Enfilade

Canaletto, Capriccio, A Palladian Design for the Rialto Bridge, with Buildings, 1744, 90 x 130 cm (London: The Royal Collection, RCIN 404029) © Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2014.

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From the Centre d’Art de l’Hôtel de Caumont:

Canaletto, Rome—Londres—Venise: Le Triomphe de la Lumière
Centre d’Art de l’Hôtel de Caumont, Aix-en-Provence, 6 May — 13 September 2015

Curated by Bozena Anna Kowalczyk

Giovanni Antonio Canal, known as Canaletto (1697–1768), is recognised as the emblematic figure of the veduta genre, the most admired Venetian artistic creation of the 18th century in Europe. This inaugural exhibition at the art centre of the Hôtel de Caumont aims to provide new insights into the complete works of Canaletto, with a particular interest in the treatment of light in the Venetian master’s paintings. Fifty paintings and drawings from international public and private collections will present Canaletto the man and the different phases of his artistic career, in Rome, London and Venice.

We initially discover Canaletto’s first activity, as a painter of theatre scenery, carried out in collaboration with his father Bernardo Canal and his brother Cristoforo. Opera librettos on which Canaletto’s name appears will be exhibited alongside his first capricci, full of musical influences, painted in 1720–1722, and the first views of Venice, composed according to the criteria for staging.

The exhibition continues with a presentation of the major undertakings of Canaletto’s youth: the views of Venice commissioned by Joseph Smith (1722–1723), Joseph Wenzel of Liechtenstein (1723) and Stefano Conti (1725–1726), are large scale canvases that bear witness to the skill of the young painter.

Canaletto’s visit to England, his contact with new landscapes and the light of the Thames, led to changes in his palette and his touch. A series of paintings and drawings show the new solutions he adopted to capture the atmosphere and spirit of England. Canaletto painted London and lingered over Westminster Bridge, the second bridge over the Thames, then under construction. He also painted the English countryside, travelling as far as outskirts of Scotland to depict Alnwick Castle, home of the Duke of Northumberland.

A special section is devoted to technical experiments conducted by the artist throughout his career. Canaletto conceived a systematic and scientific way to rework drawings that had been made outdoors by means of a camera obscura (dark chamber). An example of the camera obscura used by the painter is presented next to a facsimile that allows the visitor to visualise for himself what the painter would see when using this device. A reproduction of pages from his sketchbook, as well as a film, illustrate the technical work of the artist during his portrayal of views of Venice.

This exhibition is also the occasion to conduct for the first time a comprehensive study of the last years of Canaletto in Venice. The works accomplished after his return from London at the end of 1755 illustrate Canaletto’s new interests and his response to the new artistic climate in Venice, where Francesco Guardi (1712–1793) was making a name for himself. Particular attention is devoted to the artist’s tireless passion for the study of new effects of light and atmosphere. The greatest international museums have granted their support. Among them: the Royal Collection and the National Gallery of London, the Metropolitan Museum of New York, the Uffizi Gallery of Florence as well as the Ca’Rezzonico of Venice.

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From artbooks.com:

Bozena Anna Kowalczyk, ed., Canaletto, Rome—Londres—Venise: Le Triomphe de la Lumière (Antwerp: Mercatorfonds, 2015), 224 pages, ISBN: 978-9462300835, 45€ / $85.

For the inaugural exhibition at the Centre d’Art de l’Hôtel de Caumont in Aix-en-Provence, Mercatorfonds presents the first French monograph on Canaletto, and the first worldwide following the Metropolitan Museum’s publication in 1989. Numerous recent shows, focusing on specific aspects of Canaletto’s work or simply on his depictions of Venice, are a clear indication of the public’s interest in the painter’s oeuvre. This volume introduces the reader to Canaletto and, by tracing the various phases of his artistic path, provides a complete overview of his work. To highlight the development of Canaletto’s tastes, his reactions to Venice’s artistic and cultural trends and the atmosphere of England—where he worked for nine years—the paintings and drawings shown here have been selected from among the artist’s most remarkable pieces.

José Manuel de la Cerda, Desk-on-stand (detail), Pátzcuaro, Mexico, 18th century. Lacquered and polychromed wood with gilt decoration. On loan from The Hispanic Society of America, New York.

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From the MFA:

Made in the Americas: The New World Discovers Asia
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 18 August 2015 — 15 February 2016
Winterthur, Wilmington, Delaware, 26 March 2016 — 8 January 2017

Exquisite objects tell the story of the influence of Asia on the arts of colonial America.

Within decades of the ‘discovery’ of America by Spain in 1492, goods from Asia traversed the globe via Spanish and Portuguese traders. The Americas became a major destination for Asian objects and Mexico became an international hub of commerce. The impact of the importation of these goods was immediate and widespread, both among the European colonizers and the indigenous populations, who readily adapted their own artistic traditions to the new fashion for Asian imports.

Made in the Americas is the first large-scale, Pan-American exhibition to examine the profound influence of Asia on the arts of the colonial Americas. Featuring nearly 100 of the most extraordinary objects produced in the colonies, this exhibition explores the rich, complex story of how craftsmen throughout the hemisphere adapted Asian styles in a range of materials—from furniture to silverwork, textiles, ceramics, and painting. Exquisite objects from Mexico City, Lima, Quito, Quebec City, Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, dating from the 17th to the early 19th centuries, include folding screens made in Mexico in imitation of imported Japanese and Chinese screens, blue-and-white talavera ceramics copied from imported Chinese porcelains, and luxuriously woven textiles made to replicate fine silks and cottons imported from China and India.

The timing of the exhibition marks the 450th anniversary of the beginning of the Manila-Acapulco Galleon trade between the Philippines and Mexico, which was inaugurated in 1565 and ended in 1815, two and a half centuries later.

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From the MFA:

Dennis Carr, with contributions by Gauvin Alexander Bailey, Timothy Brook, Mitchell Codding, Karina H. Corrigan, and Donna Pierce, Made in the Americas: The New World Discovers Asia (Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 2015), 160 pages, ISBN: 978-0878468126, $50.

Made in the Americas reveals the largely overlooked history of the profound influence of Asia on the arts of the colonial Americas. Beginning in the sixteenth century, European outposts in the New World, especially those in New Spain, became a major nexus of the Asia export trade. Craftsmen from Canada to Peru, inspired by the sophisticated designs and advanced techniques of these imported goods, combined Asian styles with local traditions to produce unparalleled furniture, silverwork, textiles, ceramics, lacquer, painting, and architectural ornaments.

Among the exquisite objects featured in this book, from across the hemisphere and spanning the seventeenth to the early nineteenth centuries, are folding screens made in Mexico, in imitation of imported Japanese and Chinese screens; blue-and-white talavera ceramics copied from Chinese porcelains; luxuriously woven textiles, made to replicate fine silks and cottons from China and India; devotional statues that adapt Buddhist gods into Christian saints; and japanned furniture produced in colonial Boston that simulates Asian lacquer finishes. The stories these objects tell, compellingly related by leading scholars, bring to life the rich cultural interchange and the spectacular arts of the first global age.

Dennis Carr is Carolyn and Peter Lynch Curator of American Decorative Arts and Sculpture, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Gauvin Alexander Bailey is Professor and Alfred and Isabel Bader Chair in Southern Baroque, Department of Art History and Art Conservation, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario.
Timothy Brook holds the Republic of China Chair in the Department of History and Institute of Asian Research, University of British Columbia, Vancouver.
Mitchell Codding is Executive Director, The Hispanic Society of America, New York.
Karina H. Corrigan is H. A. Crosby Forbes Curator of Asian Export Art, Peabody Essex Museum.
Donna Pierce is Frederick & Jan Mayer Curator of Spanish Colonial Art, Denver Art Museum.

Press release for the exhibition now on view at Salisbury:

Turner’s Wessex: Architecture and Ambition
The Salisbury Museum, 22 May — 27 September 2015

Curated by Ian Warrell

J.M.W. Turner, The Choir of Salisbury Cathedral, 1797, watercolour, 65 x 51 cm (The Salisbury Museum)

Visitors to The Salisbury Museum this summer will be treated to a highly original and fascinating exhibition on J.M.W. Turner. Newly discovered facts and a wealth of material never previously assembled together revises the traditional outline of Turner’s formative years. Turner’s Wessex: Architecture and Ambition reveals new insights into Turner’s ambitious and innovative work as a very young man and his complex relationships with extremely wealthy patrons. “We are astonished to discover that Turner began his career here in Salisbury, painting the town, its magnificent cathedral and the extraordinary Fonthill Abbey nearby,” said Adrian Green, Director of The Salisbury Museum.

Building on recent successes with Constable and Cecil Beaton exhibitions, The Salisbury Museum showcases J.M.W. Turner’s meteoric rise at the turn of the nineteenth century, working for two of England’s wealthiest men as they embarked on extravagant building projects and historical research on a very grand scale in the Wessex region.

Salisbury is likely to be a magnet for visitors throughout 2015, as across the green from the museum at Salisbury Cathedral the Magna Carta celebrates its 800th anniversary. Exceptional National Trust properties such as Stourhead will be open to visitors nearby, and 20 minutes away the ancient monument of Stonehenge continues to cast its mysterious spell.

Turner first visited Salisbury in 1795 when he was 20 years old. As his career developed, he returned to paint Stonehenge and its surrounding landscape. Set in the vast Wessex plains, his depictions of the ancient stones proves to be among his most hauntingly atmospheric works.

The first of Turner’s patrons in the Salisbury area was Sir Richard Colt Hoare, a gentleman-antiquarian who inherited the Stourhead estate in 1784. In the late 1790s when Turner was barely out of his teens, Sir Richard commissioned him to paint a series of watercolours of Salisbury and its newly restored cathedral, which was then the subject of much controversy. Wiltshire owes much to Colt Hoare for his involvement in the first archaeological survey of the landscape around Salisbury and the books he published on the history of Ancient and Modern Wiltshire.

But it was another local patron, William Beckford, described by Byron as “England’s wealthiest son,” who from 1798 gave Turner his most valuable early commissions, and engaged him to paint the gothic folly he was building at Fonthill Abbey. With characteristic bravado, Turner worked on the largest sheets of paper available, bringing all his daring experimental skill to bear, always pushing at the boundaries of technical achievement. His depictions of Beckford’s legendary tower—part of which fell down in 1800—provide a unique record of its construction. The exhibition includes a series of sketches Turner made on site, usually held in the Tate archive.

The third part of the exhibition charts Turner’s delightful work in the wider Wessex region—spanning Wiltshire, the Dorset coast, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. It includes surprising images such as his exquisite watercolours of fish, and witty caricatures made along with other members of the Houghton Club. Many of the waterolours relate to Turner’s popular topographical views, which reached a wide audience as engraved prints and continue to do so today. The exhibition culminates in a record of the historic visit made by the French King Louis Philippe to Queen Victoria in 1844—the first visit by a French King to England in roughly 500 years.

The exhibition has been selected by the distinguished Turner scholar Ian Warrell, working in collaboration with the team at Salisbury Museum, and builds a vibrant and dramatic picture of the brilliant young artist, driven by self-belief and limitless ambition, grafting his way in a complex world. The Salisbury Museum is proud that the unmatched collection of Turner watercolours of Salisbury cathedral at the heart of the exhibition is being seen together for the first time since 1883. The exhibition offers a unique view into how Wiltshire’s great patrons provided a crucial springboard to the career of one of England’s best-loved artists.

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From Scala:

Ian Warrell, Turner’s Wessex: Architecture and Ambition (London: Scala, 2015), 208 pages, ISBN: 978-1857599305, £25/ $40.

Turner was only 20 in 1795 when he first visited Salisbury. This book focuses on the important commissions that resulted from his contact with the region, which provided the foundations for his success. Reunited here are his inventive watercolours of Salisbury Cathedral painted for Sir Richard Colt Hoare, widely dispersed since 1883. Turner’s matchless ability to depict architecture also attracted the attention of the eccentric art lover and writer, William Beckford. The problematic construction of Beckford’s legendary but short-lived neo-gothic abbey at Fonthill was uniquely recorded in Turner’s sketches and watercolours.

As his career developed, Turner repeatedly revisited an area that captivated him. His depictions of Stonehenge, in particular, proved to be among his most hauntingly atmospheric works. In this beautifully illustrated book many rarely seen works are brought together, illuminating this formative and fascinating period in Turner’s output.

Ian Warrell is an independent curator, specialising in British art of the nineteenth century. He is the author of many books on Turner, most recently Turner’s Sketchbooks.