Restored in 2008 with Save Venice general funds.

These four canvases displayed in the loft over the main door in the church of San Giovanni Crisostomo once served as protective shutters for the church’s organ. The figures of Saint John Chrysostomos and Saint Onophrius decorated the exterior side of the shutters and formed a unified scene when the shutters were closed; both saints are depicted in front of a balustrade overlooking the same mountain landscape. When the shutters were opened, Saint Andrew and Saint Agatha would have been visible on the interior side, flanking the pipes of the organ.

The choice of the saints depicted in these canvases reflects the church’s congregation in the early sixteenth century. Saint John Chrysostomos, the fourth-century saint to whom the church is dedicated, was an outspoken preacher and archbishop of Constantinople and one of the four Greek Doctors of the Church. Saint Onophrius, a fourth-century hermit who spent sixty years in solitude in the Egyptian desert, is depicted as an unkempt old man with long hair, dressed only in his loincloth of leaves. In Venice, Saint Onophrius was known as the patron saint of weavers and fabric dyers. Towards the end of the fifteenth century, several guilds or scuole of silk traders, weavers, and dyers came together to create a union; they maintained their headquarters near San Giovanni Crisostomo. It is very likely that a relationship between this union and the church accounts for the otherwise unexpected presence of Saint Onophrius on the organ shutters. The Sicilian Saint Agatha, a third-century martyr, also came to be venerated as a patron saint for weavers and laywomen who practiced the craft.

Although the author of the canvases has not yet been confirmed by documentary sources, they were most likely painted by Girolamo da Santacroce in the 1520s.

The paintings were restored by conservator Barbara Ferriani, with the guidance of project director Annalisa Bristot of the Superintendency of Monuments 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.

Girolamo da Santacroce (1480/85–1556) [attr.]

Saints John Chrysostomos and Onophrius (exterior organ shutters)
1520s, oil on canvas
260 x 126 cm each

Saints Andrew and Agatha (interior organ shutters)
1520s, oil on canvas
257.5 x 135.5 cm each

Bisson, Massimo. Meravigliose macchine di giubilo. L’architettura e l’arte degli organi a Venezia nel Rinascimento. Venice: Fondazione Giorgio Cini, 2012.