Pastoral Scene
Giovanni Battista Piazzetta (Italian, 1682–1754)
1740
View the original$19
Type
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Materials & printing
Archival matte paper, 189 g/m² (10.3 mil), sourced from Japan, printed with multicolor water-based inkjet so every brushstroke stays crisp. Framed prints arrive ready to hang in a .75″ ayous-wood frame with an acrylite front. Sized to standard frames by cropping, never stretching — at most about 3% comes off one edge, which isn’t noticeable on most pieces, and we only offer a size when it stays that small.
Shipping & returns
Made to order and delivered in 5–8 business days (2–4 to print, 3–4 in transit). US shipping only for now. Because each print is made for your order, all sales are final — but if it arrives damaged or defective, send us a photo within 14 days and we’ll replace it free. Full policy.
Why is it this affordable?
A thin, flat margin on every piece — just enough to keep the store running. Most of what you pay is the print itself. We only sell sizes that reproduce at full quality, and we don’t mark up the large sizes the way most shops do.
About this work
One of Venice’s leading painters, Giovanni Battista Piazzetta transformed the gritty realism and dramatic light effects of earlier Baroque painting into his own poetic style. This is one of two paintings of life-size, rustic figures that Piazetta made for his patron, Field Marshall Johann Matthias von der Schulenberg. Their meaning remains mysterious. The half-naked boy holding a basket of grapes has been interpreted as the infant Bacchus, the god of wine, although Piazzetta made no reference in his description of the work to a symbolic meaning. The artist was probably responding to his patron’s taste for pastoral scenes, a genre that appealed to middle- and upper-class city dwellers for its idealized views of rural life.
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 191.8 × 143 cm (75 1/2 × 56 1/4 in.)
Museum record · 7 owners · 7 exhibitions
Provenance
- Commissioned by Marshall Schulenburg, Venice, by 1743; his heirs; sold to Mr. Greenwood in 1774; his sale at Christie’s, London, April 13, 1775 or 42.
- Guida da Faenza Collection; his sale, Rome, 1902.
- 17th-Century Gallery, London, 1917.
- Auction London, 1935.
- G. H. Winterbottom, London.
- Jacob Heimann, Milan, 1936.
- M. D. and D. M. Koetser, London, 1936; purchased by Art Institute, 1937.
Exhibitions
- Venice, Correr Museum, 1936–37.
- San Francisco, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Venetian Painting: from the Fifteenth Century through the Eighteenth Century, June 25–July 24, 1938.
- Toledo, Museum of Art, Four Centuries of Venetian Painting, March 8–31, 1940.
- Venice, Palazzo Ducale, Dal Ricci a Tiepolo, June 7–October 15, 1969.
- Chicago, Art Institute, Painting in Italy in the Eighteenth Century, September 19–November 8, 1970; traveled to Minneapolis, Institute of Art, December 3, 1970–June 10, 1971, and Toledo, Museum of Art, February 7–March 21, 1971.
- London, Royal Academy, The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century, September 15–December 14, 1994; Washington D.C., National Gallery of Art, January 29–April 23, 1995.
- Paris, France, Grand Palais, Venice at Vivaldi and Tiepolo’s time, September 14 2018-January 21, 2019; Venice, Palazzo Ducale, Feb. 23- June 9, 2019.
