It's Time for a Feast!

Paolo Veronese  (b. 1528, Verona, d. 1588, Venezia) 

Feast in the House of Levi, 1573

Oil on canvas, 555 x 1280 cm
Gallerie dell'Accademia, Venice http://www.wga.hu/index1.html

Click the link to read more about Veronese and this wonderful Last Supper he made for the refectory of a Dominican church in Venice.  Last Supper you say?  Why is it called "Feast in the House of Levi"?  Well, take a closer look.  There are a few too many people at the this banquet and far too much frivolity for a conventional Last Supper.  The air of sadness and foreboding we usually find is absent here.  Veronese was enjoying a surprising amount of artistic freedom and celebrating the wonderful luxurious life of Venice in the late 16th century.  This was the eve of the Counter-reformation, however, and Veronese was in danger of being accused of heresy.  He was given three months to make changes, but instead changed the title of the painting.  So the Dominicans were allowed to keep their painting and Veronese was allowed to keep his head.

Perhaps Monty Python was thinking about Veronese when they performed this skit about "Michelangelo's Last Supper"  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-v-f2mT94Y

This painting has always spoken to me of a joie de vivre, of a total embrace of life, luxury and beauty without reserve or remorse.  It is so grounded in human pleasure, while still emphasizing a profoundly spiritual message as well.  Here the religious and secular, the sacred and profane, merge in a wonderful feast of the senses.  May we all experience such reveling in a similar way this Thanksgiving.