Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco, known as Giorgione, was an Italian painter of the Venetian school during the High Renaissance, who died in his thirties. He is known for the elusive poetic quality of his work, though only about six surviving paintings are firmly attributed to him. The uncertainty surrounding the identity and meaning of his work has made Giorgione one of the most mysterious figures in European art.
The Sleeping Venus, also known as the Dresden Venus, is a painting traditionally attributed to the Italian Renaissance painter Giorgione, although it has long been widely thought that Titian completed it after Giorgione's death in 1510. The landscape and sky are generally accepted to be mainly by Titian. In the 21st century, much scholarly opinion has shifted further, to see the nude figure of Venus as also painted by Titian, leaving Giorgione's contribution uncertain. It is in the Gemäldegalerie, Dresden. After World War II, the painting was briefly in possession of the Soviet Union.
Hecuba is a tragedy by Euripides, written c. 424 BC. It takes place after the Trojan War but before the Greeks have departed Troy. The central figure is Hecuba, wife of King Priam, formerly queen of the now-fallen city. It depicts Hecuba's grief over the death of her daughter Polyxena and the revenge she takes for the murder of her youngest son, Polydorus.
Bacchus and Ariadne (1522–1523) is an oil painting by Titian. It is one of a cycle of paintings on mythological subjects produced for Alfonso I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, for the Camerino d'Alabastro – a private room in his palazzo in Ferrara decorated with paintings based on classical texts. An advance payment was given to Raphael, who originally held the commission for the subject of a Triumph of Bacchus.
The Pietà is one of the last paintings by the Italian master-painter Titian, and in its final, extended state it was left incomplete at his death in 1576, to be completed by Palma Giovane. Titian had intended it to hang over his grave, and the two stages of painting were to make it fit in two different churches. It is now in the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice.
The Allegory of Prudence is an oil-on-canvas painting attributed to the Italian artist Titian and his assistants. The painting portrays three human heads, each facing in a different direction, above three animal heads. It is in the National Gallery, London.
The Feast of the Gods is an oil painting by the Italian Renaissance master Giovanni Bellini, with substantial additions in stages to the left and center landscape by Dosso Dossi and Titian. It is one of the few mythological pictures by the Venetian artist. Completed in 1514, it was his last major work. It is now in the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., which calls it "one of the greatest Renaissance paintings in the United States".
The Eleven Caesars was a series of eleven painted half-length portraits of Roman emperors made by Titian in 1536–1540 for Federico II, Duke of Mantua. They were among his best-known works, inspired by the Lives of the Caesars by Suetonius. Titian's paintings were originally housed in a new room inside the Palazzo Ducale di Mantova. Bernardino Campi added a twelfth portrait in 1562.
Venetian painting was a major force in Italian Renaissance painting and beyond. Beginning with the work of Giovanni Bellini and his brother Gentile Bellini and their workshops, the major artists of the Venetian school included Giorgione, Titian, Tintoretto (1518–1594), Paolo Veronese (1528–1588) and Jacopo Bassano (1510–1592) and his sons. Considered to give primacy to colour over line, the tradition of the Venetian school contrasted with the Mannerism prevalent in the rest of Italy. The Venetian style exerted great influence upon the subsequent development of Western painting.
The Venetian painter Titian and his workshop made at least six versions of the same composition showing Danaë, painted between about 1544 and the 1560s. The scene is based on the mythological princess Danaë, as – very briefly – recounted by the Roman poet Ovid, and at greater length by Boccaccio. She was isolated in a bronze tower following a prophecy that her firstborn would eventually kill her father. Although aware of the consequences, Danaë was seduced and became pregnant by Zeus, who, inflamed by lust, descended from Mount Olympus to seduce her in the form of a shower of gold.
A composition of Venus and Adonis by the Venetian Renaissance artist Titian has been painted a number of times, by Titian himself, by his studio assistants and by others. In all there are some thirty versions that may date from the 16th century, the nudity of Venus undoubtedly accounting for this popularity. It is unclear which of the surviving versions, if any, is the original or prime version, and a matter of debate how much involvement Titian himself had with surviving versions. There is a precise date for only one version, that in the Prado in Madrid, which is documented in correspondence between Titian and Philip II of Spain in 1554. However, this appears to be a later repetition of a composition first painted a considerable time earlier, possibly as early as the 1520s.
Polydorus or Polydoros is the youngest son of Priam in the mythology of the Trojan War. While Homer states his mother is Laothoe, later sources state his mother is Hecuba. Polydorus is an example of the fluid nature of myth, as his role and story vary significantly in different traditions and sources.
Tarquin and Lucretia is an oil painting by Titian completed in 1571, when the artist was in his eighties, for Philip II of Spain. It is signed, and considered to have been finished entirely by Titian himself. It is one of a series of great works from Titian's last years, but unlike some of these, is fully finished. It is now in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England.
The Madonna of the Rabbit is an oil painting by Titian, dated to 1530 and now held in the Louvre in Paris. It is signed "Ticianus f." and is named after the white rabbit held in Mary's left hand. The rabbit is a symbol of fertility and – due to its whiteness – of Mary's purity and the mystery of the Incarnation, and is also a symbol of her virginity; female rabbits and hares can conceive a second litter of offspring while still pregnant with the first, resulting in their being able to give birth seemingly without having been impregnated.
Salome, or possibly Judith with the Head of Holofernes, is an oil painting which is an early work by the Venetian painter of the late Renaissance, Titian. It is usually thought to represent Salome with the head of John the Baptist. It is usually dated to around 1515 and is now in the Doria Pamphilj Gallery in Rome. Like other paintings of this subject, it has sometimes been considered to represent Judith with the head of Holofernes, the other biblical incident found in art showing a female and a severed male head. Historically, the main figure has also been called Herodias, the mother of Salome.
The Tribute Money is a panel painting in oils of 1516 by the Italian late Renaissance artist Titian, now in the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden, Germany. It depicts Christ and a Pharisee at the moment in the Gospels when Christ is shown a coin and says "Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's". It is signed "Ticianus F.[ecit]", painted on the trim of the left side of the Pharisee's collar.
The Gypsy Madonna is a panel painting of the Madonna and Child in oils of about 1510–11, by Titian, now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. It is a painting made for display in a home rather than a church.
Portrait of Eleonora Gonzaga della Rovere is a 1538 painting by Titian, now in the Uffizi in Florence alongside its pair, Portrait of Francesco Maria della Rovere, showing Eleonora's husband. It formed the prototype for some of his later portraits, such as that of Isabella of Portugal.
The Pastoral Concert or Le Concert Champêtre is an oil painting of c. 1509 attributed to the Italian Renaissance master Titian. It was previously attributed to his fellow Venetian and contemporary Giorgione. It is located in the Musée du Louvre in Paris.
Portrait of a Man with a Falcon, also called Portrait of a Man of the Cornaro Family with a Falcon or Giorgio Cornaro with a Falcon, is an oil on canvas painting by the Italian painter Titian. It is variously dated from the late 1520s to the 1540s. The painting is in the collection of the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha.
