Renaissance_ A Short History, The - Johnson, Paul [70]
This epitomizing spirit is beautifully illustrated in his great painting in London’s National Gallery, Bacchus and Ariadne. It was one of three that Titian created for Alfonso d’Este, duke of Ferrara, for a camerino (small room) in his castle there. The duke had wanted the room to contain work from all the leading painters of the day, but for one reason or another Raphael and Fra Bartolommeo and Michelangelo did not contribute, and Titian incorporated their ideas in the three paintings (oil on canvas) he supplied, as well as what he had learned from Giorgione. The Bacchus is an amazingly vivid and accomplished work: vigorous figures and plenty of action, an enchanting child faun, dogs and leopards and a snake, rich colors for vestments, magnificent trees, a subtly painted landscape, a dazzling sky that was to become an overworked cliché in the hands of later practitioners, such as Poussin, but was then new and fresh—the whole worked cunningly into a composition of magical variety, balance and unity. This was the Renaissance at its opulent maturity, serene and self-assured, fascinating in detail, powerful in its central thrust. It and similar works became the standard against which the best painters measured themselves for two centuries.
Titian also laid down the parameters within which portraiture would be conducted. He moved from the typical Renaissance head and shoulders (often in profile) to the half length, three quarter and even full length. He painted the face from all angles. He got the most out of the richest possible draperies and garments in strong, warm colors. He painted the emperor Charles V on his warhorse with huge success, thus setting another fashion that lasted until the age of Bonaparte. He painted Pope Paul III, specialized in conveying shiftiness, piety and austerity. He painted scores of beautiful women, clothed and unclothed, dwelling on their voluptuousness, their sensuality and occasionally their intelligence. His portraits filled the rich, the powerful and the famous with awe and made them queue to sit for him, and drove other painters back to their studios itching to use the brush in emulation. The brushwork was the key, because although Titian drew well in his youth, few drawings from later periods survive. He worked directly on the canvas, with only slight underdrawing and often with no preliminary sketches at all. This was contrary to all the best practice in the view of the Florentines, who thought that a work should be composed in line and underlay, then completed by applying paint on top of the already existing tonal structure. But Titian might well have argued that the real world is composed not of lines but of forms and that color is part of the forms, intrinsic to them. He built up the forms with color, not lines. It allowed for spontaneity, abrupt changes of mind or atmosphere; it unleashed the genius of a master painter. In a way, it was as great a change as the use of oil paint itself. It is the method most painters have followed ever since. But it is open to abuse, and as he became an old man, Titian abused it. He stopped using underdrawing at all and laid down layers of paint on which to build his structures. His brush strokes became thicker and cruder, and he used his fingers as well as his brushes. Sometimes the effects he thus achieved were sensational, but more often they make you long to get back to the time of Giorgione.
The golden age of Venetian Renaissance painting was brought to an end and the work of Titian complemented by a coda in the shape of Jacopo Robusti, or Tintoretto (c. 1518–94). He came from a family of local