GUARDI, Francesco
(b. 1712, Venezia, d. 1793, Venezia)

The Doge on the Bucentaur at San Niccolò del Lido

1766-70
Oil on canvas, 67 x 100 cm
Musée du Louvre, Paris

This painting belongs to a series of twelve canvases, almost all in the Louvre, which recount the various episodes in the election of Doge Alvise Mocenigo of Venice in 1763. In reporting this event Guardi was inspired by engravings after the other master of the Venetian veduta (view), Antonio Canaletto. An observant and picturesque record of the traditional Venetian festival, which was part official ceremony and part popular rejoicing, this series attests to the pictorial verve of Guardi and to his sensitivity to the most fleeting atmospheric effects, worthy of the Impressionists over a century later.