Jacopo Amigoni (1682-1752)

REBECCA AND ELIEZER AT THE WELL oil on canvas 30a by 25ain. 76.8 by 64.8cm. This composition, albeit enlarged, derives from the panel commissioned shortly after 1739 by Sigmund Streit (1687-1775), as part of a series of six pictures illustrating biblical subjects. The group were sent to Berlin by 1758 (probably a little earlier than that date) but were unfortunately destroyed during the Second World War (see P. Rohrlach, 'La collezione di quadri Streit nel Graues Kloster a Berlino', in Arte Veneta, 1951, pp. 198-201). A native of Berlin, Streit had studied at the Graues Kloster in that city (1696-1701) but, upon the death of his father, he decided to travel financed on what inheritance was left to him. Arriving in Venice in 1709 (reputedly on foot), Streit was to become a successful merchant and make his fortune there. He was an avid collector of paintings, befriending and patronising artists including Antoine Pesne and Canaletto. In 1739 Streit sat to Amigoni and this portrait, now on loan from the Steit Stiftung to the Staatliches Museen, Berlin, was almost certainly the first picture he painted for him (see A. Scarpa Sonino, Jacopo Amigoni, Soncino 1994, cat. no. 28, illus.). The present painting differs from the smaller panel in a few compositional details; namely the addition of two figures at the left and a considerable extension at the top. As Schleier (see Literature) has observed, it is not entirely clear whether Streit himself commissioned this and other adaptations of his series, but this canvas must date from several years after its prototype since it is more markedly Venetian in character. Algarotti (Opere, vol. VI, ed. Venice 1794, pp. 351-374) described Amigoni's admiration for the leading Venetian painters of the 18th Century in the following terms: in Piazzetta he saw a "grande disegnatore e buon colorista, ma non elegante nelle sue forme", Pittoni he considered "singolare nello abbigliare i sacerdoti", and Tiepolo's handling of paint ("di macchia e spiritoso") was particularly appealing to Amigoni and surely influenced his confident and loose brushwork in the present picture. Rebecca and Eliezer at the Well was engraved by Wagner after 1749 and another engraving of the same subject, although different to the Streit picture, by Bartolozzi-Wagner (no. 33/3) is recorded by Scarpa Sonino (op. cit., p. 49, note 90). It is not surprising therefore that the design appears, in reverse, on an English enameled tea urn of circa 1760 (Untermeyer collection, New York). Another version of this painting was sold, London, Christie's, December 18, 1980, lot 110, as by Amigoni. A copy is in the Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge (Mass.), and a pastel, probably autograph, is recorded in a London private collection. Provenance: Julius Weitzner, New York, 1954 Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., New York, until 1971 The British Rail Pension Fund (Sale: London, Sotheby's, July 3, 1996, lot 79) where acquired by the present collector Exhibited: Portland, Oregon, Portland Museum, etc., Paintings from the Collection of Walter P. Chrysler Jr., 1956-57, no. 46 New York, Finch College Museum of Art, Venetian Paintings of the Eighteenth Century, 1961, no. 2, illus. in the catalogue Chicago, Art Institute, Minneapolis, Institute of Arts, Toledo, Museum of Art, Painting in Italy in the Eighteenth Century: Rococo to Romanticism, 1970, no. 12 On loan, Detroit, Institute of Arts, 1980-1995 Literature: B. Suida Manning, Paintings from the Collection of Walter P. Chrysler Jr., exhibition catalogue, 1956, p. 35, cat. no. 46, illus. p. 94 B. Flannegan, in J. Maxon & J.J. Rischel ed., in Painting in Italy during the Eighteenth Century: Rococo to Romanticism, exhibition catalogue, 1970, p. 46, cat. no. 12, illus. p. 47 (as dated after 1739 and described as of 'dazzling quality') E. Schleier, in Venedigs Ruhm im Norden, exhibition catalogue, 1991, p. 33, under note 5.