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History A church and monastery were founded here around 1350 by the Umiliati order from Lombardy and initially dedicated to Saint Christopher, the patron saint of the gondoliers. Fra Tiberio of Parma, the leader of the Order, is said to have been responsible for the original design of the church and is buried here. During the building of this church an unfinished statue of the Madonna, made by Giovanni de Santis (but also said to have fallen from heaven) and kept in an orchard (orto) nearby following its rejection by the Prior of Santa Maria Formosa in 1377, for which church it had been carved, started getting a reputation for glowing and working miracles. The Scuola di San Cristoforo bought the statue, with the intention of thereby increasing offerings towards the cost of the building work, and on 18th June 1377 it was placed on the high altar. Since then the church has been known as Madonna dell'Orto. After a serious subsidence in the foundations at the North end of the church the order were given 200 ducats to rebuild. Reconstruction work from 1399 resulted in the complete redecoration of the interior and the construction of the new façade. A new and larger monastery was built at this time too. The Umiliati were expelled 1461 by the Council of Ten because of their 'depraved habits', the suppression of the order by Pius V following in 1571. The Canons of San Giorgio in Alga (also known as the Turchini because of their Turkish blue/green robes) replaced them (they being an order who didn't believe in building new churches but were committed to occupying old churches) and the restoration work was finished in 1473 with the completion of the façade. In 1669 Cistercians from San Tommaso on Torcello moved here, the Canons of San Giorgio having been suppressed by Pope Clement IX. In 1787, with only three monks living here, the Republic acquired the church and it was administered by the parish priest of San Marziale as an oratory. The church was allowed to crumble, with buildings being pressed into use as a stables, a hay and wine store and a powder magazine, until 1841 when some poor restoration (which included ripping up memorial stones, destroying the already damaged ceiling paintings, plastering over the façade and destroying the organ) was carried out under Austrian rule. It closed in 1855 but, after spending some time being used as stables, it was reconsecrated and reopened in 1868 as a parish church. (See H.Taine said below.) In 1931 the complex was given to the monks of The Congregation of Saint Joseph of Leonardo Murialdo from Turin, who still administer it. More restoration work was carried out in 1912 and in 1930-1931, when the 19th century interventions where reversed. But the great acqua alta of 1966 damaged the church further. Following this flood the church and its paintings were thoroughly restored by Venice in Peril between 1970 and 1980. The church The gothic brick façade is one of  Venice's most purely pleasing. The
sloping galleries of apostles, carved by the Delle Masegne brothers, are
unique in Venice. (The herring-bone patterned brick pavement is a pretty
rare survival too). The façade went up in the early 15th
century, with the
side windows added a little later, and then the door case. This doorway,
by Bartolomeo Bon, whose workshop was nearby in San Marziale, features a gothic ogee arch with a renaissance rounded
arch underneath, containing a porphyry lunette. This stylistic mixture might be explained by the
fact that the doorway was begun in the 1460s, but not installed until
1483, twenty years after Bon's death. So it's
possible the rounded arch was added to spice up the, by then,
unfashionably gothic doorway. This entrance was financed by the
Scuola dei Mercanti next door, of which Bartolomeo Bon and his father
Giovanni were members. The ogee arch is surmounted by a statue of
Saint Christopher, with the Virgin and
The Angel of the Annunciation on either side. These statues were taken
from the 14th century church, the Saint Christopher by Bon, and the
Virgin
and the Angel by Antonio Rizzo.Interior Rows of slim columns of lovely striped Turkish marble separate the nave from the aisles, with archaic capitals, retained from the original church. Three chapels each side. Timber tie beams and a flat coffered wooden ceiling. Chunkier columns would have been needed to support a masonry roof. Art highlights From 1547 this was the parish church of Jacopo Tintoretto and his family - they moved from near San Cassiano to the Fondamenta dei Mori near here in that year. His ashes were interred here in the 19th century, along with those of his wife and eight more family members. You'll find his memorial stone in the chapel to the right of the chancel, which was previously the chapel of the Bonetti family, along with his painter offspring Marietta, who had died before him, and Domenico. He had originally been buried in the family tomb of his wife's father. There are 11 paintings by him here - only San Rocco beats this church for feasting on Tintoretto. A monumental pair, The Adoration of the Golden Calf and The Last Judgement both thought to have been painted around 1563, flank the altar, fitting exactly into their spaces, they were probably painted in situ. (It is said that amongst the bearers of the Golden Calf you'll find portraits of Giorgione, Titian, Veronese and Tintoretto himself.) The Five Virtues in the vault from c.1565 are by Tintoretto too, except the middle one, Faith, which is visibly by a different (17th century) artist, Pietro Ricchi from Lucca. The Presentation of the Virgin (see right) over the door to the Capella di San Mauro, is from 1553 and is more lovable. (Note the real gold leaf decoration on the steps.) It was painted to outdo Titian's huge painting of the same subject (in the Accademia) and even emulates the older artist's characteristic colour scheme. Tintoretto had lasted a mere ten days as Titian's pupil, for whatever reason, and they never became pals. The very-evident obelisk is also a steal from the Titian, but is also a not-unusual inclusion in paintings of this subject of this period, representing the sun and symbolising the triumph over death. The 15 steps represent the 15 psalms recited by pilgrims ascending to Jerusalem. This painting was once the outer doors of the organ, and is positioned where the organ used to be, with the two paintings currently either side of the high altarpiece The Beheading of St Paul and The Vision of the Cross to St Paul on the inside of the doors. The left-hand side of the church is dominated by works by Tintoretto's son Domenico which don't exactly shine and, in fact, a Palma Giovane Crucifixion in the Morosoni Chapel is the highlight of this side. In the first chapel on the right Cima de Conegliano’s fine Saint John the Baptist with Saints Peter, Mark, Jerome and Paul of 1493-5 (see below right) which is rare for being in its original stone frame (attributed to Sebastiano da Milano) and over its original altar, with Saint John looking for enlightenment towards the church's window. Ruskin rhapsodised: 'the whole picture full of peace, and intense faith and hope, and deep joy in light of sky, and fruit and flower and weed of earth'. It glows after its 1999 restoration, and is indeed one of his best. Titian's Tobias and the Angel was moved here from the nearby church of San Marziale, presumably because it's a less visited church. Also a couple of impressive works by Matteo Ponzone. His Saints George, Jerome and Tryphon came here, from the church of the Knights of Malta, to replace Bellini's painting of Lorenzo Giustiniani, on the Renier altar, mentioned below in Lost art. Even the Palma Giovane Annunciation in the apse is one of his more original compositions. The miracle-working 14th-century statue of the Madonna and Child by Giovanni di Santi, much restored with plaster, is in the Capella di San Mauro, along with twenty-eight portraits of Venetian saints and beatified persons, painted by various artists in the 17th century. In here is also a modern portrait of San Leonardo Murialdo, the founder of the order that has run this church since 1931. Lost art  In the first chapel on the left is a colour photograph of Giovanni Bellini's small panel painting of the Virgin and Child (1480) (see right). The painting was stolen (for the third time) from the church on 1st March 1993, having been restored in 1969 following its previous theft. A guidebook written just before the most recent theft comments that the Child's hair was 'specially pretty'. Hare's guidebook of 1904 says that the Virgin's head is the 'only beautiful part of this picture'. It had a background of gilt leather and had been commissioned (or possibly 'bought from stock') by Luca Navagero, the Venetian vice-regent for Friuli. It had been placed on his tomb in the right aisle but must originally, given its small size, have been for private devotion, and so likely painted in the decade before Navagero's death in 1488. This chapel also had a ceiling painting of God the Father with Angels with panels of Musician Angels at the sides. The centre panel fell down during the late 17th century with the Musician Angels disappearing in 1733. All are now lost. A rather good Sacra Conversazione by Bonifacio de'Pitati in the Palazzo Pitti in Florence 'probably' came from here. Lost art depicting The Blessed Lorenzo Giustiniani Lorenzo Giustiniani founded the congregation of the canons called the Turchini, at San Giorgio in Alga in the early 15th century, an order which took over the Madonna dell'Orto in 1462. He was also, in 1451, made the first patriarch of Venice and later got as close to sainthood as any Venetian from this period, attaining the status of beato in 1690. The Giustiniani were one the of the four great patrician families in Venice, and claimed to be able to trace their ancestry back to the emperor Justinian. Pordenone's The Blessed Lorenzo Giustiniani with two Canons and Saints Louis of Toulouse, Francis, Bernardino and John the Baptist of 1528/32 was painted for the altar of the Renier family chapel here, in the left aisle, where it remained until Napoleon took it in 1797. It's now in the Accademia, to which it was returned in 1815. It replaced another painting of the Blessed Lorenzo, by Girolamo Santacroce, which was then moved to San Giorgio in Alga. Also in the Accademia is the earlier (but still posthumous) The Blessed Lorenzo Giustiniani by Gentile Bellini, which was originally probably a processional standard. It is signed and dated 1465 on a cartellino, making it Gentile’s earliest securely datable work. It was used to replace the Pordenone just mentioned when it was taken by Napoleon.  Campanile 56m (182ft) electromechanical bells Erected 1332, rebuilt with the addition of a belfry in 1503, with a statue of the redeemer on top of the oriental-looking onion dome and apostles perched on the edges, all by the Lombardo workshop. Restored in 1819 following a storm. The bells were replaced in 1883. The church in fiction Donna Leon's Commissario Brunetti in the novel The Girl of His Dreams looks up at the church: 'The brick dome of the bell tower had always looked like a panettone to him, and so it did now.' The same book also reveals that Brunetti was on his holidays when the Bellini (mentioned above) was stolen, and that by the time he returned to work the art-crime squad from Rome had given up and gone home. An important scene in Time's Betrayal by David Adams Cleveland plays out here, in the first chapel on the left, in front of the Bellini Virgin and Child, before its most recent theft. Ruskin wrote An interesting example of Renaissance Gothic, the traceries of the windows being very rich and quaint. It contains four most important Tintorets: "The Last Judgment," "The Worship of the Golden Calf," "The Presentation of the Virgin," and "The Martyrdom of St. Agnes." The first two are among his largest and mightiest works, but grievously injured by damp and neglect; and unless the traveller is accustomed to decipher the thoughts in a picture patiently, he need not hope to derive any pleasure from them. But no pictures will better reward a resolute study. ... The figure of the little Madonna in the "Presentation" should be compared with Titian's in his picture of the same subject in the Academy. I prefer Tintoret's infinitely: and note how much finer is the feeling with which Tintoret has relieved the glory round her head against the pure sky, than that which influenced Titian in encumbering his distance with architecture. He later wrote that the whole picture his now been daubed over, - chiefly this lovely bit of sky, and is a ghastly ruin and eternal disgrace to modern Venice. The "Martyrdom of St. Agnes" was a lovely picture. It has been "restored" since I saw it. H.Taine wrote (Italy: Florence and Venice 1869) My walk today is to Santa-Maria dell Orto to see Tintoretto's great paintings of The Worship of the Golden Calf and The Last Judgement. I find the church closed and the pictures rolled up and taken away nobody knows where. The edifice seems to be abandoned. On one side is a dilapidated cloister broken open and serving as a lumber-yard, with the grass growing fresh and green along the arcades. This is one of my greatest disappointments in Venice.
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