Plunder : Napoleon's theft of Veronese's Feast / Cynthia Saltzman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Saltzman, Cynthia, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Veronese, 1528-1588. Marriage at Cana.

Veronese.

Louvre (Paris, France)--History.

Louvre (Paris, France).

History.

Cultural property--Destruction and pillage--Italy--Venice.

Cultural property.

Napoleon I, Emperor of the French, 1769-1821.

Napoleon.

Musée du Louvre.

Marriage at Cana (Veronese).

Cultural property--Destruction and pillage.

Italy--Venice.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

viii, 317 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021.

Summary:

"Plunder recounts the fate of Paolo Veronese's Wedding Feast at Cana, a vast, sublime canvas that the French, under the command of the young Napoleon Bonaparte, tore from a wall of the monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore, on an island in Venice, in 1797. Painted in 1563 during the Renaissance, the picture was immediately hailed as a masterpiece. Veronese had filled the scene with some 130 figures, lavishing color on the canvas to build the illusion that the viewers' space opened onto a biblical banquet taking place on a terrace in sixteenth-century Venice. Once pulled from the wall, the Venetian canvas crossed the Mediterranean rolled on a cylinder; soon after, artworks commandeered from Venice and Rome were triumphantly brought into Paris. In 1801, the Veronese went on exhibition at the Louvre, the new public art museum founded during the Revolution in the former palace of the French kings"-- Provided by publisher.

"History of Napoleon's art looting of Italy and the subsequent formation of the Louvre"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

1 "Send me a list of the pictures, statues, cabinets and curiosities" p. 11

2 Venice need not "fear that the French Armies would not fully respect its neutrality" p. 21

3 "Master Paolo will ... not spare any expense for the finest ultramarine" p. 36

4 "He is rich in plans" p. 54

5 "This museum must demonstrate the nation's great riches" p. 63

6 "Draw as much as you can from Venetian territory" p. 71

7 "The Pope will deliver ... one hundred paintings, busts, vases or statues" p. 78

8 "I'm on a path a thousand times more glorious" p. 95

9 "The Republic of Venice will surrender ... twenty paintings" p. 106

10 "In the Church of St. George ... The Wedding Feast at Cana" p. 111

11 "We ... have received from Citizen Pietro Edwards" p. 128

12 "The most secure way would be to send them on a frigate, with 32 cannons" p. 137

13 "The seam ... will be unstitched" p. 142

14 "The Revolution ... is finished" p. 147

15 "You enter a gallery-such a gallery. But such a gallery!!!" p. 154

16 "The transparency of air ... place[s] Gros beside Tintoretto and Paul Veronese" p. 168

17 "This beautiful work reminds us of the picture by Paul Veronese" p. 173

18 "I succeeded ... in packing most of the pieces of small size and great value" p. 178

19 "The only thing to do is to burn them!" p. 188

20 "This foreboding painting... seems to summon the eye ... from all directions" p. 194

21 "The masterpieces of the arts now belong to us" p. 199

22 "We are at last beginning to drag forth from this great cavern of stolen goods the precious objects of Art" p. 205.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Local Notes:

Athenaeum copy: Rosenlund fund bookplate.

ISBN:

9780374219031

0374219036

OCLC:

1153502292