Summer Morning, Venezia
Artist
William Gedney Bunce
(1840 - 1916)
Date1893
MediumWatercolor on paper
Dimensions14 x 10 in.
ClassificationsWatercolor
Credit LineGift of Meta Bunce de Macarte in memory of Mrs. Stanley Cooper.
Object number2000.82
DescriptionBunce is best known for his paintings of Venice's harbor, canals, and sailboats. These watercolors and oils were referred to as "thin-line" scenes because the city's skyline was reduced to a thin line of bumps (domes) and shafts (campanili, Italian for bell towers). A contemporary of Whistler and Hudson River School painters William Stanley Haseltine, Sanford R. Gifford, and Thomas Moran, Bunce's work borders on Impressionism in its inclusion of vibrant colors and by giving the viewer an ephemeral, fleeting impression of the scene. Like the Venetian watercolors of Moran and British painter Joseph M.W. Turner, in "Summer Morning, Venezia", Bunce experiments with atmospheric effects by manipulating the cloud patterns in the vast sky and the sunlight which reflects on the water. Bunce creates a nostalgic, subdued image of the Venetian harbor and mitigates the grandeur of the buildings on the horizon. He gives prominence to the piers and sailboats which drift languidly on the water. Bunce also enhances the tremendous warmth of the scene through his use of bright blues and golds of the boats' sails which shimmer on the surface of the water. In contrast to Turner's and Moran's more romantically charged and emotional watercolors, "Summer Morning, Venezia" emphasizes the peacefulness of this enchanted city.On View
Not on view
