Painting #125 - Rococo

Rococo in Venice - city views

Francesco Guardi (1712–1793, Venetian)  

Capriccio of a Harbor
- Francesco Guardi
- oil on canvas  (122 x 178 cm)  c.1760/70
- National Gallery of Art  (Washington) 

Canaletto (1697–1768, Venetian)

The Stonemason's Yard
- Canaletto
- oil on canvas  (124 × 163 cm)  c.1725
- National Gallery  (London) 

Venice: The Basin of San Marco on Ascension Day
- Canaletto
- oil on canvas  (122 x 183 cm)  c.1740
- National Gallery  (London) 

Bernardo Belletto (c.1722-1780, Italian)

View of Vienna from the Belvedere
- Bernardo Bellotto, il Canaletto
- oil on canvas (136 x 214 cm) 1758-61
- Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna)

Bellotto was the student and nephew of the renowned Canaletto and sometimes used the latter's illustrious name, signing himself as Bernardo Canaletto. In Germany and Poland, Bellotto called himself by his uncle's name, Canaletto. This caused some confusion, however Bellotto’s work is more sombre in color than Canaletto's and his depiction of clouds and shadows brings him closer to Dutch painting.

Rococo in England

William Hogarth (1697-1764, English)

The Graham Children
- William Hogarth
- oil on canvas (161 x 181 cm) in 1742
- National Gallery (London)

The 4 children of Daniel Graham, apothecry (present-day pharmacist) to King George II of England. The youngest child had died by the time the painting was completed -- infant mortality in Britain was high in the 18th century. (Actually, infant mortality had always been high everywhere, regardless of rich or poor, until the rapid medical progress after WW-II.)

Gin Lane
- William Hogarth
- copperplate (36 x 30 cm) 1751
- British Museum (London) 

On the simplest level, Hogarth portrays the inhabitants of Gin Lane as destroyed by their addiction to the foreign spirit of gin, with shocking scenes of infanticide, starvation, madness, decay and suicide.

Beer Street
- William Hogarth
- copperplate (36 x 30 cm) 1751
- British Museum (London) 

Hogarth portrays the inhabitants of Beer Street as happy and healthy, nourished by the native English ale, with scenes of industry, health, bonhomie and thriving commerce.

The gin crisis was severe. From 1689 onward the English government encouraged the industry of distilling, as it helped prop up grain prices which were then low, and increase trade, particularly with England's colonial possessions. Imports of French wine and spirits were banned to encourage the industry at home.

The Beggar’s Opera
- William Hogarth
- oil on canvas  (56 x 73 cm)  c.1728
- Tate Britain  (London) 

A scene from The Beggar's Opera, Act III, Scene XI

- Satirical ballad opera by Johann Christoph Pepusch

- Librettist - John Gay

- Premiere: 1728, Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, London

Marriage à-la-mode is a series of six pictures depicting a pointed skewering of upper class 18th century society.
- Hogarth was a pioneer in western sequential art.
- oil (70 x 91 cm each) in 1743-45
- National Gallery (London)

Source: Wikipedia