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

The Molo and the Riva degli Schiavoni from the Bacino di San Marco

1760-65
Oil on canvas, 122 x 152,5 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

This splendid panorama shows us how Venice appeared to travellers arriving by boat: it presents a view of the Molo, with the Ducal Palace, the Campanile and the Library. Our gaze is led from the two columns of St. Mark and Todaro by way of the Piazzetta to San Marco and the Torre dell'Orologio. Many painters have recorded the Molo from the Bacino di San Marco (e.g. Van Wittel). Francesco Guardi, however, expanded the veduta to the right by incorporating into his composition the Riva degli Schiavoni, which lies in the extension of the Molo. The representation is dominated by the cluster of sailing boats in the foreground, which with their masts and sails serve, as it were, to screen the buildings from the observer's intrusive gaze. Curiously enough, besides a single schooner and several gondolas there are mostly fishing boats here, which one would sooner expect to see on the Lagoon outside the city than on the Bacino.

Guardi produced several versions of this view. On both stylistic and topographical grounds the painting exhibited here, which may also have decorated the portego of a palazzo, can be dated between 1760 and 1765. A drawing of the view of the Molo and the Riva (in private collection) can be connected to this painting.