Material Pen and brown and black ink and black and grey wash over traces of black chalk, within brown ink framing lines16.5 x 23.5
Dimensions 16.5 x 23.5
Place of Creation Venice
Status Vetted

About the Work

This was the fi rst balloon ascent in Venice, less than six months after the fi rst manned balloon fl ight had taken place in Paris. Giacomo Guardi presumably witnessed the event, although this drawing is closely based on a sheet by his father in the Thaw Collection at the Morgan Library. Spadotto praises its ‘straordinaria suggestione’ and ‘indubbia godibilità’.

VAT

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Provenance

Giancarlo Baroni (1926-2007); his sale, Sotheby's, New York, 29 January 2013, lot 120.
From the Estate of Ambassador C. Boyden Gray.

Literature

F. Spadotto, Giacomo Guardi, Soncino, 2019, p. 242, no. 173, and p. 102, colour pl. XXVIII.

View artwork at TEFAF Maastricht 2026

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