Giuseppe Velasco painted the scene of the Discovery of the Treasure of William II, a painting full of characters dated between 1797 and 1798. There is still a sketch of the work in the Pinacoteca Zelantea in Acireale and a 19th-century copy by Giuseppe Vaccaro in the Museo Civico in Caltagirone. The work features numerous figures, all focused on recovering the treasure that the Virgin promised William in a dream. The purely historical narrative is concise and dynamic, thanks to the inclusion of numerous secondary figures and horses. Each character is represented in movement while the scene, on several levels and composed on several diagonals, is unified by the use of warm, bright colours.
