369. Titian (Tiziano Vecelli) (c. 1488-1576),

Italian, Venus of Urbino, 1538. Oil on canvas,

119 x 165 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

 

 

Titian (Tiziano Vecelli)

(1490 Pieve di Cadore – 1576 Venice)

 

Titian was at once a genius and a favourite of fortune; he moved through his long life of pomp and splendour serene and self-contained. The details of his early life are not certain. He was of an old family, born at Pieve in the mountain district of Cadore. By the time that he was eleven years old he was sent to Venice, where he became the pupil, first of Gentile Bellini, and later of Gentile's brother, Giovanni. Then he worked with the great artist Giorgione. He worked on major frescos in Venice and Padua, as well as commissions in France for Francis I (1494-1547), in Spain for Charles V (1500-58). His equestrian portrait of Charles V (1549) symbolises a military victory over Protestant princes in 1547. Titian then went to Rome for commissions by Pope Paul III (1534-49), then in Spain to work exclusively for Philip II (1527-98).

No artist's life was so completely and consistently superb; and such, too, is the character of his work. He was great in portraiture, in landscape, in the painting of religious and mythological subjects. In any one of these departments others have rivalled him, but his glory is that he attained an eminence in all; he was an artist of universal gifts – an all-embracing genius; equable, serene, majestic. Titian's beautiful reclining women, whether called Venus or any other name, are among the most original of the creations of the Venetian school and particularly of its great masters, to which he and Giorgione belonged. His works differ greatly from the Florentine nude, which is generally standing, resembling sometimes, in the fine precision of its contours, the precious work of a goldsmith and sometimes the great marble of a sculptor.