RICCI, Marco (1676--1729)
Viro clarissimo Josepho Smith litterarum, bonarumque artium amantissmo. primas has decem et octo tabulas, Marci Riccii Bellunensis celeberrimi opera ac studio olim inventas, et lineis partim, partim pictura efformatas, a Juliano vero Giampiccolo, sororis filio, adnitente Joanne Bapta Theupolo, recens excusas, Bartholomæus Zucconius collector in sui obsequii monumentum. ...
[Venice,, c. 1755?].
Engr. dedic. t.-pl., 18 pl. ; 35.5 x 50.3 cm. (obl. 2°)

Imaginary landscape and genre studies (including one architectural capriccio) etched by Giampiccoli after Ricci sometime between 1753 and 1762. For a resumé of the various arguments for and against the claim (first made by Teodoro Viero in his reissue of the work in 1775) that the figures in both the present series and its companion dedicated to Zanetti (q.v.) were etched by G.B. Tiepolo, see Aldo Rizzi, L'opera grafica dei Tiepolo: le acqueforti (Milan 1972), no. 232--3, who accepts as secure only the signed bas-reliefs decorating the title-plates to the two series. Joseph Smith, British consul to Venice, book collector and patron of the arts, was for seventy years until his death in 1770 a major figure of the British community in the city.

Copy Notes Imperfect; wanting pl. 16. Bound (and probably issued) with a copy of the second series dedicated to Antonio Maria Zanetti (q.v.). The two series bound second and third with a copy of the suite of Ricci's own etchings published by Orsolini in 1730 (q.v.) and another suite of etchings after Ricci published in 1743 by Davide Antonio Fossati (q.v.). The volume was bought from the Adam Sale, 21 May 1818, lot 92 for £2. (A.T. Bolton, Adam (1922), appendix C, p. 331).

Binding Contemporary C18th half vellum, red morocco spine-label lettered 'Ricci'.

Reference Number 3156

Additional Names Adam, Robert (1728--1792) - Collections; Giampiccoli, Giuliano (1699--1762); Tiepolo, Giovanni Battista (1696--1770); Zucconi, Bartolommeo