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In the lively artistic context of Venice in the second half of the sixteenth century, Veronese competed with the other greats – Tintoretto and Titian above all – in reworking well-known models and coming up with new solutions for the different contexts demanded by his clients.

In his Madonna and Child with Saints Joseph, Francis, John the Baptist as a Child, Jerome, and a Martyr, Veronese pushes to its limits (as Titian had already done in the Pesaro Altarpiece at the Frari) the traditional front-on scheme by laterally rotating the axis of the Virgin’s throne and setting out the saints in the lower portion in parallel to the surface of the canvas. This particular painting is dynamically charged thanks to the complex, intertwined gazes and gestures between the Virgin and Child and the patron saints of the family of the client (Francesco Bonaldo), declaring their collective devotion to this latter.

In order to suggest these bonds between the figures, Veronese exploits architecture as an organising principle in the painting. This is also true of the Feast in the House of Levy, which is based on an elaborate architectural structure inspired by the scene of an ancient Roman theatre, formed by a proscenium and painted backdrop. The imposing loggia articulates the space both in terms of depth (placed as it is between the plane of the staircases in the foreground and the plane of the urban background further back) and laterally (using the arcades to subdivide the scene into equal portions and to distribute the figures). This scenographic subdivision of the pictorial surface allows viewers’ eyes to take in an overall symmetrical order while moving from one character to another. The central opening invites us to communicate directly with Christ, as if we are in symbolic communion with him, an important aspect for the friars of Santi Giovanni e Paolo who had the painting in their refectory.

Veronese has a particular ability to present his monumental compositions as if they were a path of moral and spiritual ascent for the viewer, who is invited by the painting’s highly efficient visual devices to focus on figures embodying a model of perfection, as in the Coronation of the Virgin or the two Assumptions on display here.

To put together such well-calibrated painterly “devices”, Veronese could also rely on the well organised family workshop, which would continue with the style well after his death. Even though the considerable number of works would suggest that Veronese designed the compositions and coordinated their execution, the uneven quality seems to indicate the use of collaborators, especially in the Coronation and the Assumption in the church of San Giacomo.