Marriage in Cana of Galilee, Paolo Veronese

Description of the picture:

Marriage in Cana of Galilee – Paolo Veronese. 1562-1563. Canvas, oil. 666×990

   Paolo Veronese (1528-1588) is one of the most prominent painters of the Venetian school.

   On the canvas “Marriage in Cana of Galilee” Christ is depicted at a conjugal feast in the Galilean settlement of Cana at the time of the commission of his own first miracle: when the wine finished, He, at the request of Mom, converted the water into it. Among the guests were several students.

   The painting for this plot was commissioned by the Veronese community of the Benedictine monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore in 1562. The master worked on it for more than one year. In the refectory of the monastery, for which the canvas was created, it sagged before the conquest of Italy by Napoleon. To make it convenient to transport the canvas, the French cut it in half, after which it was already sewn in Paris.

   Freely interpreting the biblical plot, Veronese transformed it into a celebration of the Venetian marriage. The New Testament event is presented in chic building “scenery”, which could not be in a Galilean village at the dawn of the Christian era. They resemble the buildings of Andrea Palladio, constructor of the late Renaissance. Some figures are dressed in historical clothes, while the costumes of others amaze with the luxury and splendor of a completely different era. Biblical heroes are surrounded by contemporaries of the artist. According to legend, a musician in snow-white clothes on the frontal plane of the picture is the master himself."