We have very little details about the artist Paolo Veneziano’s life, as the only records concern his work in the years 1333 to 1358. A leading Venetian artist in the 1300s, he represents an amazing balance between his Byzantine training and the Romantic influences from Northern Europe.

The first work that can be definitely attributed to Veneziano (1333) is the Dormitio Virginis, now hung in the Vicenza Civic Museum, while another known to have been painted by him is the Enthroned St. Donà, perhaps an earlier work and now on show on Murano.

His later works, dated roughly 1340, are more Gothic in style and language, as seen in the folds of the clothing and the expression of the faces of the figures he portrayed: good examples are his Enthroned Madonna (1340), now part of the Crespi collection in Bologna, and the cover in the Pala d’oro (also known as the “Pala feriale”) dated 1345 and hung in St. Mark’s Museum in Venice, signed together with his sons Luca and Giovanni.

Paolo Veneziano produced various mosaics in the period 1347-1358: the best preserved and most beautiful is that in the Dandolo chapel in St. Mark’s Baptistery in Venice. Other major works by Veneziano in Venice include his Paliotto in the church of Chiesa di S. Pantalon, the Madonna with Child, Saints and the Doge Francesco Dandolo with Consort in Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, the St. Clare polyptych in the Gallerie dell’Accademia and, now on the other side of the Atlantic, his Coronation of the Virgin (1358), in the Frick Collection in New York.

1300 - 1400 - - rev. 0.1.5