Drawn to Venice
Trois Crayons Magazine, April 2026
Reviewed by Emma P. Holter, PhD candidate
Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo (1727–1804), Punchinello's Children Begging for Sweets. Photograph by Randy Dodson, courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco
On view at the Legion of Honor from 24 January through 2 August, Drawn to Venice showcases early modern Venetian draughtsmanship with examples selected from the permanent collection of the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts at the Fine Art Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF). Curated by Furio Rinaldi, the exhibition brings into focus over thirty drawings and prints dating from the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries.
Divided into four sections and spread across a single white-cube gallery, the exhibition is organised into a chronological presentation. It presents many of the protagonists of the Venetian canon, strategically supplemented with loans from local public and private collections in the Bay area—especially in the Renaissance section. Notably, this included a black chalk study on blue paper of A Fallen Warrior Holding a Sword and Shield attributed to Titian, and loaned from the collection of Rosemary Baker. Displayed nearby is a double-sided drawing by Jacopo Tintoretto featuring studies after Michelangelo’s sculpture of Samson and the Philistines and an antique bust of Vitellius, loaned from the Cantor Art Center at Stanford University.
A thread running through the exhibition labels emphasises the oft-repeated qualities that distinguish Venetian draughtsmanship from other artistic centres on the Italian peninsula, particularly a preoccupation with capturing the effects of light and colour. Likewise, autonomous drawings are showcased throughout the display. The title wall of the exhibition brings together an impressive array of four large-scale drawings from Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo’s Divertimento per li ragazzi (Entertainment for Children), a series that chronicles the misadventures of Punchinello, a character from the Neapolitan Commedia dell’arte. Tiepolo conceived of these drawings as finished works of art, signing his name in the lower margin of Punchinello’s Children Begging for Sweets, which is numbered as 17 in the series of 104 drawings.
Rosalba Carriera (1673–1757), Portrait of a Lady as Diana. Photograph by Randy Dodson, courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco
Independent portrait drawings emerge as a recurring theme across each section of the display. Some marvellous examples included a pastel Portrait of a Lady as Diana by Rosalba Carriera (the most famous and successful Venetian portraitist of the eighteenth century), a trois crayons portrait of a gentleman by Carlo Caliari, and two sheets by Giovanni Battista Piazzetta of A Boy Playing a Guitar and Bust of a Girl Holding an Apple. Drawings on blue paper, a support quite typical of Venetian draughtsmanship, were also featured; the most striking were two exquisite red chalk studies of male heads by Giambattista Tiepolo.
Carlo Caliari (1570–1596), Bearded Man Wearing a Ruff. Photograph by Randy Dodson, courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
Rounding out the survey of Venetian preparatory practices, the display included a grisaille oil sketch on canvas for Giovanni Battista Pittoni’s Descent from the Cross (ca. 1753), lent by the Legion of Honor’s Department of Paintings. While Venetian painting is often associated with rich colour, this monochromatic bozzetto for a monumental altarpiece also acknowledged the long-standing practice of painting in a limited palette of black, grey, and white.
The permanent collection rotation coincides with the loan exhibition Monet in Venice, which opened on 26 March and is co-organised by the FAMSF with the Brooklyn Museum in New York. Drawn to Venice gives local audiences an opportunity to appreciate the region’s rich holdings of Venetian drawings by some of the most notable artists active in the lagoon across three centuries. From the vedute drawing by Guardi to the prints after designs by Canaletto, these works act as evocative precedents for Claude Monet’s luminous Venetian seascapes on view in the adjacent galleries of the museum.
Drawn to Venice continues at Legion of Honor until 2 August.
