Restored in 1985 with Save Venice general funds.

Alessandro Vittoria’s altar for the Scuola dei Luganegheri in the church of San Salvador, with its grandiose classicizing architecture and dynamic sculptures, was completed around the turn of the seventeenth century. On either side of the monumental altar stand sculptures of Saint Roch and Saint Sebastian: both saints were venerated in Venice as protectors from the plague, and are often paired in Venetian art.

Of particular interest is the figure of Saint Sebastian, on the right-hand side of the altar. The pathos communicated by the pained face and struggling figure of Sebastian recalls the great sources for such figures in the late Renaissance, from the Laocoön and the Dying Alexander, both works from late antiquity, to the more recent Dying Slave by Michelangelo.

The altar was commissioned by the Scuola dei Luganagheri, or sausage-makers’ guild, and further adorned with a painted altarpiece by Jacopo Palma il Giovane, also restored by Save Venice.

The altar was restored by conservator Maria Stella Volpin, with the guidance of project director Ettore Merkel of the Superintendency of Fine Arts of Venice.

For select projects, conservation dossiers in Italian containing limited textual and photographic documentation may be available for consultation by appointment at the Venice office of Save Venice and the Rosand Library & Study Center. For inquiries, please contact us at venice@savevenice.org.

Alessandro Vittoria (1525–1608)
Altar of the Scuola dei Luganegheri with Saint Roch and Saint Sebastian
c. 1600, marble and Istrian stone
800 x 420 cm