TINTORETTO
(b. 1518, Venezia, d. 1594, Venezia)

The Ascension

1579-81
Oil on canvas, 538 x 325 cm
Scuola Grande di San Rocco, Venice

In this canvas, among the trembling and joyful mingling of angels' wings and of branches of olive and palm, Christ rises up with overwhelming vitality on the thick clouds of stormy cumulus, and he seems to cut through the upper edge of the painting. The towering apostle in the bottom left foreground, thrown backwards by the sudden apparition, seems to draw back towards his other companions grouped together around the table and around Moses and Elijah who are talking further off.