its pendant, is believed to have been in the collection of Alfred Beit who was a British South African gold and diamond magnate and an active buyer in this period.

 

1. R. Toledano, Michele Marieschi, Milan 1995, pp. 40-44, nos. V1.a-f.
2. W.G. Constable and J.G. Links, Canaletto, Oxford 1976, vol. I pp. 357-8, no.335, vol. II, reproduced plate 64.
3. D. Succi in Marieschi tra Canaletto e Guardi, exhibition catalogue, Gorizia 1989, pp. 117-8; R. Toledano, Michele Marieschi, Milan 1995, under nos. V.15,47, 3.b and 40.a.
4. Castle Howard Mss. J 12/12/18 published in D. Scarsbrick, ‘Gem Connoisseurship,’ in The Burlington Magazine, vol. CXXIX, February 1987, p. 96.
5. C. Beddington, Bernardo Bellotto and the Capitals of Europe, exhibition catalogue, Venice 2000, p. 50 under no. 3.