Giambattista Tiepolo

Bio

The son of a trader in shipping, Giambattista trained in the workshop of Gregorio Lazzarini, executing his first public commission, the Sacrifice of Isaac (Venice, Ospedaletto), at the age of nineteen. In 1717 he left his master and was received into the Fraglia guild, marrying Francesco Guardi’s sister two years later. By c. 1772 Giambattista was sufficiently famous to be documented as painter to Doge Cornaro in charge of the decoration of Palazzo Mocenigo a San Polo.

His first major fresco commission for the chapel and palace of the archbishop of Udine (1726-28) was a landmark, with its new pale tonalities and airy handling. Incorporating Piazzetta’s contrasts of light and shadow and Ricci’s maniera paolesca (Veronese), Giambattista was to create a uniquely rich and forceful style which, aided by a prodigious capacity for output, resulted in a meteoric career. Commissions rained down upon him: ceilings for the Palazzi Archinto and Casati-Dugnani in Milan (1731), the decoration of the Colleoni Chapel in Bergamo (1732-3), a ceiling for the Gesuati (S.Maria del Rosario) in Venice of St. Dominic Instituting the Rosary (1737-39), Palazzo Clerici, Milan (1740), the decorations for Villa Cordellini, Montecchio Maggiore (1743-4) and the decorations for the grand saloon of Palazzo Labia, Venice, showing the Story of Cleopatra (1745-50). Interspersed among these major commissions were numerous paintings for private patrons and major canvases for churches such as the parish church of Verolanuova (1735-40), for the Scuola dei Carmini (1740-47), and the Scalzi (1743-44).

By the middle of the century, Tiepolo’s international fame and reputation were firmly established. In 1750 he was asked by the Prince Bishop Karl Philipp von Greiffenklau to decorate the state saloon and staircase of the New Residenz in Würzburg, which the painter completed in 1753 in collaboration with his sons Giandomenico and Lorenzo. Returning to Venice, he continued to produce grandiose and theatrical frescoes for churches (The Triumph of Faith, Venice, Chiesa della Pietà), palaces (Venice, Ca’ Rezzonico), and for patrician villas in the Venetian countryside, outstanding examples of which are Villa Valmarana and Villa Pisani in Stra. In 1761 he accepted the offer of Charles III of Spain to execute the ceiling decoration for the throne room, representing the Apotheosis of Spain in the Royal Palace in Madrid. The artist died in this city seven years later.

By combining the three dimensional effects of roman Baroque artists, such as Pietro da Cortona and Bernini, with the illusionist and colourist tradition of Venetian painting, Giambattista brought fresco painting and Venetian art to its full and final maturity. He broke the boundaries between real and imaginary space and suffused every corner of his compositions with cool, silvery daylight which is in total contrast to the heavy chiaroscuro effects of his baroque precursors.