The Game of Bowls
1797–1804
- Medium
- pen and brown ink and brush and brown wash, over traces of black chalk; framing lines in brown ink over graphite on antique laid paper
- Dimensions
- 35.5 × 47.3 cm
- Status
- In Museum Collection
- Collect24 Art ID
- C24-190694
Here, Punchinello characters sporting their signature conical hats and hooked-nosed masks compete against a group of men in a lively game of bocce,an Italian bowling game. While their exaggerated movements infuse the drawing with a sense of whimsy, the massive prison fortress behind them suggests surveillance and control. Although not overtly political, this detail may allude to Venice’s fall to the French in 1797, which led to a ban on the commedia dell’arte, Italy’s popular theater tradition with its mocking Punchinellos.
Provenance
Wade Fund, 1937.571
Registry history
- 1797–1804 — Recorded in the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art — drawings
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