Bernardo Bellotto
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Bernardo Bellotto (January 30, 1720 — October 17, 1780) was an Italian urban landscape painter or vedutista, and printmaker in etching famous for his vedutes of European cities (Dresden, Vienna, Turin and Warsaw). He was the pupil and nephew of Canaletto, and sometimes also used the latter's illustrious name, thus signing as Bernardo Canaletto – illegally according to some. Especially in Germany, paintings described as by Canaletto may be his rather than his uncle's.
His style was characterized by elaborate representation of architectural or natural vistas, as well as the specific quality of each place's lighting. Like his uncle and many other Venetian masters of vedute, he used the camera obscura in order to achieve the superior precision of his urban views.
[edit] Biography
Bellotto was born in Venice, the son of Lorenzo Antonio Bellotto and Fiorenza Canal, sister of the then famous Canaletto, and studied in his uncle's workshop.
In 1742 he moved to Rome where he produced vedute of that city. In 1744 and 1745 he travelled northern Italy, again depicting vedutes of each city. Among others, he worked for Charles Emmanuel III of Savoy.
From 1747 to 1758 he moved to Dresden, following an invitation of King August III of Poland. He created various paintings of the cities Dresden and Pirna and their surroundings. Today, these paintings preserve a memory of Dresden's former beauty, which was destroyed in the bombing during World War II.
His international reputation grew, and in 1758 he followed an invitation by the Empress Maria Theresa to Vienna, where he painted views of the city's monuments. Thereafter he worked in Munich and then Dresden, again. When King August III died, Belotto's work became less important in Dresden. As a consquence he left Dresden to seek employment in St Petersburg at the court of Catherine II of Russia. On his way to St. Petersburg Bellotto, however, accepted the invitation of the King Stanislaw August Poniatowski of Poland to become his court painter in Warsaw. Here remained for the rest of his life as court painter to King Stanislaw August, for whom he painted numerous views of the Polish capital and its environs for the Royal Castle in Warsaw. His paintings of Warsaw were used for rebuilding the city after its near complete destruction in World War II.
He died in Warsaw in 1780.
