Cole & Son | Procuratie e Scimmie

Procuratie e Scimmie is the companion piece in Fornasetti's Venetian trio, and the name says plainly what it adds. Monkeys perch on the pillars and lean from the arches of the Procuratie in St Mark's Square, occupying an architecture that was never built with them in mind and is drawn as though nothing were amiss. The trio was drawn for Cole & Son from the Fornasetti archive.

The joke depends entirely on the seriousness of the drawing. The facades are rendered in intaglio line, engraved and exact, with the depth of the arcade built from hatching rather than tone; the animals are drawn in the same hand and at the same weight, so they belong to the building rather than sitting on it. Offered in a single monochrome colourway, the design has nothing to hide behind.

The 101.8 cm repeat carries a full storey of arcading, and on a 0.69 m roll with a straight match the horizontals run true across the joins, which matters more here than in most papers: a misaligned cornice line would be visible immediately. It coordinates directly with Procuratie, so the two can be used in adjoining rooms. A hall, a stair, a cloakroom or a dining room will hold it.