Lot 2096
JAMES HOLLAND, RWS (1799-1870)
THE RIALTO, VENICE
Watercolour and pencil
25.5 x 36cm.
* Holland's first visit to Venice was in 1835. He returned in 1845, 1851, 1857 and 1865. From the middle of the 19th Century, Ruskin and Thackeray shared an irritation for the lack of inventiveness in artists' views of Venice, the latter remarking, "How long are we to go on with Venice, Verona, Lago di So-and-So, and Ponte di What d-ye-call-em? I am weary of gondolas, striped awnings, sailors with red night (or rather day) caps, cobalt distances and posts in water." (Martin Hardie, Water-colour Painting in Britain, vol. III, The Victorian Period [London, 1968, pp. 35, 34]). Holland has succumbed to gondolas, striped awnings and posts in the water but he preferred an asymmetrical stance. This viewpoint appealed to him: a larger composition (53.5 x 76cm) was with the Fine Art Society in 1949 and another similar composition (in pen, black ink and oil on board, 29.8 x 29.8cm) was at Christies (June 7th 2007, lot 46). Holland puts the shadowy and featureless underside of the bridge almost at the centre of the composition and this enables him to place figures, apparently in 17th Century dress, in the foreground.
