The rule, the Bible, and the council

by Diana Gisolfi

"This monograph focuses on a Benedictine library decoration conceived and executed within a few years of the conclusion of the Council of Trent. The Benedictines of the Cassinese Congregation centered at Santa Giustina in Padua (to which nearby Praglia belongs) employed many leading artists of Venice and the Veneto in sixteenth-century projects, and the Abbey at Praglia commissioned work from Paolo Veronese and Tintoretto as well as Battista Zelotti. Diana Gisolfi and Staale Sinding-Larsen begin with a reconstruction of the sixteenth-century library room using physical, on-site evidence, extant documents concerning the furnishings, measurements of the paintings, and early descriptions to re-create with computer technology the room furnished and decorated in 1562-ca. 1570." "Once reconstructed, the program in the twenty-four ceiling and wall canvases by Zelotti is revealed as doctrinal. Following a close reading of the images with reference to biblical texts, the authors assemble Benedi