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Source Description
Giovanni Battista Piazzetta was celebrated for his finished drawings of saints, portraits, and <em>teste di carattere </em>(character heads). Cleveland’s sheet belongs to the latter genre, which describes portraits embellished with props to suggest a character type or types. Here, Piazzetta united three independent studies of individuals into a single scene, in which a young woman appears to purchase a pink—a type of flower related to the carnation—from a boy with a second young woman looking on.The image bristles with tantalizing narrative potential, but it is left to the viewer to interpret the scene as they wish. Drawings of this size and quality of finish were displayed on walls like paintings, rather than stored in portfolios, with the unfortunate consequence that the Venetian blue paper often faded to a grayish-tan as here. However, the virtuosity of Piazzetta’s technique endures on this sheet. His method of modeling—wetting and rubbing his black crayon rather than hatching—produces the density of tone and velvety shadow. Textural details are supplied by white chalk, evoking the silky weave of the boy’s shirt and the hard substance of the figures’ fingernails. Piazzetta's drawings were in high demand among affluent foreign visitors and helped to supplement his income.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
117766
label
A Young Woman Buying a Pink from a Young Man
core
obj
dtoType
drawing
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
117766
contentType
drawing
title
A Young Woman Buying a Pink from a Young Man
description
Giovanni Battista Piazzetta was celebrated for his finished drawings of saints, portraits, and <em>teste di carattere </em>(character heads). Cleveland’s sheet belongs to the latter genre, which describes portraits embellished with props to suggest a character type or types. Here, Piazzetta united three independent studies of individuals into a single scene, in which a young woman appears to purchase a pink—a type of flower related to the carnation—from a boy with a second young woman looking on.The image bristles with tantalizing narrative potential, but it is left to the viewer to interpret the scene as they wish. Drawings of this size and quality of finish were displayed on walls like paintings, rather than stored in portfolios, with the unfortunate consequence that the Venetian blue paper often faded to a grayish-tan as here. However, the virtuosity of Piazzetta’s technique endures on this sheet. His method of modeling—wetting and rubbing his black crayon rather than hatching—produces the density of tone and velvety shadow. Textural details are supplied by white chalk, evoking the silky weave of the boy’s shirt and the hard substance of the figures’ fingernails. Piazzetta's drawings were in high demand among affluent foreign visitors and helped to supplement his income.
date
c. 1740
rights
CC0
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
wikidata
Q80012471
creators
1198
genreSpecific
Drawing
imageCount
1
source
import
dimensionsRaw
Sheet: 42.7 x 54.9 cm (16 13/16 x 21 5/8 in.)
cul
Italy, Venice
accession
1938.387
Source extras
tec
black crayon (wetted and rubbed) heightened with white chalk on faded blue paper
tombstone
A Young Woman Buying a Pink from a Young Man, c. 1740. Giovanni Battista Piazzetta (Italian, 1682–1754). Black crayon (wetted and rubbed) heightened with white chalk on faded blue paper; sheet: 42.7 x 54.9 cm (16 13/16 x 21 5/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund, 1938.387
supportMaterials
description
blue laid paper (faded to green-gray)
collection
DR - Italian
didYouKnow
The flower the woman in this drawing plucks from the bouquet—a “pink”—was associated with marriage and love in 18th-century Europe.
citations
citation
Shaw, James Byam. “Venice: Piazzetta at S. Giorgio Maggiore.” <em>The Burlington Magazine </em>125, no. 969 (December 1983).
page_number
Mentioned: p. 786 n.6
citation
Rava, Aldo. <em>G.B. Piazzetta</em>. Firenze: Fratelli Alinari, 1921.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 71
citation
Fiocco, Giuseppe. “La Peinture à l’Exposition du XVIIIe Siècle à Venise.” <em>La Renaissance</em> 12, no. 12 (December 1929).
page_number
Reproduced: p. 565
citation
Ojetti, Ugo et al. <em>Il Settecento Italiano.</em> Milan: Fratelli Treves Editori, 1932.
page_number
Reproduced: fig. 244
citation
Pallucchini, Rodolfo. <em>L’Arte di Giovanni Battista Piazzetta</em>. Bologna: Giuseppe Maylender Editore, 1934.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 58, 100, fig. 74
citation
“Cleveland: A Museum’s New Acquisitions.” <em>The Art News</em> 38, no. 40 (1940): 13-14.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 13
citation
Francis, Henry S. "Two Drawings by Piazzetta." <em>The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art</em> 27, no. 7 (1940): 108-109.
page_number
Mentioned: pp. 108-109
citation
Smith College, and Ruth Wedgwood Kennedy. <em>Italian Drawing, 1330-1780, Smith College Museum of Art</em>. Northampton, MA: Press-work by A. Wilson, 1941.
page_number
Mentioned: cat. no. 51
citation
Goering, Max. “Giovanni Battista Piazzetta als Zeichner.” <em>Pantheon</em> 14, no. 11 (November 1941): 259-263.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 261-263
citation
Mongan, Agnes. “Italian Drawings 1330-1780: an Exhibition at the Smith College Museum of Art.” <em>The Art Bulletin</em> 24, no. 1 (March 1942): 92-94.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 93
citation
Pallucchini, Rodolfo. <em>Giovanni Battista PIazzetta, con cinquantasei tavole</em>. Rome: Tumminelli, 1943.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 22, pl. 53
citation
Benesch, Otto. <em>Venetian Drawings of the Eighteenth Century in America</em>. New York: H. Bittner and Company, 1947.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 29, no. 11
citation
Tietze, Hans. <em>European Master Drawings in the United States</em>. New York: J.J. Augustin Publishers, 1947.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: 172-73, no. 86
citation
Fogg Museum of Art. <em>Venice in the Eighteenth Century (May 7- June 10, 1948)</em>. Cambridge: Harvard University, 1948.
page_number
Mentioned: no. 27
citation
Milliken, William M. “L’arte Italiana nel Museo di Cleveland.” <em>Le Vie del Mondo</em> 12, no. 9 (September 1950): 897-908.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 908
citation
The Detroit Institute of Arts, John Herron Art Museum, Indianapolis, and E.P. Richardson. <em>Venice 1700-1800: An Exhibition of Venice and the Eighteenth Century.</em> Detroit: The Detroit Institute of Arts, 1952.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 44, fig. 53
citation
Morassi, Antonio. “Una Mostra del Settecento Veneziano a Detroit.” <em>Arte Veneta: Rivista Trimestrale di Storia dell’Arte</em> 25 (1953).
page_number
Mentioned: p. 52.
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art. <em>The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook.</em> Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 572
citation
Milliken, William M. <em>The Cleveland Museum of Art. </em>New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1958.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 46
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art. <em>Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966</em>. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 143
citation
Alsop, Joseph. “Treasures of the Cleveland Museum of Art.”<em> Art in America</em> 24, no.3 (May-June 1966).
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 23, 28.
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art. <em>Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969</em>. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 143
citation
Precerutti-Garberi, Mercedes. <em>Giambattista Piazzetta e l’accademia: disegni. </em>Milan: Castello Sforzesco, 1971.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 15, 23 under nos. 1 and 2, 28 under no. 5
citation
Bean, Jacob and Felice Stampfle. <em>Drawings from New York Collections III: The Eighteenth Century in Italy</em>. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, Pierpont Morgan Library, 1971.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 34 under no. 40
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art. <em>Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978</em>. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 142
citation
Pallucchini, Rodolfo and Adriano Mariuz. <em>L’opera completa del Piazzetta</em>. Milan: Rizzoli Editore, 1982.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 131, 133, no.d12
citation
Knox, George, and Giovanni Battista Piazzetta. <em>Piazzetta: A Tercentenary Exhibition of Drawings, Prints, and Books</em>. 1983.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 10, 30, 37, 126, 134, cat. no. 51, Reproduced: p. 134
citation
Pallucchini, Rodolfo et al. <em>Giambattista Piazzetta: Il suo tempo, la sua scuola. </em>Venice: Marsilio Editori, 1983.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 134, under no. 50
citation
Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Alessandro Bettagno, and Giovanni Battista Piazzetta. <em>G.B. Piazzetta: disegni, incisioni, libri, manoscritti</em>. Vicenza: Pozza, 1983.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 25, under no. 16, p. 30, under no. 37
citation
Wallraf-Richartz-Museum and Uwe Westfehling. <em>Meisterzeichnungen von Leonardo bis zu Rodin</em>. Cologne: Museen der Stadt Köln, 1986.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 110
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art. <em>Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1991</em>. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 106
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art, John Russell, and Evan H. Turner. <em>Masterpieces from East and West. </em>New York: Rizzoli, 1992.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 126.
citation
Martineau, Jane, and Andrew Robison. <em>The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century</em>. New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, 1994.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no 65, p. 145, 147, 474
citation
Alpers, Svetlana. “Post-Genius Venice.” <em>Art in America</em>, March 1995.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 66.
citation
National Gallery of Art. <em>1995 Annual Report. </em>Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 1996.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 19
citation
Romanelli, Giandomenico and Filippo Pedrocco.<em> Lorenzo Tiepolo e il suo tempo.</em> (Milan: Electa, 1997).
page_number
Reproduced: p. 33
citation
Cleveland Museum of Art, Diane DeGrazia, and Carter E. Foster. <em>Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art</em>. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art in association with Rizzoli International Publications, New York, 2000.
page_number
Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 21, p. 4, pp. 62-62, p. 286
citation
The Cleveland Museum of Art, <em>Annual Report 2000, </em>2001.
page_number
Reproduced: p. 82.
catalogueRaisonne
Pallucchini D12
creditline
Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
updatedAt
2026-05-29 06:05:58.555000
sourceId
117766
dept
Drawings
coll
DR - Italian
med
black crayon (wetted and rubbed) heightened with white chalk on faded blue paper
creatorTags
male
thumbnail_url
image_url
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
4a9e50279e6bac4a