The composition of this painting corresponds closely with a scene of the piazza San Marco by Domenichini in his eponymous series of views of Venice in the Langmatt Foundation in Zurich. Two other closely related versions by the artist have also appeared at auction in more recent years. The present work depicts the Torre dell’Orologio with the second attic storey built by Giorgio Massari which therefore dates the painting to at least 1755.
Apollonio Domenichini (1715-c.1770), was a follower of Luca Carlevarijs and Canaletto whose name appears in the registers of the corporation of Venetian painters in 1757. He achieved some reputation as a painter of vedute of Venice and its environs with his works proving influential to later artists in thw 18th century. Scenes centered around the piazza San Marco were unfailingly popular with the English gentry during the grand tour and the demand for images meant that painters could keep a steady practice depicting fairly similar views. Some were sometimes more detailed than others and the painter of this work has meticulously highlighted elements of the architectural splendour of the buildings as well as dramatically depicting the Campenile the structure of which saws vertically to the very top of the canvas, over shadowing all within the piazza, as it still does to this very day.