Last Supper

Veronese (Paolo Caliari)

Download hi-res image TITLE Last Supper
AUTHOR Veronese (Paolo Caliari)
DATE c. 1580
OBJECT TYPE AND MATERIAL Oil on canvas
DIMENSIONS cm 220 x 523
INVENTORY 554
ROOM IX
Work on display

The room hosts the leading personalities of Venetian painting in the 16th century, one of the most inspired periods in the city’s art history when its churches and palazzi were embellished with countless superb masterpieces. The Brera collection includes several important works by Veronese. In the Last Supper the deliberately asymmetrical composition sidelining Christ, the unusually dark palette and the everyday setting strike a deep chord, plunging the observer into the scene.

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“Which of us will betray you, Lord? And which will be the greatest? Thus the anxious, competitive disciples. The greatest is he who serves, says Jesus, he who washes another’s feet. And the whole unruly table leans left to witness this amazing event; Christ in a corner ready to sponge Peter’s feet. But to the right of our dividing pillar the world goes on as ever: fine clothes, dogs, beggars, a pretty woman at the window, where the sunset picks up Christ’s pink glow. And onward to Gethsemane.“
Tim Parks

Download hi-res image TITLE Last Supper
AUTHOR Veronese (Paolo Caliari)
DATE c. 1580
OBJECT TYPE AND MATERIAL Oil on canvas
DIMENSIONS cm 220 x 523
INVENTORY 554
ROOM IX
Work on display