Restored in 1978 with Save Venice general funds.

Canvases depicting scenes from the history of Rome grace the top of each door in the Sala delle Quattro Porte (Room of the Four Doors) of the Doge’s Palace. Their monochrome palette gives them the appearance of ancient relief sculpture, an effect commonly employed in the Renaissance to connote the ancient past, and therefore highly appropriate given the subject matter. These images function within the larger iconographic program in the room, the goal of which was to visually remind visitors of the authority and might of the Venetian Republic, envisioned as the new Rome.

Little is known about these paintings, but they may have been executed by an artist in the workshop of Paolo Veronese’s heirs, for they are similar in style and iconography to some of the paintings completed by this workshop for the ceiling in the nearby Sala del Collegio.

The paintings were restored by conservators Serafino and Ferruccio Volpin, with the guidance of project director Giovanna Nepi Scirè 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.

Unidentified Venetian artist
Four Episodes from the History of Rome
Late sixteenth century, oil on canvas
120 x 380 cm each
Sala delle Quattro Porte, Palazzo Ducale

Palazzo Ducale: Homepage

Wolters, Wolfgang. The Doge’s Palace in Venice: A Tour Through Art and History. Berlin: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2010.