Getty Museum

A Regatta on the Grand Canal

Date

about 1778

Medium

Pen and brown ink, brush with brown wash, over black chalk

Culture

Italian

Department

Drawings

Institution

Getty Museum

Object ID

2b66c44b-c549-408b-9a10-eaf8796217e5

This large drawing captures with freshness and spontaneity the lively atmosphere of the annual gondola race (regatta) on the Grand Canal. At left is the finish line of the race, with the ephemeral colonnaded structure set up for the occasion, where the prizes and flags were awarded to the winning teams; the Renaissance façade of the Palazzo Balbi is visible behind. Guardi uses his characteristically fluid and evocative pen work to render the decorated gondolas and their gondoliers in detail, and employs rapidly-applied but extremely subtle washes to endow the scene with the sparkling luminosity so unique to Venice. The view is taken looking north-east from the Palazzo Foscari, a building prominently situated at a sharp bend in the canal, and from which can be seen the longest straight stretch of the waterway towards the Rialto Bridge, just visible in the center. This represents one of the views most sought-after by Grand Tourists to eighteenth-century Venice, especially when the scene - as here - incorporated the activity of the regatta.

The authoritative record is held by Getty Museum. LinkedCulture surfaces this object and its connections; it does not alter institutional metadata.