065/06
9 May 2006
Culture Minister Defers Export Of Venetian View By Innovative Italian Master, Luca Carlevarijs
Culture Minister, David Lammy, has placed a temporary export bar on a painting by Luca Carlevarijs, View of the Molo, Venice, looking west. This will provide a last chance to raise the money to keep the painting in the United Kingdom.
The Minister's ruling follows a recommendation by the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest, run by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council. The Committee recommended that the export decision be deferred on the grounds that the painting is of outstanding aesthetic importance and outstanding significance for the study of the art of Luca Carlevarijs, the history of 18th-century art, the development of view painting and the history of patronage and collecting.
The painting is an outstanding work by a major artist whose achievements and originality have only recently been re-evaluated. It beautifully encapsulates Carlevarijs' breadth of vision, his command of perspectival views, and his zest in depicting the bustling, melting-pot street life of Venice. Above all, it creates a sense of Venice as a centre of trade and prosperity, an aspect that British visitors and commentators of the later 17th century found particularly congenial. It was almost certainly commissioned by Christopher Crowe, British consul at Livorno from 1705 to 1716, and is an important example of Grand Tour patronage, anticipating Canaletto's influence in Britain. Carlevarijs brought view painting to a new level and his compositions, which often have dramatic lighting and unusual points of view, were taken up as a source of ideas by Canaletto, Marieschi, Guardi and other view painters.
The decision on the export licence application for the painting will be deferred for a period ending on 8 July inclusive. This period may be extended until 8 October inclusive if a serious intention to raise funds with a view to making an offer to purchase the painting at the recommended price of £3,000,000 (excluding VAT) is expressed.
Anyone interested in making an offer to purchase the painting should contact the owner's agent through:
The Secretary,
The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest,
Museums, Libraries and Archives Council,
Victoria House,
Southampton Row,
London, WC1B 4EA.
Notes to Editors
1. From April 2005, responsibility for administering the work of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) was passed by DCMS to the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA). Media enquiries on the operation and casework arising from RCEWA and from the Acceptance in Lieu and Government Indemnity Schemes and the export licence system should go to Sharene Chatfield on 020 7273 1459, email sharene.chatfield@mla.gov.uk
2. The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest is an independent body, run by MLA, which advises the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on whether a cultural object, intended for export, is of national importance under specified criteria. Where the Committee finds that an object meets one or more of the criteria, it will normally recommend that the decision on the export licence application should be deferred for a specified period. An offer may then be made from within the United Kingdom at or above the fair market price.
3. Pictures of these items can be downloaded free of charge from the MLA site on Pixmedia. Please go to the MLA page situated within the Arts section of Pixmedia at http://www.pixmedia.co.uk/25/image/3131
4. The View of the Molo is one of a set of four paintings which hung together at Kiplin Hall in Yorkshire where they are first recorded in 1771 by Arthur Young, A six months tour of the North of England, Dublin 1771, Vol I, letter X. The original owner of the paintings was almost certainly Christopher Crowe (1682-1749) who was British Consul at Livorno (Leghorn) between 1705 and 1716; he purchased Kiplin Hall in 1722 and remodelled it in the 1730s. Two of the views were sold in 1971 (Christie's, 26 November 1971, lots 73 and 74, View of the Piazzetta looking towards the Riva and View of the Bacino di San Marco). The fourth painting, View of Piazza San Marco, belongs to the Kiplin Hall Charitable Trust.
5. At Leghorn (Livorno), where he had been a merchant before being appointed British Consul, Christopher Crowe acted as an agent for British collectors in acquiring works of art, many of which were shipped from that port, and he travelled in Italy. His contacts with Carlevarijs are not documented but there is nothing to preclude his commission or acquisition of the set of four paintings around 1710-15. He married in 1715, and his wife, Lady Charlotte Lee, is documented in Venice in 1714.
6. The son of an obscure painter, sculptor and architect in Udine, Carlevarijs was orphaned at the age of seven and settled in Venice in 1679. Main sources of inspiration include Gaspar van Wittel (Vanvitelli) and northern European art. In his early career Carlevarijs produced imaginary views of seaports and other kinds of capricci. In 1703, he published a set of over one hundred etched views of Venice, Le Fabriche, e Vedute di Venetia, disegnate, poste in prospettiva et intagliate. This was a landmark in Venetian art and publishing, absolutely unprecedented and highly innovative as a series of city views taking in all aspects of architecture and daily life, from the well-known ceremonial settings to the more remote corners of Venice. Carlevarijs in many ways here invented Venetian veduta painting: his compositions, which often have dramatic lighting or unusual points of view, were taken up as a source of ideas by Canaletto, Marieschi, Guardi and other view painters.
7. Carlevarijs' first real success in view-painting was with ceremonial entries painted for foreign diplomats and royalty: this created a huge demand for pictures of the famous and much-loved settings for ceremonies, the Piazza San Marco, the Piazzetta and the waterfront. Carlevarijs painted very few scenes outside this small area, and his patrons were largely international rather than local. Nevertheless, his compositions set out the territory for successive view-painters in Venice, that of View of the Molo being taken up most notably by Canaletto.
8. Carlevarijs was little-known in Britain until relatively recently outside a small number of scholars of Venetian art. Some exhibitions since the early 1990s, primarily in Italy and recently at the Timkins Museum of Art in San Diego, have helped to highlight his real artistic stature. Further research in recent years on the Grand Tour, on British patrons and on the early career of Canaletto has thrown some more light on Carlevarijs and the contemporary appreciation of his work.
9. The condition of the painting is very good. It has been relined and relatively recently conserved.
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