Venice: Shipping by Joseph Pennell

Venice: Shipping by Joseph Pennell

Venice: Shipping

Joseph Pennell

Title

Venice: Shipping

 
Artist

Joseph Pennell

  1857 - 1926 (biography)
Year
1883  
Technique
etching 
Image Size
7 15/16 x 10 3/16" platemark 
Signature
"J. Pennell" in pencil, lower center 
Edition Size
4 proofs located 
Annotations
 
Reference
Wuerth 72; not in the Library of Congress 
Paper
antique laid 
State
I/I 
Publisher
artist 
Inventory ID
20045 
Price
SOLD
Description

There are only 4 known impressions of this rare etching of Venice and it is not in the Library of Congress collection of Pennell's prints. The plate was done in 1883 while Pennell was working in Italy. At this point he had no press and took the prints to a professional printer while he oversaw the proving.

This view is of the Venice harbor and the island of San Giorgio Maggiore. Pennell chose the 16th century, Andrea Palladio designed, Church of San Giorgio Maggiore as the central focus. A sailboat placed in front of the church brings the viewer’s attention forward to the anchored sailing vessels with tall spars. In Venice: Shipping Pennell gives a nod to Whistler: heavy diagonal and vertical lines sketch the massive ships, lightly etched lines suggest two gondolas passing nearby, while other faint lines hint at other modes of transport on this navigable harbor.

In 1883 Pennell traveled to Europe and settled in London. He produced numerous books, both as an author and as an illustrator, many of them in collaboration with his wife, author Elizabeth Robins Pennell. In London his friends included many of the most notable creative figures of the day, including the writers George Bernard Shaw and Robert Louis Stevenson and the painters John Singer Sargent and James Abbott McNeill Whistler. His close acquaintance with Whistler led the Pennells to undertake a biography of that artist in 1906, and, after some litigation with his executrix on the right to use his letters, the book was published in 1908.