Canaletto – The Royal Collection RCIN 404432. Rome: View of the Colosseum and the Arch of Constantine (1743)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 108 x 285.1 cm. Nr.: RCIN 404432. Acquired by George III. Source: http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/404432/rome-view-of-the-colosseum-and-the-arch-of-constantine. I have changed the light, contrast and colors of the original photo.
Jan Both – The Royal Collection RCIN 405544. Landscape with St Philip Baptizing the Eunuch (c. 1640-1649)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 128.6 x 161.8 cm. Nr.: RCIN 405544. Purchased by George IV when Prince of Wales. Source: http://img-fotki.yandex.ru/get/5815/8856776.9/0_7656d_b4675a20_XL. P.S. I have changed the light, contrast and colors of the original photo
Canaletto – The Royal Collection RCIN 400504. London: The Thames from Somerset House Terrace towards the City (c. 1750-1751)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 108.3 x 188.6 cm. Acquisition date: 1762. Nr.: RCIN 400504. Source: www.royalcollection.org.uk/sites/default/files/col/400504…. P.S. I have changed the light, contrast and colors of the original photo.
Canaletto – The Royal Collection RCIN 400715. Venice: The Campo SS. Giovanni e Paolo (1736-40)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 46.7 x 78.5 cm. Acquired in 1762 by King George III. Nr.: RCIN 400715. Source: toutelaculture.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/canaletto_r….
Canaletto – The Royal Collection RCIN 404397. Santa Maria della Salute and the Entrance to the Grand Canal, looking East (1744)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 127 x 203 cm. Nr.: RCIN 404397. Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/creditsuisse/6344001241/sizes/l/in/photostream/
Jan van der Heyden – The Royal Collection RCIN 405948. A country house on the Vliet near Delft (c. 1660)
Materials: oil on panel. Dimensions: 46.6 x 58.8 cm. Inscriptions: Heyde. Acquisition date: 1814 (Acquired by George IV when Prince Regent). Nr.: RCIN 405948. Source: gallery.nen.gov.uk/assets/1106/0000/0106/van_der_heyden_-…
The country house in the right middle ground has been identified as one which used to lie on the river Vliet, running between Delft and The Hague. Though this is possible, the house does not seem sufficiently distinctive to permit such a specific identification. This scene, however, depicts a fashionable part of Holland in the seventeenth century: a navigable canal or river with a well-kept towpath and a considerable volume of freight traffic. Lining the water are houses with plots of land extending into the flat, low-lying, fertile, reclaimed land. There is an alternation of elegant farmhouses, like the one with a stepped gable and hayrick, and buitenplaatsen (country houses), like the one nearer to us, with its ionic pilasters and dormer windows with scroll surrounds (as opposed to the more traditional gables). This house has a stone gate and a topiary hedge with claire-vues and an avenue of trees. Audrey Lambert reproduces a 1770 map of Rijswijk, between Delft and The Hague, which still shows exactly this alternation of simple plots and formal gardens extending into the polders on either side of the Vliet and nearby roads. (The Making of the Dutch Landscape: An Historical Geography of the Netherlands, 1985)
This image by Heyden (1637-1712) is notable for its restrained depiction of evening light, with more white than gold in the spectrum and just a hint of pink in some of the clouds. But it is the vivid naturalism of the scene, with its matter-of-fact viewpoint, recording a public thoroughfare with no deference to the country house, which so remarkably anticipates the landscapes of the Impressionists. It is also possible that Constable had seen this painting when he painted his Scene on a Navigable River in 1816–17 (Tate, London), with its sparkling pointillist touch and scrupulous record of a working inland waterway (http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/eGallery/object.asp?maker=12090&object=405948&row=1&detail=about).
Canaletto – The Royal Collection 400532. Venice: S. Geremia and the Entrance to the Cannaregio (c. 1726-1727)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 78.5 x 47.4. Acquired by King George III. Nr. RCIN 400532. Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gandalfsgallery/6485938083/sizes/o/in/photostream/
At the centre of the composition is the mouth of the canal of Cannaregio, heading north-west from the Grand Canal towards the lagoon, and at that time the principal route from central Venice to the mainland. The canal is spanned by the sixteenth-century Ponte delle Guglie (‘of the obelisks’), painted excessively large to hold the centre of the composition. To the left is the rear of the church of San Geremia with its thirteenth-century belltower, more slender than in reality. The belltower survives, but the church was rebuilt in 1753-60 by Carlo Corbellini and its clumsy mass now dominates the waterfront. Abutting the belltower is Palazzo Labia, built over several decades from the mid-seventeenth century. The buildings on the right are ‘opened out’, as if from a point on the Riva di Biasio to the left of the principal view.
The composition corresponds in most details with a drawing of the same view, dated 16 July 1734, which is however not a study for this painting but a later derivation. The most significant difference is the building second from the right: here it is a humble two-storey brick building; in the drawing it has been transformed into the modern three-storey, five-bay Palazzo Emo.
The painting was altered in later years by Canaletto, who added the balustrade on the waterfront, with a statue of St John of Nepomuk by Giovanni Marchiori (1696-1778) at the corner. According to an inscription on the base of the extant statue, it was erected in 1742; Visentini’s engraving was similarly reworked for the second edition of the Prospectus, published in the same year, and it is thus likely that Canaletto’s alteration to the painting was carried out almost as soon as the balustrade and statue were erected. Why he or Smith should have been so keen to make this alteration is unknown, as they evidently felt no need to ‘update’ Palazzo Emo. The only comparable instance is the transformation of the façade of Smith’s own palazzo, and perhaps Smith had some involvement in the commissioning of Marchiori’s statue.
Catalogue entry adapted from Canaletto in Venice, London, 2005 (http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/400532)
Canaletto – The Royal Collection RCIN 400524. Rome: The Pantheon (1742)
Materials: oil on canvas. Dimensions: 183.5 x 105.7 cm. Inscriptions: Signed and dated ANT.CANAL FECIT / ANNO MDCCXLII. Commissioned by Joseph Smith; from whom bought by George III, 1762. Nr.: RCIN 400524. Source: www.atlantedellarteitaliana.it/artwork-928.html. P.S. I have changed the colors of the original photo.
In 1742 Canaletto painted five upright views of Rome for Joseph Smith. Like an earlier set of Venetian views, they were probably designed for a particular room. They too may have arrived in London unframed, after their acquisition by George III in 1762, since they were hung in English frames in the Entrance Hall of Buckingham House – alongside the Venetian views. The Roman set includes the major sights of ancient Rome. The Pantheon, dedicated to all the gods, was the best preserved monument of ancient Rome and the greatest symbol of the Empire. The glory of an imperial age now long past is suggested by the heaviness of the architecture, which emerges from deep shadows and shows the ravages of time. The vertical format, the low viewpoint and the admiring group of visitors on the Grand Tour emphasise this sense of a monumental past, the brightly clad figures contrasting with the browns of the stonework.
The prominent signatures are the first in Canaletto’s work and are unusual. It has been suggested that artist and patron wanted to promote a new subject at a time when the War of the Austrian Succession had greatly reduced the number of visitors to Venice. There is no record of Canaletto visiting Rome again after his youthful visit in 1719-20. For these paintings he may have relied on prints or the drawings he made in Rome in his youth. It has also been suggested that Canaletto’s nephew, Bernardo Bellotto, with whom he was closely associated, may have supplied material to his uncle. Bellotto was in Rome in 1742, returning to Venice in that year or in 1743.
The first temple on the site of the Pantheon was built in 27 BC by Agrippa, but the existing building with its dedicatory inscription was erected by Hadrian in the second century AD. It was one of the few monuments of pagan antiquity to be converted into a church in the seventeenth century. Its thirteenth-century campanile was replaced by bell towers in the seventeenth century. The fountain is shown without the obelisk bearing the arms of Pope Clement XI installed in 1711. Canaletto set out the architecture by ruling and incising. The figures are less integral to the scene than in the earlier set of views. The prosaic cart in the right foreground contrasts with the ebullience of the coach and horses arriving behind. The influence of Bellotto and of Gian Paolo Panini’s contemporary views of Rome has been traced in such details (http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/egallery/object.asp?searchText=canaletto&x=0&y=0&pagesize=100&object=400524&row=99&detail=about).
Meindert Hobbema – The Royal Collection RCIN 404577. A watermill beside a woody lane (1665/8)
Materials: Oil on panel. Dimensions: 52.3 x 68.2 cm. Inscriptions: Signed and dated lower right corner: M. Hobbema /f. 166[5 or 8]. Purchased by George IV when Prince Regent. Sursa: http://images.suite101.com/3171041_com_meyndert_hobbema_a_watermill_beside_a_woody_lane_.jpg
In this engaging landscape Hobbema (1638-1709) transforms a mundane view of everyday life into a charming scene of fairytale innocence. Like Wooded landscape with travellers (Royal Collection, RCIN 405210) the composition is constructed to lead the viewer’s eye easily through and across it. The winding path on the right curves around away from the watermill, teasing attention away from the main motif.
Watermills appear in about 35 paintings by Hobbema, the majority of which are variations on drawings that he, or other artists such as his teacher Jacob van Ruisdael, made from actual buildings. Despite this repetition of the motif, each depiction of a mill by Hobbema differs in the angle that is presented as well as the mood of the scene. This particular mill, which appears well worn and in need of a new roof, recurs in other works by the artist and may be based on a specific type which, as we know from drawings in the Teylers Museum Haarlem and the Musée du Petit Palais, Paris (Dutuit collection), he had seen and studied in Deventer in the province of Overijssel. The wheel on the side of the mill is in motion, pouring down frothy water which sends ripples across the glossy perfection of the pond beyond.
The predominant use of an orange and brown palette is typical of the artist and also lends the painting an appealing brightness. Figures inhabit this idyllic space; a man walks down the path, a woman and child sit to the side of it, and a man – possibly the mill owner – crosses a bridge to enter the mill. These distinct characters blend seamlessly with their surroundings and, together with the birds which swoop close to the water, harmoniously interact with nature. From the first mentions of landscape painting in the Renaissance it was thought to be the source of a peculiarly simple, restful pleasure. It was for this reason that it was associated with music: Paulus Bril’s Self-Portrait of c.1590 (Rhode Island School of Design) shows the artist playing a lute while a delightful wooded landscape is stretched on the easel in front of him. The fictional world that Hobbema creates similarly seduces the viewer with the imaginary sounds of rustling leaves and splashing water and with images of contentment: houses nestling amongst trees; calm clouds reflected in the surface of the water. Like Jacob van Ruisdael and Salomon van Ruysdael, Hobbema presents a perfect vision of his homeland, but with his distinctive, somewhat eccentric, flavour. (http://www.royalcollection.org.uk/microsites/dutchlandscapes/MicroObject.asp?item=5&themeid=2281&object=404577&row=5&detail=about. Text adapted from Dutch Landscapes, London, 2010)
Jan van der Heyden – The Royal Collection RCIN 405950. The town of Veere with the Groote Kerk (c. 1660-1665)
Materials: oil on panel. Dimensions: 45.7 x 55.9 cm. Nr.: RCIN 405950. Inscriptions: Signed lower right corner: I. V. Heyde. Acquired by George IV when Prince of Wales. Source: http://www.artrenewal.org/pages/artwork.php?artworkid=23450&size=large
Veere was a small, walled and moated town in Zeeland on the strait between Walcheren and Noord Beveland. The Zeeland ports – Brielle, Vlissingen and Veere – still have a mythic significance for the Dutch as the first towns captured by the Sea Beggars from the Spanish during the Eighty Years’ War, in April and May 1572. However, it is clear from contemporary maps that this is no topographical view of Veere: the Groote Kerk is entirely accurate, as is the general effect of brick fortifications and drawbridges; however, the palace to the right and the circuit of high ground leading from it towards what appears to be a Roman aqueduct are all entirely imaginary. Van der Heyden used monuments from cities lying at some distance from his native Amsterdam – Cologne, Düsseldorf and Veere – more freely than local ones. His patrons, mostly also from Amsterdam, might recognise a far-off church, but would happily accept any urban context the artist chose for it. On the other hand this view has nothing of the caprice about it: it feels like a real Dutch town, whether or not the original owner knew it or thought of it as Veere.
There are untended, and therefore picturesque, elements in this city view – a beggar, some vegetation growing though old brickwork – but the general effect is of neatness, order, security and prosperity. This is a real version of those ideal chessboard cities painted by artists of the Italian Renaissance. To have had such a wide, brick-paved road outside the gates of a city would have seemed especially remarkable and should be compared with contemporary views of Rome. Text adapted from Dutch Landscapes, London, 2010 (http://www.royalcollection.org.uk)
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