Collection Online as of December 7, 2023

A Flying Angel (recto)

1723–1727

Part of a set. See all set records

Giovanni Battista Piazzetta

(Italian, 1682–1754)

Italy, Venice, 18th century

Black chalk heightened with traces of white chalk

Support: Blue laid paper (discolored)

Sheet: 56.3 x 42.6 cm (22 3/16 x 16 3/4 in.)

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1938.388.a

Location

not on view

Fun Fact

The Venetian blue paper (<em>carta azzurra</em>) of this sheet was the preferred medium for preparatory drawings among artists in Venice at the time this drawing was made.

Description

This drawing was completed in preparation for the most prestigious religious commission of Giovanni Battista Piazzetta’s career, the ceiling painting of the Glory of St. Dominic for the church of SS. Giovanni e Paolo in Venice. Both the finished painting, which depicts St. Dominic’s arrival in heaven amid a thundery vortex, and Piazzetta’s study for the angel, who carries St. Dominic on a cloud, depart from Venetian tradition. To execute this airborne subject, he likely drew from wax or clay models suspended in midair in order to study the illusionistic di sotto in su (from below to above) perspective and the play of light found on the angel’s shadowed form. He worked out the angel’s twisting pose, imbuing it with a lively sense of movement, and accentuated the drapery’s folds with heavy lines as though considering their visibility from afar. There are only slight changes in the angel’s pose between this drawing and the completed painting. As few of Piazzetta’s preparatory studies for paintings exist, Cleveland’s sheet offers rare insight to the artist’s working methods.

Provenance

?-1938

(Italico Brass [1870-1943], Venice, sold to The Cleveland Museum of Art, Nov. 1938.)

1938-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH.

Citations

“Cleveland: A Museum’s New Acquisitions.” The Art News 38, no. 40 (1940). Mentioned: p. 13

Millikan, William M. “Two Drawings by Piazzetta.” Burlington Magazine 76, no. 444 (1940). Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 88-89, pl. C

Francis, Henry S. "Two Drawings by Piazzetta." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 27, no. 7 (1940): 108-109. Mentioned: p. 109

Fogg Museum of Art. Venice in the Eighteenth Century (May 7- June 10, 1948). Cambridge: Harvard University, 1948. Mentioned: no. 28

“Exhibition of Master Drawings of the Eighteenth Century in France and Italy.” Allen Memorial Art Museum Bulletin 8, no. 2 (1951). Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 54, no. 12.

Johnson, Mark M. Idea to Image: Preparatory Studies from the Renaissance to Impressionism. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1980. Mentioned: p. 56; Reproduced: p. 54, fig. 63

Jones, Leslie. “The Paintings of Giovanni Battista Piazzetta.” Doctoral diss., New York University, 1981. Reproduced: p. 14, fig. 35

Pallucchini, Rodolfo and Adriano Mariuz. L’opera completa del Piazzetta. Milan: Rizzoli Editore, 1982. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 84 no. 37a, p. 85

Knox, George. Piazzetta: A Tercentenary Exhibition of Drawings, Prints, and Books. 1983. Mentioned: p. 68, cat. no. 15; Reproduced: p. 69

Puglisi, Catherine R. “Piazzetta’s Glory of Saint Dominic.” Arte Veneta: Rivista di Storia dell’Arte 41 (1987). Mentioned: p. 210, p. 15 n. 5

Martineau, Jane, and Andrew Robison. The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century. New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, 1994. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 166, 480, no. 87.

Sciré, Giovanna Nepi, et al. Splendori del Settecento Veneziano. Milan: Electa, 1995. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 199, no. 72

Aikema, Bernard. Tiepolo and His Circle: Drawings in American Collections. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Art Museums, 1996. Mentioned: p. 88; Reproduced: p. 91, fig. 3

Cleveland Museum of Art, Diane DeGrazia, and Carter E. Foster. Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art in association with Rizzoli International Publications, New York, 2000. Mentioned: P. 4, 60-61, 86; Reproduced: P. 61, cat. no. 20

Exhibition history

The Silver Jubilee Exhibition. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 23-September 28, 1941).

Life in Eighteenth Century Venice. Fogg Art Museum/Harvard University, Cambridge, MA (organizer) (April 20-June 15, 1948).

Master Drawings of the Eighteenth Century in France and Italy. Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (organizer) (January 1-31, 1951).

Department of Prints and Drawings Opening Exhibition. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (March 3, 1958-October 11, 1959).

Italian and French Drawings. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 13, 1959-February 2, 1960).

Drawings: France, Italy, Netherlands. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 1-March 24, 1965).

Idea to Image: Preparatory Studies from the Renaissance to Impressionism. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (February 19-March 23, 1980).

National Schools of Style. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 14-September 18, 1983).

Giovanni Battista Piazzetta: A Tercentenary Exhibition. National Gallery of Art, Landover, MD (organizer) (November 20, 1983-February 26, 1984).

Italian Drawings from the Permanent Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 16, 1986-March 1, 1987).

The Glory of Venice: Art in the 18th Century. Royal Academy of Arts, London, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (organizer) (September 15-December 14, 1994); National Gallery of Art, Landover, MD (January 29-April 23, 1995).

Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 27-October 17, 2000); The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY (May 23-August 19, 2001); Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Houston, TX (October 14, 2001-January 6, 2002).