Paolo Veronese. Feast in the House of Levi, 1573 Video Lecture - Humanities/Arts

(lively music)
Male voiceover: We're in the Academy
of The Great Fine Arts Museum in Venice.
And we're looking at a
massive painting by Veronese,
one of the most important Venetian artists
of the 16th century.
This is the Feast in the House of Levi.
Female voiceover: Except it's not really,
because it originally, was meant to be
and I supposed it still is, a Last Supper
but its title got changed.
But you may not even know
it was the Last Supper
because it's hard to find the
Last Supper in this painting.
Male voiceover: True.
First of all, there are
tremendous number of figures
and the architecture is so imposing.
It's so grand.
The specific event being rendered
is almost completely lost.
Female voiceover: And it
really does seem as though
Veronese so enjoyed painting
all of these figures
around Chris and the Apostles,
much more than he was interested
in the spiritual moment
of the Last Supper.
He's got dozens of figures
drinking and cavorting,
welcoming others, serving
people, entertaining
and in fact, when Veronese
described his profession,
he said, "I paint and composed figures."
and you can just see the
pleasure he had in painting
so many different kinds of figures,
involved in so many
different kinds of actions.
Male voiceover: Even the most sacred,
even the most important spiritual figures,
are engaged in an action.
Look at Christ, He's just
turning to the figure
at his left, as Saint Peter
who is to his right seems
to be carving a piece
of lamb to pass it over
These are the actions of real people.
Female voiceover: And
they're real people having
that Last Supper in the space
just inside this loggia.
So, we're looking at a three-part painting
that might remind us of a
triptych with three arches
and in the space between the
front row (chuckles) of arches
and the second row of arches,
we see the Last Supper.
but in front, we have figures from
Venice (chuckles) in the 16th century.
They're dressed like
contemporary Venetians.
Male voiceover: We're seeing
the cosmopolitan nature
that was the Venetian City state.
Venice traded across the
Mediterranean East and West.
They traded North and
so, here we have Germans
on the right side of the painting,
Patricians, we have people wearing turbans
on the left side of the painting.
Venice is this intersection.
This place where the world meets.
Female voiceover: Clearly
a sense of enourmous wealth
and privilege here.
In some ways, it does
just look like a banquet
and not a Last Supper.
Male voiceover: That's what
concerned the Inquisition.
Veronese was painting during the period
that we know as the Reformation
and the Counter-Reformation.
There were people,
especially in Northern Europe
that were beginning to question
the church and its authority.
Female voiceover: Particularly,
the role of images in the church
and there was a concern
that images have a certain decorum,
have a certain propriety
and not distract the viewer.
Male voiceover: Images played
a really important role
in what we call the Counter-Reformation.
The attempt by the Catholic Church
to re-energize itself to deal
with some of the corruption
that had weakened it but
to really forcefully,
push forward Catholicism.
Female voiceover: And
art was key to doing that
and if you have art
that's got lot of fun
things (chuckles) to look at
and it's distracting and
doesn't help you focus
on meditating on the spiritual moment
or the devotional image that's depicted
then art is not in the
service of the church.
Male voiceover: So, the
Inquisition called the Tribunal
where the artist was called to answer to
what were considered a very
serious lapse of judgment.
It's interesting to note that the church
that commissioned the painting seems
to have been fine with the final product
but the Inquisition was not.
Female voiceover: They
questioned the artist
and they asked him what the
various apostles are doing
and they said, "Did anyone
commission you to paint Germans,
"buffoons and similar
things in that picture?
"Who's responsible for this?
"Are you responsible for
the ridiculous extravagance
"of this painting?"
Male voiceover: And Veronese's
response is interesting.
He says, "The artist has the
kind of license that a poet has,
"that this is from his imagination."
He was given a very
large painting to paint
and he needed to fill it with figures.
Female voiceover: Well, that's right.
He said, "I received the
commission to decorate the picture
"as I saw fit. It is
large and it seemed to me,
"it could hold many figures."
Male voiceover: What the
Inquisition had originally demanded,
was that some of the figures,
specifically, the dog be changed
but Veronese said, "No."
Instead, what he was going to do,
was simply change the title
and so, it went from being a Last Supper
to Feast in the House of Levi.
Female voiceover: And
apparently, that satisfied the
Tribunal, it satisfied the church,
it satisfied the artist
at least to some extent
in order to preserve his reputation.
It occurs to me that when
Leonardo painted the Last Supper,
it was so much about removing
everything that wasn't necessary
to portraying in an emotionally,
spiritually powerful way
this moment when Christ said,
"One of you will betray me."
and when Christ said, "Take
this bread for this is my body.
"Take this wine, this is
my blood and remember me."
This critical moment for
the church and the creation
of the Sacrament of the Eucharist.
And Leonardo distilled that
but Veronese exploded it
and put it back into our world
and to get out of that timeless world
that Leonardo had putted in.
Male voiceover: That's right.
There is all the chaos of
people paying attention
to all the different kinds of things,
the way that a dinner party takes place.
There is a kind of truth
here that is different
from the kind of truth
that Leonardo presented.
Female voiceover: Did you
see the cat under the table?
Male voiceover: (laughs) Yes.
Male voiceover: (laughs) Oh, that's great.
Male voiceover: Maybe hoping
for some of that lamb.
Female voiceover: And the
dog is watching the cat.
It's filled with anecdote
that really does distract
from that message.
On the other hand, you're right.
Maybe it makes that message
all the more palpable
by embedding it in the reality
of Venice in the 16th century.
(lively music)