From representation to imagination: the battle of Lepanto in European painting

Abstract

This study considers the depiction of the Battle of Lepanto in European art history and how it has changed over time. It aims to show how the main focus of the artists has changed from representing the battle as "it was" to propagating the battle as a "legendary victory" in symbolic paintings. Consequently, over the centuries, the weight of the artistic output has shifted from documentary and artistic paintings that attempted to represent the actual battle via historical accuracy to symbolic ones, motivated by the imagined "Lepanto narrative."