Christ giving the Keys to Saint Peter

Vincenzo Catena painted this Christ Giving the Keys to Saint Peter around 1520, depicting the Gospel episode in which Christ establishes Peter's authority as the foundation of the Church—the moment Catholics understood as instituting papal authority. The subject had obvious ecclesiological significance in the period of the early Reformation, when the legitimacy of papal authority was being challenged by Luther and others, and altarpieces depicting it served the institutional church's need to assert its apostolic foundations visually. Catena's treatment combines the Venetian tradition's warm atmospheric quality with careful attention to the dignified solemnity of the scene, Christ and Peter shown in the moment of the key's transfer that would define the Church's institutional character for two millennia.

The scene is rendered with the warm coloring and atmospheric landscape characteristic of the Venetian school. Catena's refined technique and measured compositions reflect his training in the Bellini workshop.