_Giovanni Battista Tiepolo_ (Venetian: 1692-1769).
Tiepolo, one of the leaders in the revival of Venetian art (see
under 1100), was the Paul Veronese of the eighteenth century.
"Living," says Sir F. Burton, "in the era of periwig in art
as a dress, he was at a sore disadvantage as compared with
his great prototype of the sixteenth century; but he steered
a pretty clear course between vapid classicality and buckram
fashion. Gifted with a brilliant fancy, and master of all the
resources of his art, Tiepolo formed a style which, whatever
its shortcomings, is splendidly decorative. In his easel
pictures, he is at his very best. Here he was not tempted by
vast surfaces into that looseness of composition and hastiness
of execution that often lessen the value of his frescoes;
here, therefore, he could indulge his feeling for compact
architectonic arrangement, display force of harmonious colour,
and exercise a brilliant method of handling akin to that of
Paul Veronese." Tiepolo worked for most of his life at Venice;
but went also to execute commissions at Milan, Wurzburg (where
his paintings in the Archbishop's Palace may still be seen),
and Madrid, in which latter city he died. Of his frescoes at
Venice the finest are those of "Antony and Cleopatra" in the
Palazzo Labia. Copies of these are in the Arundel Society's
Collection.
"Touched in with all the brilliant, flashing, dexterous _bravura_ of
the last of the rear-guard of the Venetians. The pictorial art of
Venice finished with Tiepolo, and it seemed as if he was resolved that
it should not die ignominiously, for in spirit and gaiety he was little
inferior to Veronese himself. He had not the stronger qualities of his
model; Veronese's grasp of character, his air of nobility, his profound
and imaginative harmonies of colour, are wanting in the eighteenth
century painter" (_Times_, December 22, 1885).