active around 1333 -1358 · Venice, Saint Mark and Adriatic

Between Byzantine icon and Gothic grace, Paolo da Venezia gives Virgins and saints a profoundly Venetian luminous majesty.

Paolo Veneziano, also called Paolo da Venezia, is the most influential painter in Venice in the mid-14th century. Active in a documented manner between 1333 and 1358, he died before 1362. His family workshop, in which his sons Giovanni, Luca and Marco participated, responded to prestigious commissions in the lagoon and all around the Adriatic. This organization explains the lasting diffusion of an immediately recognizable style: luminous gold background, long silhouettes, bold colors, collected faces and gestures of ceremonial precision. The Virgin and Child dated 1354, kept at the Louvre, formed the center of a polyptych. Mary supports Christ with gentleness contained, while gold subtracts figures from the ordinary world. The panels of Saint Francis of Assisi and Saint John the Baptist, then of Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Anthony of Padua, show how each attribute and each attitude makes it possible to identify the intercessors. Gathered with the Virgin, these saints compose a hierarchical assembly intended for prayer. Paolo does not break with the icon: he softens it with the Gothic line, emotion and colorful rhythm. He thus prepares the future development of Venetian painting. Paolo does not break with the icon: he softens it with the Gothic line, emotion and colorful rhythm. He thus prepares the future development of Venetian painting. The selection "Paolo Veneziano, known as Paolo da Venezia" notably compares the Virgin and Child and Saint Francis of Assisi; Saint John the Baptist. His reading favors color.

Paolo da Venezia gives a human voice to the icon: gold remains eternal, but looks, hands and folds begin to tell.