The church was commissioned by the Venetian Senate in 1576 for the deliverance of the city from a major outbreak of the plague. The Giudecca district was chosen to make it well visible from the city and the construction was entrusted to Andrea Palladio. The building, started in 1577 after a grand procession on a boat bridge, was completed after the death of the architect. The facade, almost like a classical temple, leads into the wide interior made up of a sequence of spatial blocks unified by its brightness.