Landscape with Tower and Two Ruined Pillars, from Vedute

Museum record 159752: Landscape with Tower and Two Ruined Pillars, from Vedute by Canaletto. A verified entry point for discovery.

What to notice

For Landscape with Tower and Two Ruined Pillars, from Vedute (record 159752), start with modern, expressive, atmospheric. Compare the focal subject, edge treatment, and atmosphere before moving on.

Discover

Curiously, Canaletto never printed either of these energetic capriccio landscapes (depictions of fantastic architecture or ruins) individually. Instead, they exist only as a pair on a single sheet (for the left half, see 1922.1381.13). While both images include fictional antiquarian architectural elements, it is not known why the artist combined them. Perhaps it was their mirrored compositions: when placed side by side, both images slope inward toward a church that straddles the margin between the plates…