Scuola Grande di San Rocco

The Scuola Grande di San Rocco was a Venetian confraternity, a charitable brotherhood formed under the plague-saint Roch, and in 1564 it needed its new marble hall decorated. It held a competition. Tintoretto won it by a trick, installing a finished ceiling panel overnight instead of submitting a sketch, then offering it as a gift the brothers could not refuse.

He stayed for more than two decades. Across some sixty large canvases he covered the walls and ceilings with the life of Christ and the Virgin in his rushing, storm-lit style, figures lunging out of darkness. A vast Crucifixion fills one whole wall on its own.

Because the paintings were made for these rooms and have never left, the Scuola is often called Venice's Sistine Chapel. Mirrors are handed out at the door so you can study the ceilings without craning your neck.