(Treviso 1842–1917 Venice)
Lagoon, signed Ciardi, oil on canvas, 35 x 64 cm, framed, (GG)

Provenance:
Leslie Hindman Auctioneers, Chicago, 14th of May 1993, lot 218;
private collection Italy.

Catalogued and illustrated in:
Volker and Erwin Silbernagl, Pittori a confronto, Edition Silbernagl, 1995, p. 35 (image upside down) and p. 47. Nico Stringa, Guglielmo Ciardi, catalogo generale dei dipinti, Ed. Antiga, 2007, p. 221, no. 128.

Exhibited:
Daverio, Pittori a confronto, Volker und Erwin Silbernagl, 19 November–23 December 1995.

Guglielmo Ciardi depicted Venice many times during his career, and his fascination with Venice, its architecture and inhabitants never diminished. He was one of Italy’s most faithful adherents of plein air painting. He trained at the Venice Academy under the landscape painter Domenico Bresolin (1814-1890).
During study trips around Italy he absorbed new influences: it was in Florence with Silvestro Lega (1826-1895) and Telemaco Signorini (1835-1901), in Rome with Nino Costa (1826-1903), and in Naples with Domenico Morelli (1823-1901) that he became enamoured with plein air painting, a style which then became central to his art.
He later returned to Venice where he remained for the rest of his life, seeking to render the atmosphere of the lagoon.
The present lot highlights his talent for capturing light with perfection. The treatment of the brushstrokes depicting the water are modern in character. Here the lagoon draws our eye through the reflection of the light in the water. The masts with their colored sails seem to move with the rhythm of the water. On the right-hand side a mother stands with her two children. In the background lies the city of Venice.