Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Italian, 1720-1778
View of the Grand Cascade at Tivoli, from Views of Rome
INV-4806
Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Italian, 1720-17781766
View of the Grand Cascade at Tivoli, from Views of Rome
Giovanni Battista Piranesi Italian, 1720-1778 →etchingprint
Date
1766
Medium
Etching on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image: 47.1 × 70.2 cm (18 9/16 × 27 11/16 in.); Sheet: 50.5 × 72 cm (19 15/16 × 28 3/8 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
The Charles Deering Collection
Giovanni Battista Piranesi had supplied decades of tourists with his massive, masterly etchings of architectural monuments in Rome and its environs by the time he completed his Views of Rome series in the late 1770s. The waterfall pictured here, in the ancient town of Tivoli, was a natural wonder, and the 16th-century Villa d’Este nearby channeled the same waterpower into a flamboyantly artificial series of fountains, automata (mechanical toys moved by water), and strategic cascades. Both were must-sees for Europeans on their Grand Tours.
Also notable
Works in the same vein
View of Ponte Lugano on the Anio, from Views of Rome
Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Italian, 1720-1778) published by Francesco (Italian, 1758-1810) and Pietro Piranesi (Italian, born 1758/9)
The Giant Wheel, plate 9 from Imaginary Prisons
Giovanni Battista Piranesi Italian, 1720-1778
Villa Pamphili outside Porta S. Pancrazio, from Views of Rome
Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Italian, 1720-1778) published by Francesco (Italian, 1758-1810) and Pietro Piranesi (Italian, born 1758/9)
