In this picture you can see Saint George. He rides straight towards the dragon and stabs it in the neck with his lance. In doing so he has defeated the dragon and saved the inhabitants of the city of Silena. On the ground you can still see the remains of the dragon's victims. The princess who is hiding behind a tree was also supposed to be sacrificed to the dragon. She prays for a good outcome to the fight.
In the background you can see a large city. In front of it another story from the Bible is taking place: a man in a red cloak is kneeling on the ground. The man is Saint Stephen. He is about to be stoned. On the left in the mountains we see two men: Jerome and Benedict of Nursia. Carpaccio painted this large picture for the monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore, which followed the rules of Saint Benedict.
Saint George is also depicted in the four small images below. The small images show how George suffered for his faith. George died and rose again three times before he was finally beheaded in 303.
The theme of the fight against the dragon – the fight between good and evil – continues to inspire artists to this day. Turn around and look at the opposite wall. Here you can see a modern representation of the theme. The Chinese artist Ai Weiwei recreated the image using Lego bricks and broke the motif down into lots of small coloured dots like pixels on a screen.