Young Lady in a Tricorn Hat

c. 1755/1760

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo

Artist, Venetian, 1696 - 1770

Shown from the chest up, a pale-skinned woman wears a black tricorn hat and a black cloak that covers her shoulders, chest, and much of her face in this vertical portrait painting. Her body is angled to our left, and she looks at us from the corners of her dark, almond-shaped eyes. The jet-black hat is set back slightly on her head but covers most of her forehead. A loop goes around a black button on the side to our right, and the corner of a parchment-white decoration, presumably a bow, peeks up from the far side of the hat. Her pale face is like a moon, partially visible within the opening of the cloak that goes from her temples, down her cheeks, and covers her chin to just under her lower lip. The garment is gathered over her chin, and drapes down her chest. The fabric is painted black with green undertones. A glimpse of brown hair peeks out over her left temple, to our right. Her right, gloved hand, on our left, emerges from beneath the fabric to hold a closed fan by her chin. The glove is gossamer white. The sides of the fan's sticks are coral orange, and the fan is streaked with forest green and more orange against cream white across the top, where the fabric is accordioned. The space behind her is dark, pine green, a shade lighter than the woman’s dress.

Media Options

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On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 32

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 62.2 x 49.3 cm (24 1/2 x 19 7/16 in.)
    framed: 80 x 68 x 7.6 cm (31 1/2 x 26 3/4 x 3 in.)

  • Accession

    1952.5.77

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Luigi Pisa, Florence, by 1937;[1] (his sale, Circolo Artistico, Palazzetto del Da Ponte, Venice, 5-9 September 1938, no. 318, repro. as by Alessandro Longhi). Italico Brass, Venice.[2] (Schaeffer Galleries, New York), probably from 1947; sold 21 May 1948 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[3] gift 1952 to NGA.
[1] Catalogue de la Collection Pisa, preface by Ugo Ojetti, 2 vols., Milan, 1937: 1:114, no. 749, 2:124. A handwritten notation on the back of an old photograph (photographic archives, NGA), reads "Pisani Collection 1932." This information has not been independently corroborated.
[2] According to Alessandro Morandotti, Mostra di pittura veneziana del settecento, Exh. cat. Palazzo Massimo alle Colonne, Venice, 1941: 43 (listed as Alessandro Brass); Max Goering, "Tiepolo" in Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, Leipzig, 1907-1950: 33:154; and Antonio Morassi, Tiepolo, Bergamo, 1943: 28.
[3] Inventory card no. 1220 from the Schaeffer Galleries, Inc., confirms the sale of the picture in May of 1948; the ealiest date on the card is 11/28/1947. (Getty Research Institute, copy NGA curatorial files). The purchase from Schaeffer Galleries is also recorded in a typewritten notation, Kress records, NGA curatorial files. See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/2492.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1939

  • Exhibition of Venetian Paintings and Drawings Held in Aid of Lord Baldwin's Fund for Refugees, Matthiesen, Ltd., London, 1939, no. 60.

1941

  • Mostra di pittura veneziana del settecento, Palazzo Massimo alle Colonne, Rome, 1941, no. 38, repro.

1982

  • Le portrait en Italie au Siècle de Tiepolo, Petit Palais, Paris, 1982, no. 47, repro. (cat. by Marco Chiarini).

1994

  • The Glory of Venice: Art in the Eighteenth Century, Royal Academy of Arts, London; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Museo del Settecento Veneziano - Ca'Rezzonico, Venice, 1994-1995, not in cat. (shown only in Washington in 1995).

1996

  • Giambattista Tiepolo: 1696 - 1996, Museo del Settecento Veneziano - Ca'Rezzonico, Venice; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1996-1997, no. 45b, repro.

1998

  • Giambattista Tiepolo 1696-1770, Musée du Petit Palais, Paris, 1998-1999: no. 71, repro.

Bibliography

1907

  • Goering, Max. In Thieme, Ulrich, and Felix Becke, eds. Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart. Leipzig, 1907-1950: 33(1939):154.

1939

  • Borenius, Tancred. "An Exhibition of Venetian Painting." The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs 74 (1939): 193.

  • Goering, Max. "Ein neuentdecktes Mädchenbildnis von Giovanni Battista Tiepolo." Pantheon 24 (1939): 226-227, repro. 225.

1943

  • Morassi, Antonio. Tiepolo. Bergamo, 1943: 28, repro. 73.

1947

  • Arslan, Edoardo. "Dipinti di Jacopo Amigoni." Belle Arti 1 (1947): 185, fig. 4, as by Jacopo Amigoni.

1951

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection Acquired by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation 1945-1951. Introduction by John Walker, text by William E. Suida. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1951: 160, no. 70, repro., as A Young Venetian Lady in Domino and Tricorne (Bautta).

1958

  • Morassi, Antonio. "Giambattista Tiepolo's 'Girl with a Lute' and the Clarification of Some Points in the Work of Domenico Tiepolo." The Art Quarterly 21 (1958): 180, 185, fig. 7, as by Giandomenico Tiepolo.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 250, repro., as A Young Lady in Domino and Tricorne.

1960

  • Pallucchini 1960, 93, fig. 233.

1962

  • Morassi, Antonio. A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings of G. B. Tiepolo. London, 1962: 67, as by Giandomenico Tiepolo.

1964

  • Levi Pisetzky, Rosita. Storia del Costume in Italia. 5 vols. Milan, 1964-1969: 4:326, pl. 186, as by Giandomenico Tiepolo.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 127, as A Young Lady in Domino and Tricorne.

1968

  • Pallucchini, Anna. L'opera completa di Giambattista Tiepolo. Milan, 1968: 127, no. 252, repro.

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 113, repro., as A Young Lady in Domino and Tricorne.

1972

  • Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 198, as by Giandomenico Tiepolo.

1973

  • Fahy, Everett, and Francis John Bagott Watson. The Wrightsman Collection. Vol. 5: Paintings, drawings, sculpture. New York, 1973: 275-276, repro. 274, as by Giandomenico Tiepolo.

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XVI-XVIII Century. London, 1973: 154-155, fig. 294, as by Giandomenico Tiepolo.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 338, repro., as A Young Lady in Domino and Tricorne.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1979: 1:440-441; 2:pl. 319, 319A, as A Young Lady in Domino and Tricorne, by Domenico Tiepolo.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 389, repro., as A Young Lady in Domino and Tricorne.

1989

  • Pignatti, Terisio. Venezia. Mille anni d'arte. Venice, 1989: 309.

1992

  • Barcham, William. Tiepolo. New York, 1992: 118, no. 37, color repro.

1993

  • Gemin, Massimo, and Filippo Pedrocco. Giambattista Tiepolo. Venice, 1993: 190, color repro., 479, no. 505, repro.

1996

  • De Grazia, Diane, and Eric Garberson, with Edgar Peters Bowron, Peter M. Lukehart, and Mitchell Merling. Italian Paintings of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1996: 289-293, color repro. 291.

2012

  • Percival, Melissa. Fragonard and the Fantasy Figure: Painting the Imagination. Burlington, Vt., 2012: 66.

Wikidata ID

Q20178129

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