GIOVANNI ANTONIO PELLEGRINI (workshop of) (Venice, 1675 - 1741) Bacchus and Ariadne Oil on canvas, 103X144.2 cm Provenance: New York, Christie's, 13 November 1997, lot 85 (as Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini's school) Lucerne, Fisher, 1 November 1998, lot 2067 (as Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini) A subject frequently frequented by the artist, the canvas under examination appears to have been executed in the guise of a large model and resolved with quick, dense brushstrokes. The stylistic and qualitative characteristics reflect the Venetian artist's manner and his culture of international breadth. Indeed, Pellegrini was welcomed at the main courts and noble residences of Europe for his extraordinary talents as a fresco decorator and skilled oil painter, by virtue of a light-hearted and brilliant language marked by delicate sensualities that were well suited to the collecting and decorating tastes of a ruling class steeped in Italianising culture and little inclined to the aesthetic gravitas of the Baroque age. His art bears full witness to the role he played in the evolution of Venetian painting at the beginning of the 18th century, transcending the examples of Sebastiano Ricci and the lesson imparted to him by Paolo Pagani, his first master. He also renewed the lessons of Gaulli and Luca Giordano, achieving a chromatic refinement and compositional score that was to be a fundamental example to Giovanni Battista Tiepolo. The canvas presented here is therefore a good example of the artist's style, with its elegant layout, speed of touch and pearly grey rocaille tones. Reference bibliography: G. Knox, Antonio Pellegrini, 1675-1741, Oxford 1995, p. 229, p. 249, no. P. 315 A. Bettagno, Antonio Pellegrini. Il maestro veneto del rococò alle corti d'Europa, Venice 1998, ad vocem