In a letter written near the end of his life, Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778) explained to his sister that he had lived away from his native Venice because he could find no patrons there willing to support “the sublimity of my ideas.” He resided instead in Rome, where he became internationally famous working as a printmaker, designer, architect, archaeologist, theorist, dealer, and polemicist. While Piranesi’s lasting fame is based above all on his etchings, he was also an intense, accomplished, and versatile draftsman, and much of his work was first developed in vigorous drawings. With nearly 100 works on view, the Morgan Library & Museum’s exhibition Sublime Ideas: Drawings by Giovanni Battista Piranesi offers the most comprehensive look at Piranesi’s drawings in more than a generation, and this tour is an opportunity for a private visit with John Marciari, curator of the exhibition and author of a related publication offering a complete survey of Piranesi’s work as a draftsman.

Led by Dr. John Marciari, Curatorial Chair and Head of the Department of Drawings & Prints, the Morgan Library & Museum.

John Marciari is the Charles W. Engelhard Curator, Head of the Department of Drawings and Prints, and Curatorial Chair at the Morgan Library & Museum, New York. A specialist in Italian art of the fifteenth through eighteenth centuries, his recent exhibitions and publications include Architecture, Theater, and Fantasy: Bibiena Drawings from the Jules Fisher Collections; Guercino: Virtuoso Draftsman; Drawing in Tintoretto’s Venice and Italian Renaissance Drawings at the Morgan Library and Museum, as well as essays, entries, and reviews in a range of exhibition catalogues and scholarly journals.

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*Please note this event has limited in-person capacity and will be offered to qualifying supporters on a first-come basis.