The landscape by Both, the figures by Poelenburgh. For the subject of the judgment of Paris, see under 194.
210. VENICE: THE PIAZZA DI SAN MARCO.
Francesco Guardi (Venetian: 1712-1793).
Francesco Guardi was a scholar and imitator of Canaletto. "Less prized during the heyday of his master's fame, he has been steadily acquiring reputation on account of certain qualities peculiar to himself. His draughtsmanship displays an agreeable stateliness; his colouring a graceful gemmy brightness and a glow of sunny gold. But what has mainly served to win for Guardi popularity, is the attention he paid to contemporary costume and manners. Canaletto filled large canvases with mathematical perspectives of city and water. At the same time he omitted life and incident. There is little to remind us that the Venice he so laboriously depicted was the Venice of perukes and bagwigs, of masks and hoops and carnival disguises. Guardi had an eye for local colour and for fashionable humours" (J. A. Symonds, "Pietro Longhi," in the Century Guild Hobby Horse, April 1889).
Notice the effect of light on the Church of St. Mark at the end of the square: "Beyond those troops of ordered arches there rises a vision out of the earth, and all the great square seems to have opened from it in a kind of awe, that we may see it far away;—a multitude of pillars and white domes, clustered into a long low pyramid of coloured light" (Stones of Venice, vol. ii. ch. iv. § 14).
211. A BATTLE-PIECE.
Johan van Huchtenburgh (Dutch: 1646-1733).
Huchtenburgh was in great request as a battle-painter, and in 1708 was commissioned by Prince Eugene to paint the victories won by that prince and the Duke of Marlborough over the French.
212. A MERCHANT AND HIS CLERK.
Thomas de Keyser (Dutch: 1596-1667).