Greenwich Hospital from the North Bank of the Thames, by Canaletto.

Repro ID: BHC1827

Description: This painting shows the Queen's House in the centre of the picture, with the Royal Observatory on the hill in Greenwich Park above it. Rysbrack's statue of George II (1735) is visible in the centre of the Grand Square of the Hospital , behind the water-stairs where figures parade along the Five-Foot Walk along the river-front, granted for public use by the Hospital in 1731. Canaletto has suppressed the upper level of the Grand Square, between the domed Queen Mary Court, 1735-51, holding the Chapel, and on the right, the King William Court, 1698-1712, holding the Painted Hall. The step arrangements up to the dome vestibules are as taken from earlier prints, not as built; the stone supporting drums below both domes themselves, bearing the clock over the chapel and the wind-dial over the Painted Hall, are also omitted. On the river-front the Queen Anne Court stands on the left and the King Charles Court on the right. To the extreme right and left stand the two white river-front pavilions of the Hospital, now gone, facing west and east. Near the east one, left, the crane and stone wharf used in unloading building materials for the Hospital are details which suggest Canaletto partly drew on personal observation for the painting. The river is busy, with some fanciful and formulaic Italianate details that relate to his Venetian Grand Canal paintings, such as oars, poles and sticks, and the ship on the right.

Creator: Antonio Canal (Canaletto)

Date: c. 1752

Credit line: National Maritime Museum, London