Paolo Veronese: A Master and His Workshop in Renaissance Venice

Paolo Veronese
Portrait of a Man, 1576–78
Oil on canvas
192.1 × 134 cm (75 5/8 × 52 3/4 in)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of J. Paul Getty, 71.PA.17

A man dressed soberly but resplendently in black leans confidently against an elaborate pedestal beneath paired columns flanking an only partially visible statue. His identity is a mystery. In the background at the lower left is the Basilica of San Marco in Venice, placed in an imaginary rural setting. While this detail may simply denote that the subject’s name was Marco, it could just as easily indicate that he held a political position associated with the Basilica or the Venetian state, or that he simply lived in Venice.
Paolo Veronese
Agostino Barbarigo, 1571–72
Oil on canvas
102.2 × 104.2 cm (40 3/16 × 41 in)
The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. L. E. Holden,
Mr. and Mrs. Guerdon S. Holden, and the L. E. Holden Fund, 1928.16

When Venice waged a naval campaign against the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, Agostino Barbarigo was second in command. His forces bore the brunt of the attack, and he took an arrow in the eye, dying from the wound two days later. Veronese’s posthumous portrait shows Barbarigo holding the arrow of his civic martyrdom. His martial pose complements the polished steel of his armor, an effect created with thick impastos (paint applied in heavy strokes creating a textured surface).
Paolo Veronese
Portrait of a Woman as Saint Agnes, ca. 1575–80
Oil on canvas
84 × 72.5 cm (33 × 28 1/2 in)
Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation, Houston

This painting might blend portraiture with the depiction of a saint. The open prayer book and lamb might be attributes of Saint Agnes, so perhaps the sitter was a devout woman named Agnes. However, her book is open to a passage in the Bible in which the Virgin Mary presented Christ to the devout Jew Simeon, who declared that he could die in peace having seen the infant. Thus the sitter may be reflecting on how the Virgin offered Christ, the “lamb of God” in her lap, to Simeon as proof of the world’s salvation.
Paolo Veronese
Allegory of Painting, 1560s
Oil on canvas
27.9 × 18.4 cm (11 × 7 1/4 in)
The Detroit Institute of Arts, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Edgar B. Whitcomb, 1936, 36.30

Holding a palette and brushes and propping a canvas up on her hip, the lovely blonde personification of the art of painting peers inquisitively out of her niche. Her fanciful costume alludes to the concerns of Renaissance painters. Her dress is loosely antique in style, featuring an imitation ancient Roman cuirass (armored breastplate) made of cloth; classical antiquity is championed as the ideal model for Renaissance art. The garments seem to be made of light silk; such fine, costly fabrics signify the nobility of painting. Abundant colors celebrate the arrangement of colors as an important element of the painter’s art.
Paolo Veronese
Atalanta and Meleager; Actaeon and Diana
with Nymphs; Jupiter and a Nude, 1560s
Oil on canvas
25.7 × 101 cm (10 1/8 × 39 3/4 in); 26 × 101 cm (10 1/4 × 39 3/4 in); 27 × 101 cm (10 5/8 × 39 3/4 in)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Bequest of Mrs. Edward Jackson Holmes, 64.2079; 59.260; 60.125

Together with the Allegory of Painting (see previous page) and other canvases, these paintings were originally part of a single decorative ensemble. They were probably installed as a frieze in a palace or country villa, either high up near the ceiling or at shoulder height. Set in a verdant landscape, Atalanta and Meleager and Diana and Actaeon show hunting scenes from ancient literature and mythology, while in Jupiter and a Nude, the king of the gods (identified by his attribute, the eagle, on the fountain at left) embraces a beautiful nude woman in an elegant classical architectural setting.
Paolo Veronese
Venus with a Mirror (Venus at Her Toilette), mid-1580s
Oil on canvas
165.1 × 124.46 cm (65 × 49 in)
Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Neb., Museum purchase, Joslyn Endowment Fund, 1942, 1942.4

The goddess of love twists around to adjust her hair and admire herself in a mirror held by the tiny god of love, Cupid. A crimson curtain offers a backdrop, complementing the fur-trimmed, green silk wrap that has fallen from Venus’s shoulders. These opulent jewel-toned silks contrast with her creamy flesh and white bed linens. The apparent modesty and mystery of the rear view is compromised by Venus’s flirtatious glance in the mirror – what is withheld from sight by the painting is offered, at least potentially, by the mirror.
Paolo Veronese and Workshop
Allegory of Venice Adoring the Virgin and Child, late 1570s
Oil on canvas
103.1 × 138.9 cm (40 1/2 × 50 3/4 in)
Private Collection

This work was installed above a door in the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi, a building housing Venetian government offices. The Virgin presents the Christ Child to a kneeling personification of Venice accompanied by the lion of Saint Mark, the city’s patron saint. The canvas initially included portraits of government officials that were painted over with the personification of Venice. Thus, divine grace and protection are bestowed upon the Republic of Venice and not on any particular person or group. The Venetian state embraced ideals of consensus and collective identity, so perhaps the figures were removed to curb an excess of self-celebration.
Paolo Veronese
Rest on the Flight into Egypt, ca. 1572
Oil on canvas
236.2 × 161.3 cm (93 × 63 1/2 in)
The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Fla., Bequest of John Ringling, 1936, SN82

According to the New Testament, after being warned of a massacre of newborn children, Joseph fled with the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child to nearby Egypt. During their journey, the Holy Family sheltered beneath a date palm. In Veronese’s depiction of the event here, the mood is light and festive. The angels are a coterie of bustling domestic servants, gathering and preparing food, tending to the laundry, and grooming the donkey. The angelic liveliness is matched by exuberant color – brilliantly blended and lusciously layered, every surface glows rich with bright light.
Paolo Veronese
Baptism of Christ, late 1550s
Oil on canvas
85.7 × 116.8 cm (33 3/4 × 46 in)
North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, Gift of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, GL.60.17.47

The Baptism is the first recorded incident of Christ’s adult life. In this early work by Veronese, Christ immerses his foot in the River Jordan as his cousin John pours a thin stream of water from a bowl onto his head. Veronese emphasized Christ’s humility through his compact, reverent pose. The two figures do not make eye contact with the viewer; they are engaged in a private ritual. The quiet, lonely landscape setting likewise contrasts this personal act with Christ’s future public preaching. Its small scale and intimate mood suggest that this painting was made for private contemplation and devotion.
Paolo Veronese and Workshop
Christ and the Centurion, ca. 1575
Oil on canvas
142.3 × 208.3 cm (56 × 82 in)
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Mo., William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 31–73

In the New Testament, a Roman centurion begged Christ to heal his servant, stating; “only say the word, and my servant shall be healed.” Christ healed the servant and praised the centurion’s faith. It has been suggested that this painting was made for a church. But with its grand architecture, lavish and exotic costumes, theatrical gestures and poses, and emphasis on surface and textures, the luxurious painting could have been equally at home in a palace.
Paolo Veronese
Dead Christ with Angels, ca. 1563–65
Fragment of the Petrobelli altarpiece
Oil on canvas
222.3 × 251 cm (87 1/2 × 98 13/16 in)
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa,
Purchased 1925, 3336

Around 1563, the cousins Girolamo and Antonio Petrobelli commissioned an altarpiece from Veronese for their burial chapel in the church of San Francesco in Lendinara, near Venice. In the eighteenth century, the altarpiece was cut into pieces. This fragment was the altarpiece’s uppermost part. Angels support the dead Christ, draw attention to his wounds, and present him for contemplation. Smaller angels carry a flail (whip), the Crown of Thorns, and nails – the so-called Instruments of the Passion used to torture Christ, whose body bears their marks. Their presence encouraged viewers to meditate on and visualize Christ’s suffering, blow by blow.
Paolo Veronese
Head of Saint Michael, ca. 1563–65
Fragment of the Petrobelli altarpiece
Oil on canvas
41 × 32.1 cm (16 1/8 × 12 5/8 in)
Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Tex., 587.1999

Along with the Dead Christ with Angels (see previous page), Head of Saint Michael comes from the Petrobelli altarpiece. When the altarpiece was cut into pieces in the eighteenth century, Saint Michael’s body was discarded. Originally, Michael – angel, warrior and judge – was shown in triumph over the devil while weighing a soul. As Michael weighs the souls of the dead at the Last Judgment, it was appropriate to include him in the altarpiece of a burial chapel. Veronese’s brush can be seen in the skillful highlights on Michael’s hair, face, and costume.
Paolo Veronese
Virgin and Child with Angels Appearing to Saint
Anthony Abbot and Saint Paul the Hermit, 1562
Oil on canvas
284.5 × 168.9 cm (112 × 66 1/2 in)
The Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va., Gift of Walter P. Chrysler Jr. in memory of Della Viola Forker Chrysler, 71.527

This painting was commissioned in 1561 for the monastery church of San Benedetto Po, near Mantua. The early Christian hermit Saint Anthony Abbot and a companion are honored with a miraculous vision of the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child. Anthony wears a coarse brown robe and can be identified by two attributes, the crutch necessary at his advanced age and the bell he used to ward off evil spirits. He also holds a rosary. Perhaps the Virgin has appeared in answer to Anthony’s prayers using his rosary, which begin with the words “Hail Mary.”
Paolo Veronese
Martyrdom and Last Communion of
Saint Lucy, ca. 1585
Oil on canvas
139.7 × 173.4 cm (55 × 68 1/4 in)
National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation and Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1984.28.1

With calm acceptance, the early Christian martyr Saint Lucy turns towards the Host (consecrated wafer) as her executioner plunges a dagger into her chest. The flames behind her refer to an earlier attempt to kill her by burning. The oxen in the background are the team that failed to drag the chaste Lucy to the brothel she was condemned to for her Christian faith. This work was painted for the church of Santa Croce in Belluno where it probably hung on the side wall of a chapel dedicated to Saint Lucy.
Paolo Veronese
Finding of Moses, ca. 1580
Oil on canvas
58 × 44.5 cm (22 13/16 × 17 1/2 in)
National Gallery of Art, Washington, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937, 1937.1.38

According to the Old Testament, Pharaoh’s daughter and her ladies removed from the River Nile the basket in which the infant Moses was placed by his Hebrew mother to save him from the slaughter of male children ordered by Pharaoh. Veronese painted this subject many times. Despite the religious subject, these paintings were created for private collectors. Veronese treated the theme with a festive and decidedly secular flair: the princess wears a gorgeous silk gown and great jewels, her bustling entourage includes the exotic figures of an African servant and a dwarf, and the scene takes place in a charmingly fanciful countryside setting.
Paolo Veronese
Studies for Paradise, ca. 1582
Pen and brown ink and wash on paper
30.1 × 21.1 cm (11 7/8 × 8 1/4 in)
Private Collection

Intertwined groupings of muscular, twisting figures inhabit this busy sheet of studies, in which Veronese explored ideas for a painting of Paradise in the Doge’s Palace in Venice, ultimately never executed. Toward the lower edge, Veronese drew the Evangelists (authors of the four books of the Bible on Christ’s life) with their attributes and identified three with inscriptions: Marco (Mark) with a lion, Zuane (John) with an eagle, and Mato (Matthew) with an angel. Luke has no inscription, but because he is accompanied by an ox, his identity is clear. A figure with radiant lines around his head is Christ.
Paolo Veronese
Costume Studies for Sophocles’s Oedipus Tyrannus, ca.1584–85
Pen and brown ink and wash on paper
21.3 × 30.3 cm (8 3/8 × 11 15/16 in)
The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 91.GG.3

Theater fascinated Veronese throughout his life, and many of his patrons and friends promoted the performance of ancient Greek and Roman plays. The sheet contains sketches of costumes for the inaugural production of Sophocles’s Oedipus Tyrannus staged to mark the opening of the Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza in 1585. Contemporary accounts of the lavish production and huge cast suggest that further studies of costumes must have been made by Veronese and the official designer, Giovanni Battista Maganza. Each rapid sketch here is labeled by Veronese or Maganza with the name of the character for whom the costume was intended.
Paolo Veronese
Rest on the Flight into Egypt, ca. 1570
Black chalk, pen and brown ink and wash, with white heightening, on paper
24.9 × 19.8 cm (9 13/16 × 7 13/16 in)
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Cambridge, Mass., Bequest of Meta and Paul J. Sachs, 1965, 1965.430

The Holy Family rests on their flight from Bethlehem to Egypt. The figures are defined by the vivid white heightening, especially on the central and most important figures of the Virgin and Child. Veronese used the white in a “painterly” fashion, brushing it on with a breadth and depth that make the composition seem closer to a painting than a drawing. This beautiful drawing was not preparatory to any known painting. Veronese excelled at creating balanced compositions in chiaroscuro (light and shade), and this one may have been considered a fully finished work of art in and of itself.
Paolo Veronese
Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine, ca. 1575
Pen and brown ink and wash, with white heightening, on prepared gray-green paper
45.5 × 30.2 cm (17 7/8 × 11 7/8 in)
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, P25W39

Veronese created this detailed drawing in preparation for an altarpiece for the church of Santa Caterina dei Sacchi, a Venetian convent. He probably presented the drawing to the nuns for their approval of the design. Saint Catherine was an early Christian convert of noble birth who had a vision that the Christ Child placed a ring on her finger in a “mystic marriage.” The choice of subject was highly appropriate for the nuns, who were considered to be brides of Christ.
Agostino Carracci (Bologna 1557–1602 Parma)
Pietà with an Angel, 1582
After the painting in the Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
Engraving, first state of three
40.7 × 28.6 cm (16 × 11 1/4 in)
Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Tex., The Leo Steinberg Collection, 2002.1700

Around 1580–82, Veronese made a small altarpiece for a chapel in the church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice. The composition’s fame was spread soon after its creation by Agostino Carracci’s engraving. The angel intertwines the fingers of his right hand with those of Christ’s left. He thus displays Christ’s wound to the viewer and perhaps also implores Christ to stand, implying his imminent resurrection. Though Veronese’s painting set the scene in a tomb, Carracci’s print places it outdoors. Prints like this one could have been used in private prayer by individuals who could not afford a painting.
Valentin Lefèvre (Brussels 1637–1677 England)
Feast in the House of Simon, plate 25 from the Opera selectiora quae Titianus Vecellius Cadubriensis et Paulus Calliari Veronensis inventarunt, ac pinxerunt (Venice: Jacobus van Campen, 1682)
After the painting at Versailles
Etching, only state
42.4 × 79.2 cm (16 5/8 × 31 1/8 in)
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Bequest of William Perkins Babcock, B2172.1–2

Valentin Lefèvre was a skilled printmaker who revered Veronese. His Opera selectiora, published in Venice in 1682, presented fifty-three plates, thirty after Titian’s major public works and the rest after those of Veronese. These plates did more than any other prints to define a core group of Veronese’s paintings. Remarkable is Lefèvre’s use of the white of the paper itself to create a focal element enhancing the visual continuity of the composition, as in the architectural features in this print.



Paolo Veronese Portrait of a Man, 1576–78 Oil on canvas 192.1 × 134 cm (75 5/8 × 52 3/4 in) The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, Gift of J. Paul Getty, 71.PA.17 A man dressed soberly but resplendently in black leans confidently against an elaborate pedestal beneath paired columns flanking an only partially visible statue. His identity is a mystery. In the background at the lower left is the Basilica of San Marco in Venice, placed in an imaginary rural setting. While this detail may simply denote that the subject’s name was Marco, it could just as easily indicate that he held a political position associated with the Basilica or the Venetian state, or that he simply lived in Venice. Paolo Veronese Agostino Barbarigo, 1571–72 Oil on canvas 102.2 × 104.2 cm (40 3/16 × 41 in) The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. L. E. Holden, Mr. and Mrs. Guerdon S. Holden, and the L. E. Holden Fund, 1928.16 When Venice waged a naval campaign against the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, Agostino Barbarigo was second in command. His forces bore the brunt of the attack, and he took an arrow in the eye, dying from the wound two days later. Veronese’s posthumous portrait shows Barbarigo holding the arrow of his civic martyrdom. His martial pose complements the polished steel of his armor, an effect created with thick impastos (paint applied in heavy strokes creating a textured surface). Paolo Veronese Portrait of a Woman as Saint Agnes, ca. 1575–80 Oil on canvas 84 × 72.5 cm (33 × 28 1/2 in) Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation, Houston This painting might blend portraiture with the depiction of a saint. The open prayer book and lamb might be attributes of Saint Agnes, so perhaps the sitter was a devout woman named Agnes. However, her book is open to a passage in the Bible in which the Virgin Mary presented Christ to the devout Jew Simeon, who declared that he could die in peace having seen the infant. Thus the sitter may be reflecting on how the Virgin offered Christ, the “lamb of God” in her lap, to Simeon as proof of the world’s salvation. Paolo Veronese Allegory of Painting, 1560s Oil on canvas 27.9 × 18.4 cm (11 × 7 1/4 in) The Detroit Institute of Arts, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Edgar B. Whitcomb, 1936, 36.30 Holding a palette and brushes and propping a canvas up on her hip, the lovely blonde personification of the art of painting peers inquisitively out of her niche. Her fanciful costume alludes to the concerns of Renaissance painters. Her dress is loosely antique in style, featuring an imitation ancient Roman cuirass (armored breastplate) made of cloth; classical antiquity is championed as the ideal model for Renaissance art. The garments seem to be made of light silk; such fine, costly fabrics signify the nobility of painting. Abundant colors celebrate the arrangement of colors as an important element of the painter’s art. Paolo Veronese Atalanta and Meleager; Actaeon and Diana with Nymphs; Jupiter and a Nude, 1560s Oil on canvas 25.7 × 101 cm (10 1/8 × 39 3/4 in); 26 × 101 cm (10 1/4 × 39 3/4 in); 27 × 101 cm (10 5/8 × 39 3/4 in) Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Bequest of Mrs. Edward Jackson Holmes, 64.2079; 59.260; 60.125 Together with the Allegory of Painting (see previous page) and other canvases, these paintings were originally part of a single decorative ensemble. They were probably installed as a frieze in a palace or country villa, either high up near the ceiling or at shoulder height. Set in a verdant landscape, Atalanta and Meleager and Diana and Actaeon show hunting scenes from ancient literature and mythology, while in Jupiter and a Nude, the king of the gods (identified by his attribute, the eagle, on the fountain at left) embraces a beautiful nude woman in an elegant classical architectural setting. Paolo Veronese Venus with a Mirror (Venus at Her Toilette), mid-1580s Oil on canvas 165.1 × 124.46 cm (65 × 49 in) Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Neb., Museum purchase, Joslyn Endowment Fund, 1942, 1942.4 The goddess of love twists around to adjust her hair and admire herself in a mirror held by the tiny god of love, Cupid. A crimson curtain offers a backdrop, complementing the fur-trimmed, green silk wrap that has fallen from Venus’s shoulders. These opulent jewel-toned silks contrast with her creamy flesh and white bed linens. The apparent modesty and mystery of the rear view is compromised by Venus’s flirtatious glance in the mirror – what is withheld from sight by the painting is offered, at least potentially, by the mirror. Paolo Veronese and Workshop Allegory of Venice Adoring the Virgin and Child, late 1570s Oil on canvas 103.1 × 138.9 cm (40 1/2 × 50 3/4 in) Private Collection This work was installed above a door in the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi, a building housing Venetian government offices. The Virgin presents the Christ Child to a kneeling personification of Venice accompanied by the lion of Saint Mark, the city’s patron saint. The canvas initially included portraits of government officials that were painted over with the personification of Venice. Thus, divine grace and protection are bestowed upon the Republic of Venice and not on any particular person or group. The Venetian state embraced ideals of consensus and collective identity, so perhaps the figures were removed to curb an excess of self-celebration. Paolo Veronese Rest on the Flight into Egypt, ca. 1572 Oil on canvas 236.2 × 161.3 cm (93 × 63 1/2 in) The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Fla., Bequest of John Ringling, 1936, SN82 According to the New Testament, after being warned of a massacre of newborn children, Joseph fled with the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child to nearby Egypt. During their journey, the Holy Family sheltered beneath a date palm. In Veronese’s depiction of the event here, the mood is light and festive. The angels are a coterie of bustling domestic servants, gathering and preparing food, tending to the laundry, and grooming the donkey. The angelic liveliness is matched by exuberant color – brilliantly blended and lusciously layered, every surface glows rich with bright light. Paolo Veronese Baptism of Christ, late 1550s Oil on canvas 85.7 × 116.8 cm (33 3/4 × 46 in) North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, Gift of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, GL.60.17.47 The Baptism is the first recorded incident of Christ’s adult life. In this early work by Veronese, Christ immerses his foot in the River Jordan as his cousin John pours a thin stream of water from a bowl onto his head. Veronese emphasized Christ’s humility through his compact, reverent pose. The two figures do not make eye contact with the viewer; they are engaged in a private ritual. The quiet, lonely landscape setting likewise contrasts this personal act with Christ’s future public preaching. Its small scale and intimate mood suggest that this painting was made for private contemplation and devotion. Paolo Veronese and Workshop Christ and the Centurion, ca. 1575 Oil on canvas 142.3 × 208.3 cm (56 × 82 in) The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Mo., William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 31–73 In the New Testament, a Roman centurion begged Christ to heal his servant, stating; “only say the word, and my servant shall be healed.” Christ healed the servant and praised the centurion’s faith. It has been suggested that this painting was made for a church. But with its grand architecture, lavish and exotic costumes, theatrical gestures and poses, and emphasis on surface and textures, the luxurious painting could have been equally at home in a palace. Paolo Veronese Dead Christ with Angels, ca. 1563–65 Fragment of the Petrobelli altarpiece Oil on canvas 222.3 × 251 cm (87 1/2 × 98 13/16 in) National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Purchased 1925, 3336 Around 1563, the cousins Girolamo and Antonio Petrobelli commissioned an altarpiece from Veronese for their burial chapel in the church of San Francesco in Lendinara, near Venice. In the eighteenth century, the altarpiece was cut into pieces. This fragment was the altarpiece’s uppermost part. Angels support the dead Christ, draw attention to his wounds, and present him for contemplation. Smaller angels carry a flail (whip), the Crown of Thorns, and nails – the so-called Instruments of the Passion used to torture Christ, whose body bears their marks. Their presence encouraged viewers to meditate on and visualize Christ’s suffering, blow by blow. Paolo Veronese Head of Saint Michael, ca. 1563–65 Fragment of the Petrobelli altarpiece Oil on canvas 41 × 32.1 cm (16 1/8 × 12 5/8 in) Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Tex., 587.1999 Along with the Dead Christ with Angels (see previous page), Head of Saint Michael comes from the Petrobelli altarpiece. When the altarpiece was cut into pieces in the eighteenth century, Saint Michael’s body was discarded. Originally, Michael – angel, warrior and judge – was shown in triumph over the devil while weighing a soul. As Michael weighs the souls of the dead at the Last Judgment, it was appropriate to include him in the altarpiece of a burial chapel. Veronese’s brush can be seen in the skillful highlights on Michael’s hair, face, and costume. Paolo Veronese Virgin and Child with Angels Appearing to Saint Anthony Abbot and Saint Paul the Hermit, 1562 Oil on canvas 284.5 × 168.9 cm (112 × 66 1/2 in) The Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va., Gift of Walter P. Chrysler Jr. in memory of Della Viola Forker Chrysler, 71.527 This painting was commissioned in 1561 for the monastery church of San Benedetto Po, near Mantua. The early Christian hermit Saint Anthony Abbot and a companion are honored with a miraculous vision of the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child. Anthony wears a coarse brown robe and can be identified by two attributes, the crutch necessary at his advanced age and the bell he used to ward off evil spirits. He also holds a rosary. Perhaps the Virgin has appeared in answer to Anthony’s prayers using his rosary, which begin with the words “Hail Mary.” Paolo Veronese Martyrdom and Last Communion of Saint Lucy, ca. 1585 Oil on canvas 139.7 × 173.4 cm (55 × 68 1/4 in) National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation and Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1984.28.1 With calm acceptance, the early Christian martyr Saint Lucy turns towards the Host (consecrated wafer) as her executioner plunges a dagger into her chest. The flames behind her refer to an earlier attempt to kill her by burning. The oxen in the background are the team that failed to drag the chaste Lucy to the brothel she was condemned to for her Christian faith. This work was painted for the church of Santa Croce in Belluno where it probably hung on the side wall of a chapel dedicated to Saint Lucy. Paolo Veronese Finding of Moses, ca. 1580 Oil on canvas 58 × 44.5 cm (22 13/16 × 17 1/2 in) National Gallery of Art, Washington, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937, 1937.1.38 According to the Old Testament, Pharaoh’s daughter and her ladies removed from the River Nile the basket in which the infant Moses was placed by his Hebrew mother to save him from the slaughter of male children ordered by Pharaoh. Veronese painted this subject many times. Despite the religious subject, these paintings were created for private collectors. Veronese treated the theme with a festive and decidedly secular flair: the princess wears a gorgeous silk gown and great jewels, her bustling entourage includes the exotic figures of an African servant and a dwarf, and the scene takes place in a charmingly fanciful countryside setting. Paolo Veronese Studies for Paradise, ca. 1582 Pen and brown ink and wash on paper 30.1 × 21.1 cm (11 7/8 × 8 1/4 in) Private Collection Intertwined groupings of muscular, twisting figures inhabit this busy sheet of studies, in which Veronese explored ideas for a painting of Paradise in the Doge’s Palace in Venice, ultimately never executed. Toward the lower edge, Veronese drew the Evangelists (authors of the four books of the Bible on Christ’s life) with their attributes and identified three with inscriptions: Marco (Mark) with a lion, Zuane (John) with an eagle, and Mato (Matthew) with an angel. Luke has no inscription, but because he is accompanied by an ox, his identity is clear. A figure with radiant lines around his head is Christ. Paolo Veronese Costume Studies for Sophocles’s Oedipus Tyrannus, ca.1584–85 Pen and brown ink and wash on paper 21.3 × 30.3 cm (8 3/8 × 11 15/16 in) The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 91.GG.3 Theater fascinated Veronese throughout his life, and many of his patrons and friends promoted the performance of ancient Greek and Roman plays. The sheet contains sketches of costumes for the inaugural production of Sophocles’s Oedipus Tyrannus staged to mark the opening of the Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza in 1585. Contemporary accounts of the lavish production and huge cast suggest that further studies of costumes must have been made by Veronese and the official designer, Giovanni Battista Maganza. Each rapid sketch here is labeled by Veronese or Maganza with the name of the character for whom the costume was intended. Paolo Veronese Rest on the Flight into Egypt, ca. 1570 Black chalk, pen and brown ink and wash, with white heightening, on paper 24.9 × 19.8 cm (9 13/16 × 7 13/16 in) Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Cambridge, Mass., Bequest of Meta and Paul J. Sachs, 1965, 1965.430 The Holy Family rests on their flight from Bethlehem to Egypt. The figures are defined by the vivid white heightening, especially on the central and most important figures of the Virgin and Child. Veronese used the white in a “painterly” fashion, brushing it on with a breadth and depth that make the composition seem closer to a painting than a drawing. This beautiful drawing was not preparatory to any known painting. Veronese excelled at creating balanced compositions in chiaroscuro (light and shade), and this one may have been considered a fully finished work of art in and of itself. Paolo Veronese Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine, ca. 1575 Pen and brown ink and wash, with white heightening, on prepared gray-green paper 45.5 × 30.2 cm (17 7/8 × 11 7/8 in) Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, P25W39 Veronese created this detailed drawing in preparation for an altarpiece for the church of Santa Caterina dei Sacchi, a Venetian convent. He probably presented the drawing to the nuns for their approval of the design. Saint Catherine was an early Christian convert of noble birth who had a vision that the Christ Child placed a ring on her finger in a “mystic marriage.” The choice of subject was highly appropriate for the nuns, who were considered to be brides of Christ. Agostino Carracci (Bologna 1557–1602 Parma) Pietà with an Angel, 1582 After the painting in the Hermitage, Saint Petersburg Engraving, first state of three 40.7 × 28.6 cm (16 × 11 1/4 in) Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, Tex., The Leo Steinberg Collection, 2002.1700 Around 1580–82, Veronese made a small altarpiece for a chapel in the church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice. The composition’s fame was spread soon after its creation by Agostino Carracci’s engraving. The angel intertwines the fingers of his right hand with those of Christ’s left. He thus displays Christ’s wound to the viewer and perhaps also implores Christ to stand, implying his imminent resurrection. Though Veronese’s painting set the scene in a tomb, Carracci’s print places it outdoors. Prints like this one could have been used in private prayer by individuals who could not afford a painting. Valentin Lefèvre (Brussels 1637–1677 England) Feast in the House of Simon, plate 25 from the Opera selectiora quae Titianus Vecellius Cadubriensis et Paulus Calliari Veronensis inventarunt, ac pinxerunt (Venice: Jacobus van Campen, 1682) After the painting at Versailles Etching, only state 42.4 × 79.2 cm (16 5/8 × 31 1/8 in) Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Bequest of William Perkins Babcock, B2172.1–2 Valentin Lefèvre was a skilled printmaker who revered Veronese. His Opera selectiora, published in Venice in 1682, presented fifty-three plates, thirty after Titian’s major public works and the rest after those of Veronese. These plates did more than any other prints to define a core group of Veronese’s paintings. Remarkable is Lefèvre’s use of the white of the paper itself to create a focal element enhancing the visual continuity of the composition, as in the architectural features in this print. This jQuery slider was created with the free EasyRotator software from DWUser.com. Need a powerful Flash slideshow creator with built-in iPhone/iPad/Android support? EasyRotator is supported by the XML Flash Slideshow v4 Software. OK