1750, Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal), Venice, the Grand Canal Looking East with Santa Maria della Salute -- Legion of Honor (San Francisco)
From the museum label: Bathed in afternoon light, Canaletto's composition looks down the Grand Canal, past the basilica of Santa Maria della Salute. Views of Venetian waterways, churches, and public squares are among the great icons of eighteenth-century European painting, and Canaletto was the master of the genre. He painted this picture for an English country house, where it originally hung with other views of Venice and Rome by Canaletto and his contemporary Giovanni Paolo Panini. Built in an act of civic gratitude after the end of a plague in Venice, the church of the Salute offers modern viewers a symbol of resilience as the world continues to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic.
1750, Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal), Venice, the Grand Canal Looking East with Santa Maria della Salute -- Legion of Honor (San Francisco)
From the museum label: Bathed in afternoon light, Canaletto's composition looks down the Grand Canal, past the basilica of Santa Maria della Salute. Views of Venetian waterways, churches, and public squares are among the great icons of eighteenth-century European painting, and Canaletto was the master of the genre. He painted this picture for an English country house, where it originally hung with other views of Venice and Rome by Canaletto and his contemporary Giovanni Paolo Panini. Built in an act of civic gratitude after the end of a plague in Venice, the church of the Salute offers modern viewers a symbol of resilience as the world continues to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic.