Restored in 2008 with Save Venice general funds.

Venice is currently one of the four Latin Sees that has been accorded the title of Patriarchate by the Catholic Church, together with Lisbon, the East Indies, and Jerusalem. Originally, the Patriarch’s See of Venice was located in the church of San Pietro di Castello. After the fall of the Venetian Republic, the See was moved to the Basilica di San Marco in 1807, and a new palace was built there to house the Patriarch. This palace, adjacent to the Basilica, was finished in 1850, and decorated with works of art produced between the fifteenth and nineteenth centuries.

This painting by Austrian artist Karl von Blaas depicting God the Father with Apocalyptic Beasts is located on the staircase of the Patriarchal Palace. Against a nondescript monochrome background, the imposing figure of God the Father, clad in bright crimson and green, is seated upon a cloud formation. He is surrounded by four winged creatures that are the symbols of the evangelists: to the viewer’s left are the lion of St. Mark and the eagle of St. John, and to the right, the angel of St. Matthew and the ox of St. Luke.

The work is is signed and dated by the artist, who also completed three other paintings with apocalyptic themes for the palace. Von Blaas was a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice; he returned to Austria after Venice became part of unified Italy in 1866.

The painting was restored by conservators Walter and Valentina Piovan, 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.

Karl von Blaas (1815–1894)
God the Father with Apocalyptic Beasts
1861, oil on canvas
223 x 252 cm