After Paolo Veronese - The Little St. John
After Paolo Veronese (1528-1588), Italian
The Little St. John, undated copy
OIL ON CANVAS, 24 ¾ x 19 ⅜ inches
Gift of the Estate of Albert L. Farwell
A leading figure of the Italian Renaissance in Venice, Paolo Veronese was celebrated in his own time, as he is today, for his rich palette and mastery of illusion. The Little St. John reproduces a single figure from Veronese's Madonna Enthroned with Saints (originally painted for the sacristy of Venice's Church of San Zaccaria around 1562) that is now in the city's Gallery of the Accademia. In Veronese's original composition, the infant John the Baptist is situated at the painting's visual center, leading the viewer's eye upward toward the enthroned Virgin. The centrality and subtlety of the infant's turning figure as a space-creating compositional device, known as a repoussoir, illustrates the creative experimentation for which early critic and biographer Giorgio Vasari first admired Veronese's work.