Giuseppe Bernardino Bison, 1762 Palmnova – 1844... Lot n° 338

THE FEAST OF "GIOVEDÌ GRASSO" AT THE PIAZZETTA IN VENICEOIL on canvas. 59 x 80 cm. The festival of "Giovedì grasso" ("Nonsense Thursday"), spectacularly celebrated in Venice, the Thursday before Ash Wednesday and Lent, is a tradition that dates back to 1162, the victory of the Doge against the Patriarch of Aquileia. As can also be seen in the present picture, the Doge himself takes part. Here he can be seen behind gold-colored screen between the columns of the Palazzo, a rope, from the top of the Campanile runs towards him. In this attraction, an acrobat dressed as an angel floats towards the Doge. In 1548, this "angel flight" was held for the first time. He threw flowers into the crowd from a great height and then made his way to the Doge's Stand. Other attractions were fireworks, Arabic "moresca" dances or human pyramids. On the Piazzetta, in addition, a huge tower was built in wood, which dominates the center here in the picture, in a stepped structure, with colored columns and a crowning golden Victoria. The square is filled with an immense crowd of people watching the festive attractions from the side stands. In the foreground the painter has shown the hustle and bustle of the visitors, some of them masked, with children and doggies among nobly and simply dressed spectators. Compositionally, the depiction goes back to Giovanni Antonio Canal, gen. Canaletto (1697-1768), published around 1766 through an engraving by Giambattista Brustolon (1712/26-1796). Francesco Guardi (1712-1793) was also inspired by this series of "feste dogali" (Louvre). Thus Bison also devoted himself to the subject, likewise in recourse to the aforementioned copperplate engraving. More clearly and precisely than Guardi, Bison, in the spirit of early classicism, documented the architectural details, even in the background, with the domed church of San Giorgio Maggiore and the ships in the Grand Canal. Bison, trained first in Brescia with Girolamo Romanino (1484/87-1562), then at the Accademia di Venezia, with Giovanni Antonio Canal. He studied works by Guardi and Gian Domenico Tiepolo (1727-1804), also worked as a fresco painter in Venice, went to Treviso, Padua and Trieste, and finally to Milan in 1833, where he remained until the end of his life. It can be assumed that the painting could have been created in the Milan period. The artist was an Italian painter of classicism, he studied in Brescia and was a pupil of Girolamo Romanino Romani (1484/87-1562). Later he moved to Venice and continued his art studies under Giovanni Antonio Canal (1697-1768). From 1834-1838 he made a series of trips that took him to Florence, Rome, Naples and Paestum, among other places. In addition to numerous views of Venice, he also created idyllic fantasy landscapes. In addition to the diversity of his subjects, the high quality of his pictorial production is particularly noteworthy. A.R. (†) Literature: See Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 10, Rome 1968, pp. 684-685. See Lina Urban, Processioni e feste dogali, Vicenza 1998. (1300774) Giuseppe Bernardino Bison, 1762 Palmanova - 1844 Milan THE FEAST OF THE "GIOVEDÌ GRASSO" ON THE PIAZZETTA IN VENICEOil on canvas. 59 x 80 cm. (†) Literature: cf. Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 10, Rome 1968, p. 684-685. cf. Lina Urban, Processioni e feste dogali, Vicenza 1998.