MOSAIC ARTIST, Italian
(active 1215-1220 in Venice)

South side aisle (detail)

1215-20
Mosaic
Basilica di San Marco, Venice

The mosaics on the south side aisle belong to the Passion cycle, but represent a different, more modern style, influenced to some extent by French Gothic art. They represent Christ's praying on the Mount of Olives.

Three phases of the event are pictured in a friezelike arrangement. Christ' prayer on the Mount of Olives is pictured three times, and three times he speaks with Peter. In the first scene Peter sits in the middle of the tangle of sleeping disciples, but in the two following, he reappears as a single figure. Probably the work was executed by three different hands.




© Web Gallery of Art, created by Emil Krén and Daniel Marx.