Assumption of the Virgin (Assunta) (1515–1518)
Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice
The largest altarpiece in Venice, still on the high altar it was made for
Image: Titian · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Art
Titian
c. 1488/1490–1576 · Venetian (Italian)
High Renaissance (Venetian School)
Tiziano Vecellio, known as Titian, was the greatest painter of the Venetian School. A master of colour and loose, expressive brushwork, he excelled at altarpieces, mythologies and portraits, working for Venice, the princes of Italy, Emperor Charles V and Philip II of Spain.
How to spot them
- ▸Rich, glowing colour — deep reds and blues — built up with visible, increasingly loose brushwork in later works
- ▸Sensuous reclining nudes and dramatic classical mythologies (the poesie for Philip II)
- ▸Quiz clue: 'Venice', 'Cadore', 'Frari', 'colorito vs disegno', 'Charles V picked up his brush', or 'Titian red' hair
Key works
Sacred and Profane Love (c. 1514)
Galleria Borghese, Rome
Two women, one clothed and one nude, sit on a sarcophagus-fountain; its title dates only from 1693
Image: Titian · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Bacchus and Ariadne (1520–1523)
National Gallery, London
Bacchus leaps from his cheetah-drawn chariot; painted for Alfonso d'Este's Camerino in Ferrara
Image: Titian · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Venus of Urbino (c. 1534–1538)
Uffizi Gallery, Florence
Reclining nude with a small dog; inspired Manet's Olympia
Image: Titian · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Equestrian Portrait of Charles V (1548)
Museo del Prado, Madrid
The emperor in armour after his victory at Mühlberg (1547)
Image: Titian · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Diana and Actaeon (1556–1559)
National Gallery, London, and National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh (jointly owned)
One of the poesie for Philip II; bought jointly by the two galleries in 2009
Image: Titian · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Quick-fire facts
- •He was born in Pieve di Cadore, in the Dolomites, and trained in Venice under the Bellini brothers and alongside Giorgione
- •He died in Venice in 1576 during a plague epidemic and is buried in the Frari church
- •Legend says Emperor Charles V stooped to pick up Titian's dropped paintbrush; Charles made him a Count Palatine
- •The term 'Titian' (Titian red) is used for a reddish-auburn hair colour
- •His late masterpiece The Flaying of Marsyas is in the Archdiocesan Museum at Kroměříž, Czech Republic
- •His Pesaro Madonna in the Frari broke convention by placing the Virgin off-centre
- •Vasari praised Florentine disegno (drawing) against Venetian colorito (colour), with Titian as the champion of colour
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Sources
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — Titian
- E. H. Gombrich — The Story of Art