"Wedding at Cana"

Regarded as something of a child prodigy, Veronese matured into one of the most famous masters of the late Renaissance. The artist belongs to the Venetian School and, though he post-dates the period by a generation, he is often grouped with the glorious triumvirate of Titian, Tintoretto and Giorgione. Veronese came into his own however as a superb colorist and painter of the elegant and grandiose - in both theme and scale - of narratives that conveyed their meanings through rich and fluid color schemes. The figures in his works are often described as having the subtle foreshortening of Correggio and Michelangelo's heroism and Veronese typically placed them against a painted architectural "stage" that was redolent of a city (Venice) that was (and still is) thought to resemble a magnificent living arena in its own right. Regardless of the often sacred nature of his subject-matter - Veronese was himself a devout Catholic - his paintings would often exude the worldly, playful atmosphere of 16th-century Venice. John Ruskin once wrote that he learned from Veronese's pictures that "to be a first-rate painter, you mustn't be pious - but rather a little wicked and entirely a man of the world." Ruskin was referring to the gayety in Veronese's paintings which did not always meet with the approval of the ruling Church bodies

This painting depicts the Biblical Wedding Feast at Cana where according to the New Testament, Jesus performed his first miracle by turning water into wine. The Biblical story, however, is set into Veronese’s time although some figures are depicted wearing antique clothing. It is said that Veronese painted himself among the 130 participants of the wedding feast (clothed in white with a viol next to Titian and Bassano).