View of Pirna from Posta

Bellotto created a series of views of Dresden and Pirna for Count Heinrich von Bruhl, minister to the court of the Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, Augustus III. Consisting of 15 paintings altogether, the whole series was acquired in 1768, with the rest of Bruhl's collection, by the Russian Empress Catherine II. Ten canvases are still to be found in the Hermitage. Bellotto's style is precise and somewhat dry, but the water and the buildings reflected in it, the softly melting background and the briefly sketched figures reveal the best qualities of his Venetian painterly style.