Generously sponsored by JoAnne M. K. Jackson and George Jackson.

This rare painting was bequeathed to Ca’ Rezzonico Museum in 2020 by Contessa Maria Francesca Tiepolo (1925–2020), who served as the director of Venice’s Archivio di Stato from 1977 to 1990. It is an oil sketch, or bozzetto, of Giovanni Battista Piazzetta’s Ecstasy of Saint Francis from 1729, now displayed in Palazzo Chiericati in Vicenza.

The work is executed with just a thin preparation of a dark color and quick and full-bodied brush strokes, and it is not documented in current Piazzetta literature. Saint Francis is portrayed in the center, cradled by an angel. A figure in prayer is barely distinguishable in the lower left corner, and on the bottom right there is a skull and a book. In the upper section of the painting, the dove of the Holy Spirit illuminates two little angels and the saint and angel below. The figures are flanked on the right by architectural ruins.

Once restored, the painting will be permanently displayed in Ca’ Rezzonico Museum.

The oil sketch was in a very fragile state of conservation and the details had been obscured by several thick layers of varnish and heavy overpainting from previous maintenance interventions. These thick, non-original surface layers were carefully thinned and removed gradually in several steps, in order to protect the original work. Any small losses to the pictorial surface were filled and integrated with removable conservation paints, before a final layer of surface varnish was applied. The original stretcher also underwent maintenance to ensure that the tension of the canvas was maintained. The 2021 treatment was carried out by conservator Enrica Colombini.

Giovanni Battista Piazzetta [Attr.] (1682–1754)
Oil Sketch of Saint Francis in Ecstasy
Early 18^th-century, oil on canvas
55cm x 34cm
Ca’ Rezzonico Museum