VIENNA.- An important, previously unknown work, The Karlskirche Vienna, by the great view painter Bernardo Bellotto is to be offered for sale at Dorotheum on 21 October 2026.
Bernardo Bellotto painted the famous topographical views of Vienna that shape our image of the city as it was at the height of Habsburg power. An important, newly discovered view of the Karlskirche, Vienna painted by the celebrated vedutist will be offered in Dorotheum’s Old Masters auction on 21 October 2026.
The imposing Karlskirche, built to mark the end of the last great scourge of the plague, was designed by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach and completed in 1739. It is thought this view of the church was painted during, or shortly after, Bellotto’s stay in Vienna between 1759 and 1761. The work has recently been confirmed as a fully autograph work by Bernardo Bellotto, who was the nephew and pupil of the celebrated Venetian view painter, Canaletto. This newly discovered painting is the prototype for other versions of the same subject, some of which are attributed to Bellotto’s son and assistant, Lorenzo.
Bellotto was commissioned to produce a series of city panoramas of Vienna, including the celebrated View of Vienna from the Belvedere now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, which present the imperial city as a centre of political, cultural and scientific influence. Bellotto’s precisely composed paintings, such as the present work, are characterised by carefully chosen viewpoints, a perfect observation of buildings set within a living urban landscape, and all lit by a sophisticated interplay of light and shade.
This view of the Karlskirche is an important addition to Bernardo Bellotto’s oeuvre and is a significant visual record of mid-eighteenth century Vienna (estimate €400,000 - 600,000).
Other significant works offered in the 21 October auction include another important new discovery: a Head Study on paper by Pietro di Cristoforo Vannucci, called il Perugino, which directly relates to his altarpiece of the Piet in the Uffizi, Florence (€200,000 - 300,000).
A further recently discovered work for sale in the auction at Dorotheum is a refined painting by the celebrated Venetian artist Paolo Veronese, Madonna and Child in an Architectural Niche from a private collection (€100,000 - 150,000). Also included in the sale is an important work by Luca Giordano, Massacre of the Innocents, which was part of the monographic exhibition held in Naples, Vienna and Los Angeles in 2001 (€400,000 - 600,000) . Another work of note is a Nativity by Guido Reni which was once in the collection of the celebrated British portraitist Sir Joshua Reynolds (€200,000 - 300.000).
Flemish art is represented, among other works, by a Portrait of a child by Frans Pourbus and a landscape entitled Flight into Egypt by Herri met de Bles (€200,000 - 250,000; €40,000 - 60,000).
Other notable works include a Still Life by the Spanish painter Juan van der Hamen y Len, as well as The Agony in the Garden by the Nuremberg artist Hans von Kulmbach (€100,000 - 150,000; €30,000 - 40,000).
