Punchinellos Felling (or Planting) a Tree

Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo Italian

Not on view

Domenico Tiepolo’s 104 drawings illustrating the life of Punchinello, a popular commedia dell’arte character, trace the amusing story of the everyman in elaborate detail—from his parentage, birth, and childhood to his diversions and adventures in near and distant lands to his illness, his death, and the apparition of his ghost. Nine sheets from the series are in the Robert Lehman Collection.

This energetic narrative of a group of Punchinello figures felling a tree may be an allusion to the so-called Tree of Liberty erected by Napoleonic troops as a symbol of their conquest of the Venetian Republic in 1797.

Punchinellos Felling (or Planting) a Tree, Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo (Italian, Venice 1727–1804 Venice), Pen and brown ink, brown wash, over rough black chalk

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Punchinellos Felling (or Planting) a Tree, Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo (Italian, Venice 1727–1804 Venice), Pen and brown ink, brown wash, over rough black chalk
Punchinellos Felling (or Planting) a Tree, Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo (Italian, Venice 1727–1804 Venice), Pen and brown ink, brown wash, over rough black chalk

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