Curatorial Narrative Felice Auguste Cipriani’s rendition of Venice, a View of Santa Maria della Salute (1878) embodies the sumptuous aesthetic of late Baroque Italy. The artist’s masterful brushwork imbues the painting with an unassuming yet assured quality, as if the visual plane itself had been coaxed into existence through subtle manipulations of chiaroscuro and sfumato. Within this finely calibrated spatial rhythm, the Santa Maria della Salute rises majestically towards a sky dominated by a deep azure, its terracotta hues softened by the atmospheric weight of a Venetian morning.As one considers the painting at an enlarged scale say, 44×52 inches the chromatic structure begins to exert a profound influence on the surrounding environment. The blues and greens, initially seen as a harmonious backdrop for the church’s architectural majesty, now dominate the visual field with their deep, almost melancholic undertones. In a luxury i