Three river gods

In autumn 1541, Vasari travelled to Venice at the invitation of the poet Pietro Aretino (1492–1556). While there, he received a commission to decorate a grand hall in the Palazzo Gonella with an extensive, though temporary, series of images for the occasion of a festive performance of Aretino’s comedy La Talenta during the Carnival festivities.
This modello was created for one of four paintings executed in a chiaroscuro technique, which were displayed on the side wall. It bears personifications of rivers to be found in Venetian territory: the Livenza, the Timavo, and the Tagliamento. The complex arrangement of the river gods, one behind the other, gives the image an extreme spatial depth. The carefully constructed sheet conveys a painterly expression of the artist’s concept. The drawing was presumably intended either as a design for presentation to the patron or to serve the orientation of the painters' assistants.