The Cleveland Museum of Art

• Provenance
  Until 1800

  Possibly Federigo Giovanelli, Venice

  ?

  Baroness Valerie Groedel, Budapest

  By 1933?

  (Neumann Gallery, Vienna)

  1952

  (Francesco Pospisil, Venice, sold through Alessandro Brass to the Cleveland Museum of Art)

  1952-

  The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio

  Provenance Footnotes

  1 In 1934, Rodolfo Pallucchini mentions a Guardi painting depicting the “Sacrifice of Abraham” as possibly appearing in the 1731 will of Count Giovanni Benedetto Giovanelli.  In 1964, Terisio Pignatti argued that several Guardi copies (the Cleveland paintings are all copies after paintings by other artists) listed in the 1800 inventory attached to the will of Federigo Giovanelli could be the same ones recorded in the 1731 will as executed by the “Fratelli Guardi.”  However, there are two problems with this suggestion: First, the Cleveland Guardi pictures are dated to the 1750s – twenty years after the 1731 will.  Second, Alice Binion notes that the Guardi copies recorded in 1731 did not remain in the possession of the Guardi family, but rather were bequeathed to a certain Antonio de Caroli (Archivio Venice, Atti Marcello Girolamo – Testamenti 612, No. 345: “Al sunominato Sigr Antonio de Caroli mio amorevole…lascio le copie de quadri, che egli tiene di mia ragione, fatte dalli Fratelli Guardi…”).  Thus, if the Cleveland Guardis are indeed those mentioned in the inventory of 1800, they would have come into the Giovanelli family’s possession sometime after 1731 and would not be found in both inventories.  

  2 In his 1953 article in Burlington Magazine, “A Signed Drawing by Antonio Guardi and the Problem of the Guardi Brothers,” Antonio Morassi refers to the Cleveland pictures: “four canvases with scenes from the Old Testament…which twenty years ago I recognized in the Neumann Gallery as works by Guardi and which, after various vicissitudes, have recently been acquired by Cleveland.”  If Morassi’s recollection is correct, the paintings would have been with the Neumann Gallery by 1933; this date is consistent with Rodolfo Pallucchini's reference to this “recently discovered” Guardi painting in his L’arte di Giovanni Battista Piazzetta, published in 1934.
• Citations
  Binion, Alice. Antonio and Francesco Guardi, Their Life and Milieu: With a Catalogue of Their Figure Drawings. New York: Garland Pub, 1976.

  Pallucchini, Rodolfo. L'arte di Giovanni Battista Piazzetta. Bologna: Giuseppe Maylender, editore, 1934.

  Levey, Michael. The Eighteenth-Century Italian Schools. London: Publications Dept., National Gallery, 1956.

  Morassi, Antonio. Guardi. Antonio e Francesco Guardi. Venezia: Alfieri, 1973.

  Alessandro Brass, letter to Henry S. Francis, Aug. 15, 1952, in CMA curatorial file

  Nancy Coe Wixom, letter to Alessandro Bettagno, Oct. 22, 1969, in CMA curatorial file

  Alessandro Brass, letter to Henry S. Francis, Aug. 15, 1952, in CMA curatorial file

  Antonio Morassi, letter to Neumann, Nov. 24, 1937, in CMA curatorial file.

  Nancy Coe Wixom, letter to Alessandro Bettagno, Oct. 22, 1969, in CMA curatorial file.

  Morassi, Antonio, “A Signed Drawing by Antonio Guardi and the Problem of the Guardi Brothers,” Burlington Magazine 95 (August 1953): 267.

  Morassi, Antonio. Guardi. Antonio e Francesco Guardi. Venezia: Alfieri, 1973.

  Alessandro Brass, letter to Henry S. Francis, March 29, 1952, in CMA curatorial file.

  Alessandro Brass, invoice, July 5, 1952, in CMA curatorial file.

  Morassi, Antonio. Guardi. Antonio e Francesco Guardi. Venezia: Alfieri, 1973.

  Coe, Nancy. "Four Paintings by Giovanni Antonio Guardi." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 44, no. 9 (November 1957): 198-203. Mentioned: p. 198; Reproduced: p. 200 www.jstor.org

  The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 145 archive.org

  The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 145 archive.org

  Cleveland Museum of Art. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 3. European Paintings of the 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974. Reproduced: cat. 159C, p. 360 - 363

  The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 143 archive.org
• Exhibition History
  The Allure of La Serenissima: Eighteenth-Century Venetian Art. Oklahoma City Museum of Art, Oklahoma City, OK (organizer) (September 9, 2010-January 2, 2011).

  Oklahoma City Museum of Art (9/9/2010 - 1/2/2011): "The Allure of La Serenissima: Eighteenth-Century Venetian Art", cat. no. 6, p. 54.
• Cite this Page
  {{cite web|title=The Angels Appearing to Abraham|url=false|author=Francesco Guardi|year=1750s|access-date=13 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}