Introduction

Enduring fame—the goal of so many figures in history—was the promise of art. This fresco was originally painted on the ceiling of the Porto family palace, in the town of Vicenza, Italy, to celebrate the bravery of the Porto family, which was noted for generations of military accomplishments. Orazio Porto commissioned Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, the greatest Venetian artist of the eighteenth century, to design and execute the painting. The artist first made a fluid oil sketch to show to his patron before he commenced work on the ceiling. Tiepolo's design is an allegory in which Victory crowns the golden-robed figure of Valor with a laurel wreath, as Time watches helplessly from the shadows below, his scythe overturned.