11. Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
(1696-1770)
Three Soldiers and a Boy

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Tiepolo, Three Soldiers

Three Soldiers and a Boy

Etching, 1740s, from Capricci, 140 x 176 mm., Rizzi 30 only state, DeVesme 4. Very fine impression on laid paper without visible watermark, trimmed on the platemark (a narrow margin at the right and part of the top) but complete. The Capricci do not bear numbers, so there is no state "before" the number. They were issued in 1649 and again in 1675 and there appears to be no way of determining from which edition any single plate comes. Renowned throughout Europe as the greatest painter of large-scale frescoes of his time, Tiepolo showed an amazing ability to translate his vision and style into the small-scale black-and-white medium of etching. His prints are filled with the same kind of luminescence as the paintings and depict the same sort of imaginative fantasy, and one feels them totally complete without the need of color.