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International Art Treasures Web Magazine May 2006 |
Bellini, Giorgione, Titian!
Renaissance of Venetian Painting
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Messina's paintings had an impact on Bellini by teaching him the capabilities of oil painting instead of tempera. This allowed Bellini to explore interactions between color and light. He is credited with bringing Venetian art into the forefront of the Italian Renaissance and any exhibit that explores the importance of that city on that movement is not complete without Bellini works. |
Bellini taught both Titian and Giorgione.
Title: Virgin with the Blessing Child, 1510
Artist: Giovanni Bellini (Italian ca. 1426-1516)
Medium: oil on canvas, transferred from panel
Permanent Collection: Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
Image Courtesy: National Gallery of Art, Washington
Giorgione
Title: Sunset Landscape ("Il Tramonto"), c. 1507
Artist: Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco called Giorgione (Italian ca. 1477-1510)
Medium: oil on canvas
Permanent Collection: The National Gallery, London
Image Courtesy: National Gallery of Art, Washington
Giorgione was born in a town on the outskirts of Venice called Castelfranco Veneto. Separately he and Leonardo da Vinci both discovered chiaroscuro, which is the delicate use of shades of color to illustrate both light and perspective.
Titian
From 1506-1508 Titian worked with Giorgione on the external fresco for the Fondaco dei Tedeschi. After Giorgione's early death Titian went on to finish a number of Giorgione's paintings. It has led to dispute over who painted these works, some of which are extremely well known.
Title: Bacchanal of the Andrians, 1522-1524
Artist: Tiziano Vecellio known as Titian (Italian ca. 1485-1576)
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Permanent Collection: Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid
Image Courtesy: The National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
The Venetian's early commissions of note were three frescoes at the Scuola del Santo in Padua in 1511. His return to Venice put him on the path to becoming the greatest artist of his time, the one person in his way was Bellini who died in 1516. Then Venice belonged to Titian.
A highlight of the exhibit is Titian's Pastoral Concert on loan from the Musée du Louvre. It is believed to be the pièce de résistance of the Venetian Renaissance movement and was once thought to be the work of Giorgione. The females in the foreground are the Muses of Poetry.
Title: Pastoral Concert ("Concert Champêtre"), c. 1510
Artist: Tiziano Vecellio known as Titian (Italian ca. 1485-1576)
Medium: oil on canvas
Permanent Collection: Musée du Louvre, Departement des Peintures, Paris
Photo: Réunion des Musées Nationaux/Art Resource, NY
Image Courtesy: National Gallery of Art, Washington
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Lore holds that once, while painting before a patron, Titian dropped his brush. The patron, Emperor Charles V, bent down and retrieved it embarrassing the Venetian artist who said, "Sire, I am not worthy of such a servant." "Titian is worthy to be served by Caesar", the Emperor replied. |
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Cima da Conegliano
Title: Virgin and Saint Peter Enthroned with Saints John the Baptist and Paul, 1516
Artist: Cima da Conegliano (Italian 1459-1517)
Medium: oil on canvas, transferred from panel
Permanent Collection: Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
Image Courtesy: National Gallery of Art, Washington
Rather unfortunately Cima da Conegliano has the moniker 'the poor man's Bellini'.
Giovanni Battista was named for the place of his birth, in the manner of Leonardo of Vinci and Michelangelo Merisi, more familiarly known as Caravaggio. His style is quiet and devotional. Cima da Congeliano was one of the earliest painters to include the landscape as part and parcel of the subject matter. His works were usually religious in nature, often with the Madonna enthroned and surrounded by various saints.
Lorenzo Lotto
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Lorenzo Lotto, like Titian, trained in Bellini's studio. Both men were influenced through the study of Antonello da Messina's paintings. |
Lotto viewed the paintings of Melozzo da Forli and Luca Signorelli after traveling to the Marches. It is from these studies from which flowed his understanding of perception and figurative works.
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This certainly aided in his reputation as an outstanding portraitist. |
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He wasn't successful in Venice and returned to the Marches. His later works weren't as good, though it is believed the artist became blind towards the end of his life, which certainly would have impacted his work. Late in life he took vows at the Sanctuary of the Santa Casa in Loreto.
Bellini, Giorgione and Titian are three reasons to spend time at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC:
June 18 - September 17, 2006
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna:
October 17 2006 - January 7, 2007