FRANCESCO GUARDI (maniera di)

(Venice, 1712 - 1793) View of the Rialto China on paper, 28.7X41 cm View of the Island of San Giorgio View of the Doge's Palace China on paper, 30.5X42 cm,8 (3) The Venetian view is a pictorial genre of extraordinary success, artists such as Canaletto (1697-1768), Francesco Guardi (1712-1793), Michele Marieschi (1710-1743) and Bernardo Bellotto (1721-1780) contributed to the creation of a true collective imagination of the city. The extraordinary production was destined to satisfy the demand of new collectors and refined connoisseurs, especially English, who had the great merit of having favoured the development of a genre that broke with the academic figurative tradition. During the first decades of the 19th century the diffusion of these works did not slow down at all, and quite a few masters continued to paint and draw according to the viewpoints typical of the previous era. However, one can see how the transition between the two ages led to a search for greater modernity through a more accentuated pictorialism.