Titian

Titian
(1488 - 1576) - Italy
Painting of the Week - Assumption of the Virgin

MONDAY

Tiziano Vecelli, known as Titian, was a great artist of the sixteenth century during the Renaissance. Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael worked in Florence, Italy, but Titian was the leading artist of Venice. Titian is known above all for his remarkable use of color and his painterly methods which influenced not only other Italian Renaissance painters but future artists. Titian was equally skilled at portraits, landscape backgrounds, religious subjects, and mythological works. The painting of the week is Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin.

Titian's Assumption of the Virgin

YouTube video - Titian Assumption of the Virgin (3:24 min.) The narrators whisper their commentary, but it provides a good view of the painting in its setting of the Frari Church in Venice.

TUESDAY

Unlike many artists, Titian knew fame as a painter through most of his lifetime. He was called “a Sun amidst Small Stars”. Titian became the official painter to the Venetian Republic in 1516 and spent time at the Vatican painting for the pope.

Two emperors sought his work. One granted him a knighthood. All members of the nobility wanted their portrait done by Titian. Besides being talented and successful, he was well liked. Titian was intelligent, quick witted, humorous, and easy company.

WEDNESDAY

Assumption of the Virgin by Titian in Frari Church

In 1516, Titian received his first major job to create a painting above the high altar of a Venetian church known as “the Frari”. His Assumption of the Virgin was a masterwork that helped establish him as one of the leading painters of the time. It broke with tradition in the grand scale of the figures, its three-tier composition, and the use of bold color.

Interior of Frari Church in Venice

The Assumption can be seen at the far end of the church from the entrance. It draws the eye to the sacred space of the altar. It took Titian two years to complete and it changed painting forever. Titian himself is buried in the Frari church in an impressive tomb.

THURSDAY

Titian’s state portrait of Emperor Charles V established a new genre, that of the grand equestrian portrait. Remember, genre is a type of painting. An equestrian portrait shows a person on a horse. Titian’s portrait of Charles V presented the ruler as a symbol of power. Titian’s figure is realistic and even looks weary. The portrait commemorated Charles V’s victory in battle and was painted by Titian in 1548.

After Titian’s equestrian painting many other artists painted portraits of people on horseback. We’ll look at a few painted by past Artists of the Week. David painted Frenchman Napoleon Crossing the Alps in 1801.

Velazquez painted Philip IV, a king of Spain, on horseback in 1634.

Rembrandt painted the Dutch official, Frederick Rihel in 1663. This was a rare subject for Rembrandt, who did few equestrian paintings.

FRIDAY

Titian's The Holy Family With a Shepherd

During the last twenty-six years of Titian’s life, he worked mainly for Philip II and as a portrait-painter. Titian became more self-critical, a never satisfied perfectionist.

He kept some pictures in his studio for ten years, never wearying of refining and retouching them. He is credited with this quote while in his seventies: “I think I am beginning to learn something about painting.”

Titian's Pieta

Titian’s last painting, the Pieta is a dramatic scene of suffering in a night setting. It was apparently intended for his own tomb chapel. He had selected as the place for his burial the Frari church. In return for a grave, he offered the church the picture of the Pieta, representing himself and his son before Christ. He nearly finished the work. The plague raged in Venice, and Titian and his sons died of it. It’s uncertain whether he was in his eighties or nineties when he died. Titian’s tomb is in the Frari (Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari), near his own famous painting, the Assumption of the Virgin.

Titian for Kids: Pigment Making - website tells how to make color pigment as a science experiment.

Video of slides of Titian paintings