Fountain of Trevi, Rome

For 30 years, from 1732, the Trevi Fountain was a building site. Pope Clement XII had given the job to the Roman architect Nicola Salvi, who set the fountain against the back of the Palazzo Poli and turned the whole palace front into its stage. Salvi died in 1751 with the work half done. The architect hired to finish it was Giuseppe Pannini, the son of the painter of this view. Giovanni Paolo Panini had been painting the sights of Rome for decades, and here one of them was partly a family affair. The museum gives the picture no date. It shows the fountain in its full design, with the sea god Oceanus, carved by Pietro Bracci, standing in the central arch above the rocks and the wide basin. The fountain was finally opened on 22 May 1762 by Pope Clement XIII, the third pope to see the works through.