Time Unveiling Truth

One of a series of 108 drawings by Giambattista Tiepolo from an album bearing the title, "TIEPOLO DESSINS ORIGINAUX", inscribed by Edward Cheney, "E.C. Venice 1852 May 31 / bought from the Conte Corniani Algarotti".
This sheet is probably a preparatory study for the painting now in the Museo Civico in Vicenza, which was first recorded in Palazzo Cordellina in Vicenza, although that palace was built after Giambattista's death and cannot have been the original location for the canvas. Scholars have thus traditionally associated the painting with Tiepolo's work of 1743-44 in the Cordellina villa at Montecchio Maggiore, but Lionello Puppi (1968) noted that the work was too large for the rooms of the villa and suggested that it may have been for the Venetian residence of Carlo Cordellina in Campo San Maurizio; Menegozzo (1990) echoed that thought, further arguing that the canvas was likely a few years later than the work at the villa. The style of the drawing, with its rougher finish and its quicker, less precise application of wash, represents Tiepolo's drawing study beginning specifically around 1745. This is consistent with Menegozzo's dating of the painting and thus strengthens the hypothesis that the Vicenza painting was executed several years later than Tiepolo's work at the villa in Montecchio Maggiore.