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Between 1494 and 1505/10, the Scuola Grande di San Giovanni Evangelista—a confraternity dedicated to Saint John the Evangelist—commissioned a series of nine narrative painted canvases known as the Cycle of the True Cross. The large paintings illustrate the miracles associated with the confraternity’s most precious relic, a fragment of the True Cross donated to the Scuola in 1369 by Philippe de Mézières, former Chancellor of the Kingdom of Cyprus, who had received it from the Patriarch of Constantinople.

Entrusted to the leading narrative painters of the time—Gentile Bellini, Vittore Carpaccio, Lazzaro Bastiani, Giovanni Mansueti, Benedetto Diana, and Pietro Perugino (whose painting is now lost)—the series depicts miracles believed to have taken place in Venice during the 14th century. Entrusted to the leading narrative painters of the time—Gentile Bellini, Vittore Carpaccio, Lazzaro Bastiani, Giovanni Mansueti, Benedetto Diana, and Pietro Perugino (whose painting is now lost)—the series depicts miracles believed to have taken place in Venice during the fourteenth century. The cycle was installed in the Sala dell’Albergo of the Scuola, the room where the confraternity’s officers met and conducted their affairs. This space was also known as the Oratory of the True Cross, since it housed the confraternity’s most precious relic, preserved in a gilded reliquary placed on the altar. In this setting, the images and the relic were experienced together in a powerful devotional dialogue. The miracles represented in the paintings were mirrored by the presence of the actual fragment of the True Cross, displayed only a few steps away. For members of the confraternity, the relic thus functioned not merely as a sacred object but as a living agent of divine intervention, capable of continuing the miraculous acts illustrated on the surrounding walls. This close physical and spiritual proximity intensified the emotional and religious impact of the cycle, transforming the room into a space where history, faith, and communal identity converged.

The artists drew on accounts preserved in a twelve-page incunabulum, an early printed book produced by the Scuola around 1490 and rediscovered in 1982 by Prof. Patricia Fortini Brown at the Biblioteca del Museo Correr. Notably, in representing these events, the painters updated them to the Venice of their own time, staging the miracles within recognizable urban settings and populating the scenes with portraits of contemporary figures, such as Caterina Corner, Queen of Cyprus, and the Scuola’s Guardian Grande, Andrea Vendramin. As a result, the painted cycle not only offers invaluable insight into the religious and civic culture of early 16th-century Venice, but also provides detailed visual documentation of the city’s appearance—the Rialto Bridge, the Basilica di San Marco, and Piazza San Marco—sometimes preserving the only record of buildings and decorative schemes that have since disappeared.

The paintings remained in the Scuola’s Oratory of the Cross until 1806, when they were removed during the Napoleonic suppressions. On 4 July 1820, the entire cycle was transferred to the Gallerie dell’Accademia in Venice, where it is still displayed today in a room adjacent to Carpaccio’s Saint Ursula Cycle, conserved by Save Venice in 2019. That same year, Save Venice also funded the creation of a Virtual Reconstruction of the Oratory, allowing visitors to experience an immersive tour of the space as it appeared in the 16th century.

Save Venice is committed to funding the conservation of the entire True Cross Cycle. To date, the restoration of iconic canvases like Vittore Carpaccio’s Miracle of the Relic of the True Cross at the Rialto Bridge, as well as Gentile Bellini’s The Procession in Piazza San Marco and The Miracle of the Relic of the True Cross at the Bridge of San Lorenzo, has been successfully completed.

From 2022 to 2026, Room XX of the Gallerie dell’Accademia—where the cycle is displayed—has been closed for renovation. During this period, the conservation firm CBC treated the first three paintings at the Accademia’s Misericordia Restoration Laboratory. Once Room XX reopens to the public, CBC will conserve the remaining works individually, one at a time, on site, allowing visitors to view both the paintings on display and the ongoing conservation treatment.

The paintings still awaiting intervention are obscured by accumulated dust and grime, as well as thick layers of aged varnish. In addition, the painted surfaces show significant abrasion and alterations resulting from earlier restorations. These issues not only diminish their visual impact but also pose a risk to their long-term preservation. Building on the technical expertise gained during the restoration of the first three canvases, conservators are now uniquely positioned to develop a rigorous, informed, and highly effective conservation campaign for the remaining works.

This next phase will ensure that these extraordinary masterpieces of Renaissance Venice can be fully understood, appreciated, and safeguarded for future generations.

Lazzaro Bastiani (c. 1430 – 1512)
Donation of the Relic of the True Cross
1494, tempera and oil on canvas
441 x 324 cm

Gentile Bellini (c. 1429 – 1507)
Miraculous Healing of Pietro de’ Ludovici
1501, tempera and oil on canvas
368 x 263 cm

Giovanni Mansueti (active 1485 – 1525/26)
Miracle of the Reliquary of the True Cross in Campo San Lio 
1494, tempera and oil on canvas
463 x 322 cm

Giovanni Mansueti (active 1485 – 1525/26)
Miraculous Healing of the Daughter of Ser Benvegnudo of San Polo
1506, tempera and oil on canvas
361 x 299 cm

Benedetto Ruschi, called Benedetto Diana (1460 – 1525)
Miraculous Healing of the Son of Ser Alvise Finetti
1505-10, tempera and oil on canvas
371 x 150 cm

Fortini Brown, Patricia. “An Incunabulum of the Miracles of the True Cross of the Scuola Grande di San Giovanni Evangelista.” Bollettino dei Musei Civici Veneziani, 27 (1982): 5-8. Link to the article

Fortini Brown, Patricia. Venetian Narrative Painting in the Age of Carpaccio. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988, pp. 135-164, 282-285

Glixon, Jonathan. Honoring God and the City. Music at the Venetian Confraternities 1260-1807. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003

Matino, Gabriele. “Gentile Bellini, Giovanni Mansueti e il Riconoscimento del miracolo della reliquia della Croce al ponte di San Lio: chiarimenti e proposte.” Venezia Cinquecento, 20, 40 (2011): 5-34. Link to the article

Petkov, Kiril. The Anxieties of a Citizen Class. The Miracles of the True Cross of San Giovanni Evangelista, Venice 1370-1480. Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2004

Tolstoy, Irina. Object and Image: The Role of Perspective in Bellini’s Cycle of the True Cross at the Scuola Grande di San Giovanni Evangelista. In de Maria, Blake and Mary E. Frank, eds. Reflections on Renaissance Venice: A Celebration of Patricia Fortini Brown. Milan: Continents Editions, 2013, pp. 41-53