Paolo Caliari's The Finding Of Moses

1386 Words3 Pages

Paolo Caliari was born in 1528 in one of the small districts of Verona, Italy. Similar to many young males in the 1500’s, he began as an apprentice to a respected local painter, Antonio Badile, at the age fourteen (Priever, 12). In Verona, Paolo developed a web of relations and an impressive reputation before he was even twenty years old. In 1553, Paolo moved to Venice and was given the nickname Veronese, after his birthplace (Wundram, 92). Throughout his life, Paolo Veronese examined old works and contemporary artistic models and then challenged himself to revive them into something new and original (Priever, 15). Following this pattern, in 1570-1575, Veronese combined his own original style with the stylistic developments of the Italian High Renaissance to reconstruct the work of Bonifazio de’Pitati into his own version of The Finding of Moses. The Finding of Moses is a vibrant 50 X 43 cm oil painting that is currently on display in Madrid, at the Museo del Prado. Veronese captured the narrative of the Old Testament parallel story of the slaying of infants by Herod in Bethlehem. In this story, the Pharaoh ordered all new-born sons to be …show more content…

With that said, from the time period of 1560-1588, Veronese created a workshop and worked in collaboration with multiple members of his family and other hired assistants. This first began with his brother Benedetto Caliari and later his sons Gabriele and Carletto (Priever, 123). This is important because there are many cases when Veronese’s own works, including The Finding of Moses, were slightly varied or copied by workers in his workshops (124). The need for Veronese to have a workshop is proof in itself that he was a master of his time. While The Finding of Moses may have only been a small success in comparison to some of his other works, it encapsulates all of his unique techniques that keep him original but still connect him with the

Open Document