(Palmanova 1762–1844 Milan)
The Regatta on Grand Canal, Venice,
oil on canvas, 58.5 x 78 cm, framed

The attribution of the present painting has been confirmed by Fabrizio Magani and Dario Succi.

The present painting is a pendant to Bucintoro at the Molo di San Marco on Ascension Day by Giuseppe Bernardino Bison (see lot 99).

The present festive image of Venice, depicts one of its most dramatic and celebrated views, along with its companion pendant painting (lot 99) it sought to offer foreign ‘Grand Tourists’ a documentation of the glories of the Serenissima. Such festive events were orchestrated and created to display the power and importance of Venice and Bison was able to capture these scenes, thereby becoming one of the worthiest heirs of the great eighteenth-century era of vedute painting.

The regatta had been organised since the Middle Ages on the day of the Purification of Mary, during carnival season. Some of the figures in the foreground wear the bauta, a costume of white mask and black cape that was typically worn during the carnival season. Boat races started from Motta di Sant’Antonio, following the Grand Canal to the Santa Croce bridge and then back as far as the bend between Palazzo Balbi and Ca' Foscari, where a temporary structure was set up on wooden barges. Here the winners received their prize and a colourful flag. In the present painting, Bison captures the race, with the structure depicted on the left with columns on high pedestals. The artist demonstrates his scenographic skills in the vanishing perspective view of the festive with palazzi decorated in a profusion of colours and in the rendering of the bustle of the crowds that flock to the spectacle, evoking the general festive atmosphere.

The present work is inspired by the work of Canaletto, but the brushwork here seems more fluent and liquid, the bright touches of colour laid in little bright ‘patches’, and the sense of space is produced by the use of colour towards the vanishing point, where we can make out the Rialto bridge. Antonio Visentini, produced a series of engravings based on paintings by Canaletto that were part of the collection of Consul Smith, a celebrated collector and dealer, published in Urbis Venetiarum Prospectus Celebriores in 1742. The present painting is similar to plate XIII of the engravings, but also to other works by Canaletto, such as A Ragatta on the Grand Canal in the National Gallery in London. The subject matter was developed from the 17th century onwards, and represents an important tradition in the history of Venetian painting.

The great age of Venetian vedute constituted a point of reference for the Friuli-born artist Giuseppe Bernardino Bison, who trained at the Accademia in Venice in the 1780s. Here he learned the techniques of perspective from the noted scenographer and painter, Antonio Mauro, whose teachings would be crucial to his later and prolific fresco painting activity in many private palazzi of northern Italy. In Venice, Bison also came across the great exponents of the Venetian tradition, including Francesco Guardi, Giandomenico Tiepolo and Pietro Longhi, as well as later masters such as Giambattista Tiepolo, Marieschi, the Ricci, and, of course, Canaletto.

In the neoclassical era of cultural upheaval, Bison remained faithful to the Venetian cultural heritage, devoting himself to easel paintings of numerous genres passed down from the heyday of the eighteenth century such as landscapes, architectural capricci, mythological scenes and above all, views, of which the present work and its companion piece are among the very best examples.