Giovanni Bonomi (Venice, active in the second half of the 19th century), View with the Rialto Bridge

Giovanni Bonomi (Venice, active in the second half of the 19th century)

View with the Rialto Bridge

Oil on canvas, 37 x 49 cm

With frame 43 x 56 cm

Signed “G. Bonomi” at the bottom right

The genre of Venetian landscape painting developed in the early eighteenth century, coinciding with the ever-increasing influx of those, including foreign scholars and artists, who wished to bring a memory of the lagoon's wonders to their homeland. Canaletto's pioneering production and the affirmation of the positive use of scientific means such as the optical camera produced a solid affirmation of the Venetian panoramas, which began to become popular throughout Italy. In the 19th century, various artistic currents following the romanticism, vedutisme and historicism begun in the previous century also supported the preferential role to be granted to paintings of lagoon subjects.

The present offers a romantic view of the Grand Canal with the Rialto Bridge, taken in the calm of a quiet Venetian evening. The construction of the bridge dates back, in the design concept, to the Middle Ages: as reported by Lorenzetti (Guide to Venice) since 1172 the Doge Sebastiano Ziani proposed the idea of ​​joining the two opposite banks of the canal via a pontoon bridge; Nicolò Baratieri fulfilled this wish in 1181, with the so-called Quartarolo bridge, named after the coin that tolled the toll, or the coin, due to its relative proximity to the premises of the Mint. The randomness of the pontoon bridge was replaced in the 1496th century with a solid wooden structure, rebuilt several times during the following centuries; The Miracle of the Cross at the Rialto Bridge by Vittore Carpaccio (Venice, Gallerie dell'Accademia, ca. 1554) offers meticulous testimony to this. The bridge subsequently took its name from the Rivoalto market which took place there. The urgency of continuous maintenance of the wooden skeleton, however, pushed the Council to decide on a tender for the design and construction of a stone replacement: Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, Palladio and Sansovino took part in the tender, announced in 1588. The realization of the project by the Venetian Antonio da Ponte was arranged: the construction, begun in 1592, ended in XNUMX.

Giovanni Bonomi, the artist of the present painting, dedicated himself mainly to genre painting and to the more colorfully lively Venetian landscape painting, as happens in the present. Originally from the lagoon city, Bonomi found national favor by exhibiting in Rome in 1883 with Costumi del 1700; the exhibition experience was then repeated in 1887 at the Venetian national exhibition with Abbey, War Badities and San Marco.