Deník Marie Bashkirtseff

Apotheosis of Venice (Veronese)

Také známý jako: Apotheosis of Venice, Apothéose de Venise, Apoteosi di Venezia, Venise peinte par Paul Véronèse, la peinture du plafond par Paul Véronèse

Kultura · Umění
Oval ceiling painting: Venice, a crowned woman in white and gold, enthroned on clouds between twisted columns above a balustrade crowded with Venetians and mounted soldiers
Paolo Veronese, Apotheosis of Venice (c. 1585), oil on canvas, 904 × 579 cm, ceiling of the Sala del Maggior Consiglio, Doge's Palace, Venice Palazzo Ducale, Venice; public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (Web Gallery of Art)

Overview

The Apotheosis of Venice (c. 1585) is the great oval canvas by Paolo Veronese (1528-1588) set into the ceiling of the Sala del Maggior Consiglio, the Great Council Hall of the Doge's Palace (Palazzo Ducale) in Venice. Oil on canvas, about 904 × 579 cm (Wikimedia Commons / Web Gallery of Art record). The central figure is Venice personified: a tall, fair, richly dressed woman enthroned on clouds between spiral columns, crowned by a flying Victory, with allegorical figures about her and Venetian citizens and soldiers below. The hall was redecorated after the fires of 1574 and 1577; the Doge's Palace guide on Wikipedia dates Veronese's ceiling canvas to 1585 and places it in the same programme as the Tintoretto workshop's Paradiso (Wikipedia, "Doge's Palace").

The painting is the "Venus-Venice" Marie has in mind when she measures herself or others against the figure of Venice. It is not the same work as Veronese's portrait of his wife (see below).

Marie and this work

Marie had seen the ceiling on her Italian travels and uses the allegorical Venice as a standard of blond, fresh, full-bodied beauty:

  • 1875-01-07 (028.0180, Nice): her chambermaid, also called Marie, "la première qui sut me plaire, grande belle, blonde, toujours gaie", "ressemble, en laid et en chambrière, à Venise peinte par Paul Véronèse sur le plafond de la grande salle du palazzo ducale à Venise".
  • 1875-08-18 (039.0109, Schlangenbad): she recalls the ceiling again: Venice "sous les traits d'une femme, grande, blonde, fraîche. Je rappelle cette peinture"; her photographic portraits cannot render her colour, and her freshness and whiteness are her chief beauty.

Both passages were already glossed by the researcher in 028 as the Apotheosis of Venice (RSR 2026-01-30). Marie names no title, only "Venise peinte par Paul Véronèse sur le plafond de la grande salle", which fits the Sala del Maggior Consiglio ceiling.

Related mentions of Veronese (not this painting)

  • 1875-09-14 (043.0167, Florence): "J'aime beaucoup la grasse et fraîche figure de la femme de Paolo Véronèse, peinte par lui." A painted portrait labelled as Veronese's wife in a Florentine gallery is probably meant; the inventory could not identify it, and it is not the Apotheosis. Left unidentified (RSR 2026-10-10).
  • 1882-04-22 (094.0428, Paris): at the Louvre, Veronese "m'a apparu dans toute sa splendeur"; no work named.

The author entry is Paul Veronese (a stub).

Sources

  • Wikimedia Commons, file record for Apotheosis of Venice (WGA24942): date 1585, 904 × 579 cm, Palazzo Ducale, Venice; public domain (PD-art).
  • Wikipedia, "Doge's Palace", section on the Chamber of the Great Council.
  • Diary: 028.0180, 039.0109.