Christus heilt den Gichtbrüchigen

Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini was a Venetian painter who spread the Venetian decorative tradition across northern Europe — he worked in England, Germany, the Netherlands, France, and elsewhere — in the early eighteenth century, preparing the way for Tiepolo's later international career. His Christ Healing the Paralytic, painted around 1730, demonstrates his mature Venetian Rococo style: light, airy, warmly coloured. Pellegrini's work influenced the development of Rococo decoration in every country where he worked.

Christ's healing gesture is the compositional focus, with the gathered witnesses responding with varied expressions of astonishment and devotion. Pellegrini's warm, sketchy brushwork and his light, airy palette give the composition its characteristic lightness. The figures are modelled with his rapid, confident touch — more loosely finished than Tiepolo but equally luminous in effect.