Premises and art collections
“The Chapel of Saint Jerome overlooking Campo San Fantino, is the architectural work of Alessandro Vittoria”, Tommaso Temanza wrote in his publication – Lives of the most famous Venetian architects and sculptors – dated 1778.
Constructed at the end of the 1500’s, the former Scuola di San Fantin today hosts on the ground floor (previously where its chapel was situated), the Auditorium of the Ateneo Veneto. On the first floor instead of the “Albergo Grande”, now there is the Library. In 1664, the Scuola expanded adding the Albergo Piccolo, known today as the Tommaseo Hall. The sacristy formerly on the ground floor, today, is the Vittorio Cini Hall.
The Auditorium and all of the other halls are embellished with numerous paintings and art works made by important Venetian and Veneto artists of the 1500’s and 1600’s. These elegant and sophisticated areas can be used to welcome the initiatives promoted by the Ateneo Veneto as well as suitably accommodate other types of events.
The Auditorium
The coffered ceiling houses thirteen paintings depicting the Cycle of Purgatory (painted on canvas) by Jacopo Palma il Giovane, completed in December 1600. Along the walls, above the original marble dossals, the stories of Christ’s Passion, have been depicted by Leonardo Corona and Baldassare d’Anna (1600-1600). The same Baldassare d’Anna painted the canvas of the two Prophets. The archways above the left wall also host two canvases relevant to the Gospel parable of the “Return of the Prodigal Son” and the “Good Samaritan” painted by Antonio Zanchi in 1670, who was considered to be one of the major artists of the “tenebrosi” painters of the time. The ancient chapel had two altars designed by Alessandro Vittoria. Dismantled during the Napoleonic period, they were transferred to the Basilica of Saints John and Paul. In their place, the bronze bust of Tommaso Rangoni (a medical physician from Ravenna), previously located in the Church of San Geminiano and the marble busts of the Venetian medical physicians, Nicolò and Apollonio Massa, formerly situated in the Church of Saint Domenic were installed. All these artworks were made by the same Vittoria.
The Vittorio Cini Hall
Built in the 17th century, the Council Chamber, today renamed the Vittorio Cini Hall, was part of a minor structure added to the back of the main building. Upon its completion, it was known as the new sacristy, since it substituted the previous one and was decorated with numerous paintings dating from 1667 to 1695. The decorations of the Hall, are from the sixteenth-century cycle of the Stories of the Virgin (Marian Stories), attributed to Paolo Veronese and his school, which until then, had been abandoned in the old sacristy. Today, the Stories of the Virgin are housed in the Reading Room of the Library.
Over time, the art work in this Hall has been subject to various changes and repositioning. To date, remaining in their original location, is the ceiling canvas representing San Girolamo (St. Jerome) and the Virgin of the Assumption by Francesco Fontebasso; the Two figures of the Prophet by Jacopo Palma il Giovane and the Portrait of Gian Pietro Pellegrini by Alessandro Longhi.
This Hall was completely restored in 2012, thanks to the generosity of Giovanni Alliata di Montereale, a Member of the Ateneo, who financed the restoration works on the occasion of the 35th anniversary of the death of his grandfather, Count Vittorio Cini, he too a Member of the Ateneo from 1936 to 1977.
Tommaseo Hall
The Hall was named after this illustrious scholar and patriot in 1913, who is commemorated with a marble bust. There are also the bronze busts of the patriots Jacopo Bernardi and Daniele Manin. The Hall located on the first floor was built in the 17th century. Decorated within a harmonious setting there are famous paintings on the walls and the ceiling depicting the Last Judgement by Antonio Zanchi (1674). On the back wall, the Dinner at the home of the Pharisee, by Francesco Fontebasso (1732-35), stands out. On the side walls, there are canvases portraying the Prophet David and the Prophet Isaiah, made by the sixteenth-century painter Ermanno Stroiffi, a follower of Bernardo Strozzi.
On the right wall, there is a large canvas painting by Antonio Zanchi (1667 approx.), representing The Explusion of the Merchants from the Temple, while on the walls between the windows there are the Healing of the Madman by Giovanni Segala, the Resurrection of Lazarus by Ermanno Zerest (1665 approx.) and the Two Sybils by Jacopo Palma il Giovane (1580).
Library
The Reading Room of the Library, once part of the Albergo Grande della Scuola, was in the late 1500’s decorated with canvases painted by Jacopo Palma il Giovane including the eight episodes of the Life of San Girolamo (St. Jerome) and an altarpiece, painted by Tintoretto, portraying the Virgin’s apparition to Saint Jerome.
A large canvas completed by Palma during the last decade of the 1500’s depicts the Glory of Mary in Heaven with angels and adoring figures decorating the ceiling. Over time, this Hall, more than the others, underwent important changes and was also ransacked, until in 1826, the work of art was removed. The canvas was heavily damaged and cut into various pieces which were scattered around Europe. One of these fragments is currently at the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg.
The Library hosts the ten canvases of the Stories of the Virgin realised by Paolo Veronese and his entourage; four paintings of Jacopo Tintoretto which portray, respectively, the Virgin’s apparition to Saint Jerome, Saint Marc, Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Jerome receiving gifts from the merchants.
There are also sculptures of some prominent physicians such as Francesco Aglietti, Viviano Viviani, Santoro Santorio, Gian Raimondo Forti, Francesco Paiola and the architect Antonio Diedo
