Special thanks to the Microsoft Corporation for permission to use following biographical information from Microsoft® Encarta '97:
Vittore Carpaccio was an Italian painter whose pageant paintings illustrate in an incomparable manner Venetian life during the early Renaissance.
Born in Venice, Carpaccio was greatly influenced by the Venetian painters Gentile Bellini and Giovanni Bellini. Carpaccio executed four cycles of narrative paintings, of which only the first two are notable. The first, done between 1490 and 1495, was the cycle of nine large paintings, The Legend of Saint Ursula (Academy of Fine Arts, Venice), considered his finest work. Especially original is the painting Dream of Saint Ursula. The second cycle, painted from 1502 to 1507, consists of nine scenes that are mainly from the lives of Saint George and Saint Jerome (Scuola di San Giorgio degli Schiavone, Venice). The two best-known paintings of this cycle are Saint George Slaying the Dragon and Saint Jerome in His Study. Among Carpaccio's other paintings are A Saint Reading and Virgin and Child (both in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.). Carpaccio was one of the most able painters of the early Renaissance in Venice. His drawing is sometimes faulty; his use of color, however, is clear and harmonious, and he handles light and atmosphere with masterly effect.
