Collection: Gaspar van Wittel

Gaspar van Wittel (1653-1736), known in Italy as Vanvitelli, arrived in Rome from Holland in his early twenties and became one of the fathers of the veduta, the painting that shows a city as it really is. He painted Rome, Venice, Naples, Florence and the northern lakes with the precision of a man who had started out drawing the course of the Tiber for an engineer; his son Luigi, born in Naples, was the architect of the Royal Palace of Caserta.

In this collection you will find the View of Piazza del Popolo and the Colosseum in Rome, the Tiber Island, the waterfall at Tivoli, the Borromean Islands, the Riviera di Chiaia in Naples and the Church of the Salute in Venice, printed on handmade Amalfi paper.

After him the veduta was carried forward by Giovanni Paolo Pannini in Rome and Canaletto in Venice.