(Venice 1664–1744)
A View of the Pantheon, Rome,
oil on canvas, 72 x 109.5 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private European collection

We are grateful to Dario Succi for confirming the attribution of the present painting after examination in the original.

The present painting of the Ancient Roman temple of the Pantheon is a significant work by Bernardo Canal. Among the Venetian view painters of the eighteenth century, Bernardo Canal, the father of the more celebrated Antonio, is of particular interest owing to the relationship between his paintings and those of his son and other painters, including, Johan Anton Richter, Luca Carlevarijs and Bernardo Bellotto.

In 1695 he married Artemisia Barbieri and subsequently Bernardo’s profession is identified as ‘pittore’ in the baptismal record of his son Antonio (17 October 1797). In 1717 and in the years 1737–1743 his name appears in the register of the Fraglia dei pittori Veneziani, or Venetian guild of painters. From 1716 to 1718 Bernardo collaborated with his brother Cristoforo and his son Antonio on the execution of stage set designs for the Venetian theatres of Sant’ Angelo (1716–1717) and San Cassiano (1718–1719). In 1719-1720 he moved to Rome with his son to work on the stage sets of the operas Tito Sempronio Gracco and Tullio Aricino by Alessandro Scarlatti which were both staged at the Teatro Capranica during the Carnival of 1720.

Over the course of the nineteenth century Bernardo Canal fell into obscurity, until Giuseppe Fiocco, on the occasion of the exhibition Pittura Veneta (Riccoboni, Fiocco 1947, p. 12, nos. 71-72) brought to light two Venetian view paintings both inscribed on the backs of their original canvases ‘Bernardo Canal Fecit 1735’. Fiocco observed that the two view paintings, which are characterised by a lively sense of perspective ‘sembrerebbero di un Richter meno azzurrino’ [‘would seem to be by a less light-blue Richter’]. The two paintings belonged to a group of five canvases formerly conserved in the Palazzo Salom, Venice, later moved to Segromigo Monte near Lucca – the other three were published by Rodolfo Pallucchini (see Appunti per il vedutismo veneziano del Settecento, in: Muzeum i tworka, 1969, pp. 145–146).

Subsequently Pallucchini (1994–1996, II, p. 298) summarised the principal characteristics of Bernardo Canal’s style, observing that the skies in his view paintings are distinguished by ‘nuvole bianche zigzaganti in diagonale, luminose e lucide a un tempo, per via di un segno pittorico assai netto. Si direbbe che Bernardo non riesca a staccarsi dal gusto di Carlevarijs […] che scalava i cieli con simili nubi […] tentando però di aggiornarle secondo i metodi liberamente pittorici del figlio’ [‘white diagonally zigzagging clouds, which are shiny and bright. One might say that Bernardo could not separate his style from that of Carlevarijs (…) who scaled the skies with similar clouds, with the objective of increasing perspectival depth (…) while attempting to update them according to the freely pictorial manner of his son’].

This composition represents the imposing structure of the Pantheon, one of Rome’s most celebrated monuments both on account of its grandeur and method of construction, as well as for its unique form, unifying the dome and circular cella of the termae type, with a traditional pronaos and tympanum. At the centre of the square stands the quatrefoil fountain raised on steps and adorned with dolphins, designed by Giacomo della Porta and sculpted by Leonardo Sormani in 1575.

The painting is datable to the 1720s and presents all the typical characteristics of Bernardo Canal’s style: a pearl-like luminosity, zigzagging rose clouds, small rounded figures, and a detailed (though not excessively), rendered description of the buildings.