A Boy and a Page

A boy in splendid clothes is painted as if about to enter this room. Beside him, a page in a plumed hat looks back and talks with a man behind a green curtain. The greyhound at their feet looks up toward the voice. The canvas is tall, measuring 205.0 x 104.0 cm.

Veronese worked on the decoration of several villas of nobles, and this work was originally decorative painting on the door of a room. Later, for preservation, the paint layer was transferred from panel to canvas. Using trompe l'oeil, so that people seem to enter through an imaginary door within the picture, it creates the effect of architecture, sculpture, and painting joining seamlessly to decorate a single residence. It is thought to have formed a pair with "A Warrior and a Page," a work of the same size.

The subtle combination of rose and green and the brightness of the soft yellow are colors Veronese favored. He liked painting dogs and children, and worked them even into large religious paintings.