Polyptych of the Apocalypse

Jacobello Alberegno's Polyptych of the Apocalypse, now in the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice, is a remarkable and rare visual interpretation of the Book of Revelation in fourteenth-century Italian panel painting. The Apocalypse was seldom depicted in Italian altarpieces, making this work exceptionally unusual among Venetian Trecento paintings. Jacobello, a follower of Paolo Veneziano, adapted the visionary imagery of St. John's text into the format of a multi-panel devotional altarpiece.

Painted in tempera on gold-ground panels, the polyptych translates the fantastic imagery of Revelation into the decorative idiom of Venetian Gothic painting. The visionary scenes employ vivid, saturated colors and fantastic figural inventions set against the characteristic gold backgrounds of Trecento panel painting.