Venicescapes is committed to promoting a greater understanding of Venice's historical and cultural importance and of its artistic and architectural heritage through ongoing scholarly research. This inquiry, conducted at the pre-eminent centers for Venetian studies, uses a multi-disciplinary approach in order to determine the manner in which various political, economic, artistic, social, and religious forces all came together to create individual monuments and works of art.
Custodian of Wisdom:
the Marciana reading room and the transcendent knowledge of God
This first-ever complete and detailed study of the twenty-one roundels that comprise the ceiling decoration of the Marciana Library is a fascinating window onto the cultural and political landscape at a critical crossroads in Venetian history. The decorative program, conceived to help refashion the Republic's self-image in the aftermath of its most crushing defeat, ultimately presents Venice as the ideal Platonic State, founded upon the awareness of a transcendent reality and destined to last in eternity.
published in
Studi veneziani
the international journal of the
Istituto di Storia della Società
e dello Stato veneziano
Ascent to Wisdom:
the Marciana staircase and the patrician ideal
This comprehensive analysis of the esoteric symbols and allegories that comprise the Marciana Library staircase traces the first steps in the educational and moral formation of Venice’s future leaders. Within the philosophical framework of the Neoplatonic ascent of the soul, the iconographic program conveys the concerns and goals of the Venetian government in modeling the character of the ideal young patrician and forging temperate and stalwart rulers, insisting as a conclusion on devotion to family, dynasty, and – above all – patria.
published in
Studi veneziani
the international journal of the
Istituto di Storia della Società
e dello Stato veneziano
The Myth in Image:
Veronese's ceiling in the Hall of the College
Drawing upon the Renaissance iconographic tradition, this study examines the decorative program created for the Hall of the College where diplomatic representatives were received in audience before the Signoria to ‘decipher’ the image of the Republic that the Venetian government wanted to project to the greater world. Overall, the program exalts and explains the political stability and social harmony of the Republic on the basis of the contemporary political treatises which presented Venice as the very essence of good government, the living reality and the ultimate perfection of the classical republican ideal.
published in
Studi veneziani
the international journal of the
Istituto di Storia della Società
e dello Stato veneziano
Presentation in Italian
Il mito in immagine
Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana
20 October 2022
17 November 2022
The Supremacy of Faith:
Venetian Spirituality and Tridentine Doctrine in the Sala Capitolare at the Scuola Grande di San Rocco
Applying the organizational principles common to sixteenth-century Venetian painted ceilings to the vast pictorial cycle of the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, this study represents a significant departure from previously proposed readings of Tintoretto's masterwork. On the basis of a pattern of fixed relationships between the paintings, the decorative program is presented as a faithful exposition of Tridentine doctrine and as a part of broader trends aimed at reinforcing religious uniformity and consequently social cohesion in sixteenth-century Venice.
published in
Studi veneziani
the international journal of the
Istituto di Storia della Società
e dello Stato veneziano
Presentation in Italian
Filone di Alessandria
nella Venezia del 500
l'incontro tra la fede e l'Umanesimo
Scuola Grande di San Rocco
20 September 2023
Presentation in Italian
Marciana
la Biblioteca della Repubblica
Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana
12 October 2023
19 October 2023
