The church of San Giovanni Nuovo (or, in Venetian, San Zan Novo) is a religious building in the city of Venice, located in the homonymous field, in the Castello district, not far from Piazza San Marco.
Of very ancient foundation (10th century), the church was rebuilt in 1762 but the facade, which according to Matteo Lucchesi's project should have been in the Palladian style, remained unfinished. In this church on March 23, 1703, Antonio Vivaldi celebrated his first mass.
The facade of the church is gabled with a tympanum portal, flanked by
two side windows and surmounted by a large half-moon opening, which
gives light inside.
The interior has a single nave and is
decorated with Corinthian columns which support the vaulted ceiling. On
the sides of the nave, there are two pairs of side chapels, while the
presbytery has a square plan and a barrel vaulted ceiling. The high
altar is adorned with the altarpiece San Giovanni Evangelista martyred
in the boiling oil cauldron created by Francesco Maggiotto. On the sides
of the altarpiece there are two other paintings, both by Fabio Canal,
the Sacrifice of Abraham and the Sacrifice of Melchisedech.
On
the altar of the second lateral chapel on the right there is a
polychrome wooden Crucifix which can be dated around the 14th century.
Externally, to the right of the building, a cell with three arches
containing three bells acts as a bell tower.