Federico del Campo

Anonymous sale, London, Sotheby's, 19 March 1986, lot 42;

Where acquired by MacConnal-Mason, London;

Private Collection (acquired in the United States circa 1980);

Thence by descent from the above;

Anonymous sale, New York, Sotheby's, 1 February 2019, lot 437;

Where acquired.

This sweeping view epitomizes Federico del Campo’s approach to vedutismo, a popular genre pioneered in the eighteenth century by Francesco Guardi and Canaletto, which gained increasing popularity in the nineteenth century. Painted from the promenade overlooking the lagoon and encompassing the Doge's Palace, the entrance to St. Mark's Square, and the Church of Santa Maria della Salute, the panorama is striking in its technical precision, lively brushwork and luminous palette. The elegance of the subject and its technique are telling of their times, reflective of sophisticated Belle Époque taste during the 1880s and 1890s, and of the increased demand for souvenir views by a newly mobile bourgeoisie. Indeed, so much were del Campo's views in demand that he painted the present view several times, it becoming his signature composition.

The young del Campo was lured to Italy not only by its picturesqueness but by the hope of launching a successful and lucrative career. In moving to Venice in the late 1880s, he joined an already large community of emigré artists, among them Antoinetta Brandeis and the Spanish colony of painters who included Rafael Senet, Mariano Fortuny, and Martin Rico y Ortega, all of whom found a ready international market for their views of the city. Many, del Campo included, made such big names for themselves through this genre that they painted nothing but Italian views.