December 1, 2008
ads on Venice…
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Ca’ Pesaro Madonna
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masks of Venice
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November 12, 2008
Titian presentation Power Point
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Presentation Titian’s Altarpieces-Katherine
This is the updated edited rough draft for my research paper. Yellow highlights indicate further research or information I still hope to uncover. I will be in Venice this week to see these altarpieces in person and gain new insight into my work. Ok, I’ll be having the time of my life, too! I can’t wait to see them in situ. I’ll have photos and thoughts posted shortly after my return.
Please go to readings (category at right of screen) and read Titian in the Frari by David Rosand before class Thursday. You can view the slides for this presentation in my previous post (there is a link).
Titian’s Altarpieces: Color, innovation, and invention
Titian was a master of painting and color; his influence on Western art is enormous and far reaching. Through careful examination of Titian’s altarpiece paintings, Assumption and Ca’ Pesaro Madonna, it is possible to glimpse not only the unusual, yet inherently Venetian, way Titian approached painting, but also the decisions that led to the final artworks and to his unique contributions to Renaissance painting. Titian began his career as a painter in Renaissance Venice at a time when painting was in flux, oil and glaze were new, and altarpieces were a unique vehicle for artistic expression. He synthesized all that was happening around him and created expressively life-like paintings that took perspective, color, subject and composition all to a new level. “Throughout his long career, Titian respected tradition. Never can we think of him as an avant-garde artist…yet while his work always depended on the past, he subtly transformed what he took into something new.” (Cole 67). Although Titian did honor painting’s past, it is difficult not to believe that he was ahead of his time. His work influenced the history of Western art for centuries to come; his influence continues today.
This paper will briefly outline the history of altarpieces in Venice, the progression of naturalism in those paintings, some of the people and events influencing Titian, and finally it will examine the innovative ways in which Titian approached his masterpieces and made his mark on painting. With the Assumption, created for the high altar in the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Titian is credited, by Marino Sanuto, for establishing High Renaissance in Venice. (Rosand Painting in the Sixteenth Century p35). Likewise the Pesaro Madonna exceeded the expectations of his time. Many of the elements destined to become hallmarks of this master of Renaissance painting are exemplified in this unprecedented altarpiece.
Mendicant orders [end note here] are credited with bringing the Gothic style churches, with their high altars placed against the wall of the apse, to Venice in the fourteenth century. The pala d’altare, or altarpiece, was a natural development. The pala d’altare or pala, consists of a unified, vertical picture plane. Although the frame of the pala can be quite ornate, the pala itself does not include sculptural elements. Altarpieces served several functions. They reflect the altar and the sacrament of the Eucharist, serve as a visual reminder not only of the presence of Christ, but also the idea of Transubstantiation (the presence of the body and blood of Christ), they allow congregants to sit face to face with intercessors, and they serve as a representation of the altar’s titulus, or subject of dedication.
Although church doctrine stated that all altars were dedicated only to God, in Venice END NOTE WHY THIS DEVELOPED IN VENICE? it was common practice to dedicate altars to a particular saint, Christological, or Marian mystery. (Humphrey 67). By convention an altarpiece reflected the dedication of the altar and thus was important in distinguishing one altar from another. (Humphrey 57). Often it is possible to recognize the titulus by the iconography of an altarpiece. However, when the Virgin and Child are depicted, the titulus is more difficult to determine. Often it is the saint to the Virgin’s right or the saint in the center of the sacre converzione, a conventional grouping of Madonna, Child and Saints. (Humphrey 67). EXAMPLE OF THIS – BELLINI?
The subject of the pala is iconic or narrative, although the delineation of the two can be imprecise. Although many ecclesiastical accessories of the church were strictly regulated by church law in the fifteenth century, the altarpiece was not. This gave artists and patrons a degree of freedom in subject, style and form, yet challenged their respect for longstanding tradition. Humphrey states that “…it could be argued that it was precisely this tension between convention of the type, and the freedom to experiment within it, that allowed the altarpiece to become one of the most important and expressive vehicles of Italian Renaissance art” (The Altarpiece in Renaissance Venice p4). Titian took full advantage of the artistic freedom allowed and developed many innovations exemplified both in the Assumption (1516-18), and in the Pesaro (1519-26) altarpieces.
Extraordinary, brilliant use color is a hallmark of Venetian painting. Perhaps the early painters got their inspiration from the mosaics of San Marco. Figures composed of hundreds of tiny glass tesserae adorn the basilica; reflected light and the polished glow of gold infuse the atmosphere. Patricia Fortini Brown suggests, in Art and Life in Renaissance Venice, that “The chromatic approach to color of Giovanni Bellini, Titian, and other Venetian artists had its antecedents here” (28) in San Marco’s mosaic work. Many Venetian painters and artisans worked on restoration projects and thus became familiar with the mosaics; Titian is among these. END NOTE TITIAN’S MOSAIC/SAN MARCO WORK
New ideas found their way to Venice through foreign artists and imported art works. Titian flourished during this period of flux in painting; new materials, new ideas and a return to the classics were blooming in Florence and Rome and finding their way to Venice. Titian’s teachers, Bellini, Giorgione, and his contemporaries, Raphael and Michelangelo, had a profound influence on the direction of Titian’s painting. Titian’s genius, in part, was his flexibility and capacity to synthesize the flow of ideas, thoughts, and talent surrounding him into innovations in painting making him the premier painter in Venice.
Up until the High Renaissance, altarpieces, and painting in general, gradually shifted toward a greater naturalism. Slowly, the flat icon-like painted figures and spaces depicted gained volume and a degree of realism. Paolo da Venezia, (Coronation of Mary, mid-1300) the earliest Venetian painter historians know by name, found inspiration for his altarpieces at San Marco. It was Paolo who brought the polyptych to Venice in the fourteenth century, where it became a standard.FROM WHERE FOOTNOTE Venezia’s altarpiece reflects the medieval style of decorative, linear painting; the figures and space are relatively flat and two-dimensional with a liberal use of gold leaf ornamentation. (http://www.wga.hu/tours/gothic/characte.html Pächt). Domeinco Veneziano, working with tempera on wood panel, is perhaps best known for his Saint Lucy altarpiece, 1455. The triple arch, reminiscent of a polyptych, creates a nearly three-dimensional illusionistic space containing one of the earliest extant sacra conversazione. Rosand states that Domenico was working to draw the viewer into the illusionistic space, playing with space, both fictive and illusionistic, while retaining the Virgin and Child as the “iconic core” of the work. (28 Painting in the Sixteenth Century). It was Giovanni Bellini, (Holy Conversation, 1501) MENTION TITIAN HAVING SEEN IT/BEEN INFLUENCED BY IT in the fifteenth century, who reinterpreted the artistry of San Marco ELABORATE ON SAN MARCO’S INFLUENCE into a more naturalistic form; Giovanni sought to place natural looking figures into a more realistic, believable architectural setting. Brunelleschi’s linear perspective, mastered by Bellini, enabled him to bring illusionistic space into a two-dimensional picture plane. This turned paintings into windows from which viewers could look into a fictitious space beyond. Bellini also extended the viewer’s space into the picture plane by uniting actual and painted elements of the frame. His tonality, well modulated color, and golden light are all reminiscent of the mosaics of San Marco. Bellini experimented with oil glazing techniques as a way of duplicating the effects of light on glass tesserae. Bellini is one of Titian’s early teachers and Titian will adopt his use of oil and glazes to create light effects with oils.
The unique qualities of Venetian painting in the Renaissance are due to the focus on colorito, or color. By the early part of the sixteenth century Venetian painters were exposed to classical art and the science of perspective, but they chose to pursue color as opposed to the careful drawing favored by Florentine painters. Crowe suggests (103) that they simply found disegno too difficult to master and so chose to imitate color and form over careful draughtsmanship, contour and perspective. However, Dolce presents a more favorable view; he praises the controlled use of color to imitate nature. Colorito, as used by Venetians to describe painting, is a verb. It represents the very act of using carefully blended colors to describe form in a painting. Rosand, in Painting in Sixteenth-Century Venice, calls this controversy a “stylistic distinction” (18) stating that drawing was ancillary in Venice. Venetian painters interest in the way light and shadow could be used to mimic form, and their controlled use of color, by layering and glazing paint, is championed by Lodovico Dolce, an Italian theorist of painting, as superior to the Florentine style with its emphasis on disegno or drawing. (add a footnote information on his Dialogue). The work of both Raphael (School of Athens and Transfiguration) and Michelangelo were well known to Venetian painters. While the Florentine painters insisted that disegno was of primary importance, the Venetians focused on colorito. Vasari, a biographer of artists, insists that disegno, the father of all arts, is the most important. However, it is colorito that gives Titian the expressive ability to paint
One of the principle factors leading to the Venetian value of colorito over disegno is the invention of oil paints. Oil and canvas were a necessity for Venetian painters due to the high humidity and salt present in the air; frescos and tempera did not last long in such an atmosphere. “…Venetian painting in 1488 was still in a state of transition, [that] tempera was no longer a medium in which great masters consented to work, though boys were still taught to paint in it” (Crowe 48). The masters however, were using oil in much the same manner as they had used tempera before. Younger painters, including Titian, and his contemporaries, pushed and explored the new medium of oil paints. They experimented with oil paints and glazes and worked with dark colors over lights which give their paintings the effect of an inner glow. Oil paints allowed for a naturalism not yet achieved by the most talented painters. It is this naturalism, glow of color, and experimentation, as well as his exploration of composition and narrative, that propelled Titian to become a master. SOURCE??
Marino Sanuto FOOT NOTE OR STATE WHO HE IS states that with the Assumption, “Titian established classical High Renaissance art in Vencie, for in its dramatic gestures, its breadth of form, and its symbolically geometric structure, the Assumption epitomizes…” the work that Raphael was doing (Rosand Paint 16th C 35). * double check quote and end. Titian’s Assumption altarpiece, created for the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari’s main altar, was so innovative when it was introduced to the Venetian public it was not immediately appreciated. Titian’s innovation and new concepts were thrust into the public eye in a size and scope the public was clearly not prepared for. The Assumption was the largest altarpiece yet painted in Venice; it soars an impressive twenty two feet high. Titian depicted the Assumption of the Virgin in a manner alluded to in the drawings of Fra Bartolommeo, but not yet realized; compositionally, Raphael’s Transfiguration, 1516-1520 is the closest compositional precedent. The heroic figures, drama, and expressive qualities of the Assumption were a novel concept in Venice when introduced. Much of Titian’s innovation stems from peculiarities of the Gothic basilica’s interior space and existing architectural elements, and his interpretation, theme, and layers of meaning. Titian faced several problems he had to address in order to compose a painting that would not only fit into the existing space, but also be a focal point of the apse.
In response to the vast distance between viewers and the main altar of the Frari, Titian envisioned an altarpiece on a monumental scale. The Virgin of the Assumption invites us to view her from several vantage points; in each one she remains the central figure. Each orthogonal leads the eye to her. Upon entering the basilica, the figure of the Virgin is at the center of the space. Proceeding up the aisle, her face is at the center of the repeating arches of the choir screen and architectural frame. Moving closer to the altarpiece, the monumental scale and heroically dramatic figures appear and the viewer sees the entire painting for the first time. Upon entering the Frari, the Virgin’s portrait appears to be at the center of the interior space. Viewed through an impressive choir screen, which blocks much of the altarpiece’s composition, the size and scope of the painting are initially hidden from view. As the worshipper proceeds down the aisle, the painting is revealed. Bellini, and other painters before him, carried elements of existing architectural space into their fictitious space by adding elements of the actual space to the imagined space. What Bellini considered, however, was a static viewer seeing the painting from a single, ideal vantage point. What Titian did was remarkably innovative; he understood that the setting was important on many more levels and that the viewer would move through the space coming to the painting from several vantage points. Titian worked to make his paintings accessible from many points and to include and encompass the existing architectural space. It was his response and adaptation while painting, due to the lack of pre-planned cartoons, which allowed for much of his innovation and ability to bring life to his canvas.
Titan worked to compose a painting that could relate to its intended space. Begun in 1330, with the choir, transepts and campanile, the Friari’s high altar was not consecrated until 1469. The Frari was built in the Italian Gothic style, with a row of small chapels on either side of the chancel, stone columns, wood tie beans and clerestory windows, with the choir interrupting the massive space of the nave. “The warmer character of the interior of the Frari must also be attributed to the effect of Titian’s marvelous high altarpiece, the famous ‘Assumption of the Virgin’ commissioned in 1516. The compelling presence of this pictorial vision, framed by the central arch of the choir which concentrates one’s attention on the painting and at the same time makes it seem more remote and intangible, draws the eye straight to the focal point of the architecture” (Howard, 75-76). Cole states that “So striking is the overall impression of this huge altarpiece that it rivets the onlooker’s attention even in the monumental, light-filled choir of Santa Maria dei Friai. It is a commanding work equal to its august surroundings” (78- Titian and Venetian Painting). The ornate apse windows behind the main altar, framed in ornate Gothic traceries, presented Titian with a problem to solve. The vast space between worshippers and main altar was also a consideration. The choir screen, through which the altarpiece is viewed, and the great architectural frame, presented problems the artist had to solve. Synthesizing all he had learned, the ideas of the High Renaissance, and solutions to the problems he incurred, Titian produced a startling, yet profound work of art not immediately appreciated by the donor or the general public. But it was not long before Titian’s genius was understood, and then imitated.
Renaissance paintings were meant to be read, and were immediately understood by their contemporary viewers although today the meaning is often lost to us. The Assumption follows this norm; however, Titian’s altarpiece was more an interpretation of theme rather than subject. (Goffen 98). This altarpiece has multiple layers of meaning; it is as much a response to the theological debate of the Immaculate Conception, a subject hotly argued in the Cinquecento, as it is about the Assumption of the Virgin. When the apostles came to bury Mary, the story goes FIND SOURCE, they were astonished to arrive and witness her assumption into heaven. Titan’s Assumption is, on one level, his interpretation of this event. The realms of heaven and earth are unified in this composition depicting the Virgin’s ascent into heaven where an angel awaits with her crown and God glances lovingly toward her, ready to welcome her into her place in heaven. The minimal representation of earth is purposeful; the apostles, astonished by this wondrous event, are standing on firm ground, but, for theological reasons, Mary’s grave has no prominence in this painting. clarification of Cathedral of Verona tomb pronounced- very theological and site/church doctrine specific 101 Goffen] Mary’s upward movement towards God is apparent by the sweeping arm gestures, flow of drapery and direction of her glance. The look of joy and wonder on the face of the Virgin whose eyes are focused on God, and His expression of love and tenderness directed toward her reference a leitmotiv of their divine and loving relationship (Goffen 103). The “images of the Madonna were intended to convey at once several interrelated meanings, both sacred and civic” (Goffen xiv); the first layer of interpretation is evident; the second layer is very much a response to a theological debate of the time.
The concept of the Immaculate Conception, firmly established in the Franciscan Order, was hotly debated during Titian’s lifetime. Franciscans firmly believed that Mary could not be the “Temple of Christ” if she was stained with Original Sin. Franciscan theologians argued that Mary was preordained to be saved, in advance, before time. Her advanced redemption anticipated our own redemption, just as her assumption into heaven anticipates the assumption of the faithful. To the Franciscans, who commissioned this altarpiece for their basilica dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin, Titian’s painting was a visual affirmation of their doctrine and faith in the Immaculate Conception. EXPLAIN THIS – MORE! INCLUDING VERONA INFO…
Titian unified his complex ideas with a boldly geometric composition, chromatic repetition and a combination of light and dark among other elements. To balance the effect of the delicate tracery of the apse windows on the viewer, Titian planned a bold and dramatic composition together with heroic figures on a monumental scale. Leaving behind the old method of equal attention to the depiction of every detail and element, Titian used different levels of finish, paying more attention to some areas and less to others. Understanding that the eye would complete unfinished areas, and areas of greater refinement would draw attention where the artist intended, directing the eye to the most important elements. Titian’s heroic figures were larger and therefore closer to the viewer; as Cole stated this brings the figures into our physical reality. (64 Cole) The triumphal arch is a compositional mainstay of both the Assumption and the interior of the Frari. HERE ADD DETAILS: WHERE IS THE ARCH IN PAINTING AND CHURCH- CHOIR SCREEN The arch is a visual reminder of Mary’s triumphal entry into heaven and her triumph over death. Light is also used as a compositional element; an innovation Titian can lay claim to. The golden light at the top of the painting is envocative of the golden dome of heaven. Instead of representing an architectural dome, reminiscent of the one adorning San Marco, Titian has used unnatural light in a distinctive way. This light, that emanates from within the painting itself and casts no shadow, is the glow of heavenly light. It curves around the top of the pala as another visual reminder of the arch. The arc of putti serves a similar compositional function. Titian used the circle as a symbol of God and His endless nature and also His enduring love for Mary, and all of humanity. The circle is repeated throughout this painting. Light and shadow combine to create a circle across the top third of the Assumption. The golden light is circular, as is the arrangement of putti. When the painting is seen through the choir screen Mary’s head seems to be encircled by the arc of the screen and clouds depicted in the painting. Titian’s bold use of a brilliant shade of red, HOW DO I KNOW THIS? at first shocking to the Venetian public at the unveiling of the Assumption, was to become one of his hallmarks. The red is used, in differing values to direct the eye throughout the composition; it is a unifying feature as well as an indication of the upward movement of the Virgin. The two red clad saints, together with the red of the Virgin’s dress, create an arrow pointing up to God, whose figure is painted with red highlights.
With the Assumption, Titian brought the High Renaissance to Venice. Titian’s response to the problems presented by the interior of the Friar and subject matter were innovative and exceptional. The use of scale, light, color, and bold composition were an inventive synthesis of prevailing thoughts in art and religion at the time it was painted. With his reputation quickly gaining tremendous respect, Titian received a second commission for an altarpiece in the Frari, the donor, Jacopo Pesaro. With the Ca’ Pesaro Madonna altarpiece, which places the Virgin in an asymmetrical position, Titian creates powerful, expressive portraits and again sets new standards in Venetian painting. The soaring, massive columns present us with a puzzle; they are unique in Renaissance painting. The secular references in the painting are also unique in altarpieces of the period.
The Ca’ Pesaro Madonna represents the first oblique Madonna in Venetian painting. Titian placed her off center, creating an asymmetrical composition. “The dynamics of Titian’s composition, then, are not a deliberate assault upon aesthetic and theological tradition but represent rather a response to the challenge of a particular site.”(Rosand Titian in the Frari 207).
Have not yet completed the Pesaro yet. I will cover the columns, asymmetrical composition, oblique Madonna, and sacra conversazione, altarpiece or votive painting- what is the Pesaro? I have resources and notes I plan to work into four pages, then finish the conclusion up and begin the process of editing and rewriting. I know I have a lot I want to say, and I need to organize and present it better. My daughter had a beautiful healthy girl, and I am now behind schedule- But I know my subject; I just need to write.
CONCLUSION>>Vasari did not appreciate Titian’s lack of refinement or the fact that his painting was often experimental and spontaneous due in part to the absence of carefully planned cartoons; however this is in part Titian’s genius; it gave him the freedom to experiment and adapt as he worked. “he painted slowly and carefully, always adjusting his forms and paint to achieve a premeditated effect” (Cole 70). Titian’s experimentation with the new medium of oil and glazes allowed him to depict light and paint with luminosity never seen before and bring his paintings to life. His adaptation to and incorporation of existing architecture and his novel concept of perspective that took into account a moving viewer also contributed to his innovation.
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