Starting in the 14th century, the Republic of Venice became a principal center for the evolution of European painting, creating styles that spread continent-wide. Initially, Venetian artists followed the Byzantine tradition, prioritizing spirituality over naturalism through two-dimensional, nonplastic figures in religious contexts.
However, during the 14th century, Venetian artists began embracing innovations from central Italy, particularly Giotto’s introduction of space and human realism. Paolo Veneziano pioneered this renewal, skillfully blending Byzantine decorative elegance with the new narrative and expressive sensibilities of the Gothic style in his visual language. This renewal process intensified in the 15th century through family workshops like the Vivarini and Bellini. Giovanni Bellini emerged as the most significant figure, becoming the leading Venetian painter of his generation and crucial in developing the school’s characteristic chromatic depth.
In the early 16th century, Venetian painting evolved further with Giorgione, who fascinated contemporaries with his extraordinary use of color, dreamy, harmonious landscapes, and often cryptic meanings. With Titian, Giorgione’s pupil, Venetian art reached its peak fame and a European audience. Alongside him, Paolo Veronese and Tintoretto helped establish the Venetian style as an influential model throughout Europe, especially for Northern artists. The 17th century was a period of relative calm for Venetian painting, but it regained great vitality in the 18th century. This new golden age featured internationally renowned artists like Canaletto, Giambattista Tiepolo, and Rosalba Carriera.
Here are 10 Venetian paintings that made history.
1. Paolo Veneziano, Dormitio Virginis
This painting by Paolo Veneziano, dated 1333 and created for the church of San Lorenzo in Vicenza, is noteworthy and recognized for its distinctive pictorial technique and rich iconography. The central panel features the Dormitio Virginis (the Dormition of the Virgin). Following a traditional Byzantine iconographic model, this scene depicts the Madonna on a bed, surrounded by apostles and angels. Christ appears holding Mary’s soul, portrayed as a child, which signifies her spiritual rebirth into eternity after death.
This valuable polyptych is characterized by its gold background, further enhanced with precious materials like gold, lapis lazuli, and smaltite. Artistically, the work skillfully combines two figurative languages. The Byzantine influence is apparent in its iconographic framework, while an absorption of Western artistic innovations, particularly from Giotto, is evident in the expressive portrayal of faces and Veneziano’s overall mastery and maturity of expressive means.
2. Giovanni Bellini, San Giobbe Altarpiece
Giovanni Bellini’s San Giobbe Altarpiece depicts Sacra conversazione (a holy conversation), a very common scene that represents the Virgin Mary with the Child in her arms, surrounded by angels and saints. A particularly remarkable feature is the coffered vault. This architectural element introduces a sense of perspective to the sacred composition and creates a virtual extension of the real space of the nave.
The figures themselves are rendered with a combination of monumentality and warm humanity, achieved through the rich use of color. The Virgin Mary and the Child are portrayed as isolated and absorbed in their majesty. A Byzantine heritage is still evident in the iconic detachment of the divine figures, which lends them an air of mystery and unattainability.
3. Giorgione, The Tempest
Giorgione’s The Tempest, painted around 1508, depicts a semi-nude woman breastfeeding a child in the foreground, while on the left, a man observes them. The figures are set within a landscape crossed by a river that flows beside a city and under a bridge, with an impending storm announced by lightning striking through dense clouds. The meaning of the work has never been definitively confirmed, and while many hypotheses exist, all remain largely unsatisfactory.
Stylistically, this work marks Giorgione’s departure from the precise and detailed style of his earlier paintings. Instead, he employs a richer and more blended color palette, which reflects the influence of Leonardesque aerial perspective, likely adopted from Leonardo‘s followers active in Venice. Giorgione also demonstrates great skill in his extraordinary management of light, evident in the accurate rendering of the tree foliage, which contrasts vividly with the dark, dense clouds of the approaching storm.
4. Titian, The Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence
The Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence was created by Titian in 1558 during his most mature artistic phase, a period marked by a sudden stylistic shift away from Giorgione’s earlier influence. The atmosphere of the piece is notably somber and almost monochromatic, a departure from the luminosity of his previous paintings. This deliberate monochromatic approach accentuates the points of light that Titian strategically incorporates, such as the glow of torches and moonlight. It showcases his remarkable skill in rendering light.
Strong classical references are also evident, particularly in the depiction of the figures, which recall those of Michelangelo. Furthermore, Titian’s painting technique evolved, predominantly employing reddish tones that lend uniformity to the works and utilizing a rougher, more textural brushstroke.
5. Paolo Veronese, Apotheosis of Venice
Paolo Veronese’s Apotheosis of Venice was created for the Hall of the Great Council in the Doge’s Palace in Venice shortly after the fire that struck the latter in 1577. The painting depicts in a magniloquent manner the glorification of Venice, represented as a regal-looking woman who is crowned by the personifications of Honor, Peace, and Happiness, under the gaze of all Venetian society.
The painter demonstrated great skill in the use of perspective, visible in the powerful architecture represented, which appears almost like a dynamic and luminous theatrical stage. Additionally, he proved to be highly skilled in the luminous rendering of colors.
6. Tintoretto, Annunciation
In 1582, Tintoretto was involved in the creation of several canvases within the Scuola Grande di San Rocco. Indeed, he was commissioned to produce eight large canvases depicting episodes from the life of the Virgin and the childhood of Christ. One of these monumental paintings (teleri) portrays the Annunciation.
Tintoretto was keen to emphasize the poverty of the Holy Family, an element that also recurs in the other paintings of the cycle. Another feature that distinguishes it from other depictions of the Annunciation is the unusual crowding of figures that fill the scene, namely the swirl of putti and cherubim accompanying the Archangel Gabriel. Tintoretto’s work is characterized by a dramatic use of perspective and light, as well as a choice of dark tones that create extraordinary chiaroscuro effects.
7. Marietta Robusti, Self-Portrait with Madrigal
Marietta Robusti was the daughter of Jacopo Tintoretto, born from a relationship that predated his marriage to the mother of Domenico Robusti (Tintoretto’s second-born son and heir to his workshop).
The number of works definitively attributed to Marietta Robusti remains small—some may have been mistakenly credited to her father or brother. However, among her certain pieces are several self-portraits, including Self-Portrait with Madrigal, which is housed in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. This work portrays Robusti posed before a harpsichord, holding a musical text identified as Madonna per voi ardo (My lady, for you I burn), a madrigal by Philippe Verdelot. In the few works attributed to her, her artistic talent is evident, notably surpassing that of her brothers. Sadly, she died prematurely at just 30 years old. The family workshop was then entrusted to her brother Domenico to carry on their father’s legacy, although it failed to replicate its former success under his leadership.
8. Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Danaë and Jupiter
In 1736, Tiepolo created a work depicting Danaë and Jupiter, an episode described in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Clear allusions to two representations of the same theme by Titian, produced approximately two centuries earlier, are evident, for instance, in the inclusion of Cupid and the old nurse in the scene.
The principal difference, however, lies in Tiepolo’s choice to depict Jupiter in his true form and not merely as a shower of gold coins. The artwork is characterized by a magnificent rendering of light, as well as by quick and confident brushwork. The colors are soft and luminous, typical of Tiepolo’s pictorial style.
9. Canaletto, The Bucintoro at the Molo on Ascension Day
Canaletto’s painting portrays the Bucintoro—a ceremonial vessel used by the Venetian leaders, or doges, for a symbolic ritual on Ascension Day—during the Feast of the Ascension. The artist captured this event from a central viewpoint. His style is distinguished by brushwork that is both fluid and precise in detailing, along with a quality of light characterized by a golden warmth, which produces vivid reflections.
This approach marks an evolution from his earlier, more dramatic paintings. In this piece, Canaletto managed to achieve a realistic and dynamic composition, capturing the vastness of the water and the dense arrangement of boats with considerable accuracy.
10. Rosalba Carriera, Portrait of a Woman with Mask
Rosalba Carriera was arguably the most renowned female Italian painter in 18th-century Europe, esteemed in her native Italy and other major European nations such as France and Denmark. She pioneered the use of pastels in her paintings, a technique that quickly gained popularity and imparted a soft, hazy quality to her works.
In her portraits, like the Portrait of a Woman with Mask, Rosalba also demonstrated a remarkable ability to capture the emotions of her subjects, which made her highly sought after for such commissions.
