Giambattista Pittoni

Training under Francesco Pittoni and Antonio Balestra is recorded. Anton Kern and Cesare Ligari are recorded as having studied under Giambattista Pittoni. Places of work recorded in the authority are Venice and Republic of Venice. Residence is recorded at Venice. Positions recorded include rector. Works named in the authority record are Polyxena in front of the Achilles' Tomb, Bacchus and Ariadne, Christ Giving the Keys to Paradise to St. Work by Giambattista Pittoni is recorded in the collections of Belvedere, Städel Museum, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Museo del Prado and Art Institute of Chicago.

• Name — Giambattista Pittoni • Birth Name — Giovanni Battista Pittoni • Born — 6 June 1687 • Birthplace — Venice, Republic of Venice (present-day Italy) • Died — 6 November 1767 • Place of death — Venice, Republic of Venice • Known for — painting • Style — late-Baroque, Rococo • Illustration — Portrait of Pittoni by Bartolomeo Nazari

Pittoni was born in Venice on 6 June 1687. He studied under his uncle Francesco Pittoni, a well-known but undistinguished painter of the Venetian Baroque; a Samson and Delilah at the Villa Querini in Visinale, near Pasiano di Pordenone, is signed by both painters. The theory of Rodolfo Pallucchini that Pittoni studied under Antonio Balestra is now generally discounted. Pittoni was unwilling to leave Venice and travelled little; although he received many foreign commissions, no journey in connection with any of them is documented, while from 1720 onwards records show that he was in Venice in every year. However, in 1720 he may have travelled to France with his uncle Francesco, together with Rosalba Carriera, Antonio Pellegrini and Anton Maria Zanetti. His change of style from a heavy Baroque to a lighter and more delicate Rococo manner dates from about this time; some older writers have attributed this change to an indirect French influence, perhaps through Pellegrini or through Sebastiano Ricci. Pittoni joined the Fraglia dei Pittori Veneziani, the Venetian guild of painters, in 1716. From, probably, the same year until his death he was a member of the Collegio dei Pittori, of which he became prior in 1729. He was elected to the Accademia Clementina of Bologna in 1727. In 1750 he was one of the forty-six founding members of the Veneta Pubblica Accademia di Pittura, Scultura e Architettura, which later became the Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia; from 1758 to 1760 he succeeded Tiepolo as president of the academy, and was elected for a second term in 1763–64. Pittoni died in Venice on 6 November 1767. His tomb is in the church of San Giacomo dell'Orio, Venice.

• Illustration — The Death of Sophonisba in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow • Illustration — View of the Brenta, near Dolo, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The catalogue raisonné by Franca Zava Boccazzi of Pittoni's paintings lists 247 extant and 117 lost, missing or destroyed works. The catalogue raisonné by Alice Binion of his drawings includes 304 items.

Christ Giving the Keys to Paradise to St. Work and production. Works recorded as notable number 4: Polyxena in front of the Achilles' Tomb, Bacchus and Ariadne, Christ Giving the Keys to Paradise to St. Peter and Portrait of Cardinal Bartolomeo Roverella.