Catalogue Entry
This drawing on Venetian ledger paper, and rendered in medium-soft graphite, depicts a view eastward from the Campo di San Barnaba, a square in Dorsoduro, the sestiere of Venice where Twachtman resided in 1878 (figs. 1–2). The arched bridge in the middleground is the Ponte dei Pugni. At the right is the neoclassical Church of San Barnaba (constructed 1776), built with large ionic capitals on wide columns. At the center of the arrangement is the church’s detached bell tower, with its eleventh-century pine-shaped spire.
Choosing a vertical format, Twachtman emphasized the solitary presence of the tower, contrasting it with the interlocked shapes below it. In the foreground, steps lead down to the Rio di San Barnaba, where a gondola awaits passengers. The drawing demonstrates Twachtman's precision in architectural rendering and his observant eye for the scene's details.
He featured this site again in The Campanile, Late Afternoon (OP.651), a painting he probably created in 1881, in which he was less descriptive, establishing a tonal composition that evokes Whistler's aestheticism.
The drawing has a Milch inventory number in pencil on the verso (P1090-C, p.29), indicating that it was probably once in the artist's estate.