View of the Rialto Bridge and the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi with the festive entry of...

Michiel Giovanni Marieschi (Venice 1696 – Venice 1743). Oil painting on canvas, View of the Rialto Bridge and the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi with the festive entry of the Patriarch Antonio by Michiel Giovanni Marieschi (Venice 1696 – Venice 1743), 1737. A landscape painting showing an accurate portrayal of the Rialto Bridge in Venice, with a stylised image of the Grand Canal around it including a Venetian Gothic palazzo; in the bottom left a cargo barge is loaded with barrels; three highly decorated barges pass along the canal and under the bridge, with other water traffic going about its business. Marieschi was a younger and shorter-lived contemporary of Canaletto, who published a much-copied set of sixteen engraved views of Venice in 1741, and painted in a bolder, more highly-coloured manner. This picture, which is rare in being signed, and almost uniquely datable, is one of his masterpieces. Osterley Park and House, London (Accredited Museum)