Walking Male figure seen from below c. 1740 - 1750

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo made this drawing of a Walking Male Figure, likely in Venice, sometime in the mid-18th century. It's rendered in pen and wash, a technique favored for its speed and expressiveness. Tiepolo was a master of the grand manner, producing frescoes and paintings for the Venetian elite. But drawings like this offer us a glimpse into the artist's process. Note the low vantage point. Is Tiepolo commenting on social hierarchy? Is he looking up, perhaps satirizing those in power? Or is this study for a larger, more complex composition in which the figure would be physically above other figures? To understand Tiepolo fully, we might turn to period writings about Venetian society, archival records of his commissions, and other drawings that reveal the artist's evolving ideas. The meaning of a work is not fixed, but rather emerges from a rich web of social and institutional relations.