Tintoretto

The ancient and prestigious works held in the Patriarchal Palace of Venice are showing in a large exhibition now on in the rooms of Venice’s Diocesan Museum.
The catalogue to the exhibition, edited by Gianmatteo Caputo, the Diocesan Museum’s director, presents extraordinary masterpieces that are little known to the public because they are rarely shown; the collection consists of works from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century which come primarily from suppressed churches or those that are no longer open for worship, in addition to donations and temporary loans.
Among the superb works is a cycle of canvases on the life of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, painted by Jacopo Tintoretto and his workshop and which comes from the Venetian church of the same name.
The six episodes of the saint’s life are narrated in Tintoretto’s vigorous technique and didactic style; in some of the canvases he was assisted to a large degree by his workshop and in particular his children Domenico and Marietta. The cycle, which is dated 1582-1585 and which originally hung on the walls of the presbytery of the Church of Saint Catherine, explains – through a sweeping narrative style – the meaning of the main altarpiece, The Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine, a magnificent work by Veronese now held in the Academy Galleries. The Tintoretto canvases describe the stages in the saint’s life, faithfully illustrating the rich and complex hagiographical events through a narrative style that was greatly appreciated by the patrons of the Augustan monastery of nuns.
Works alongside the cycle of Saint Catherine include a Nativity by Giambattista Tiepolo, which comes from Saint Mark’s Basilica, a Last Supper by Palma il Giovane and eight canvases depicting Prophets (works owned by the Procurator’s office of Saint Mark) that are the sketches for the mosaics in the Marciana Library, and also the figures of Saints Peter and Paul which are in a mosaic form on the façade of Saint Mark’s Basilica.
 
Venice, Diocesan Museum, Cloister of Saint Apollonia
6 October 2005 - 30 July 2006