photograph Jacopo Robusti il “Tintoretto” –
courtesy MUVE and
Gemaldegalerie - Kunsthistorisches Museum - Vienna
Palazzo Ducale
Tintoretto 1519-1594
To celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth, of Venetian painter Jacopo Tintoretto, one of the giants of sixteenth-century European
painting, at Palazzo Ducale, in the Doge’s Apartment, the exhibition Tintoretto 1519-1594, until January 6,
is curated by the American scholars and great connoisseurs of Tintoretto, Robert Echols and Frederick Ilchman. The exhibition, under the consultative
direction of the director of the Musei
Civici di Venezia, Gabriella Belli is jointly promoted with the National Gallery of Art in Washington,
where it will go on show next year. The exhibition contains fifty autograph
paintings and twenty drawings by Tintoretto, lent by great international
museums, together with the famous cycles painted for the Doge’s palace between
1564 and 1592 – visible in their original position – the exhibition showcases
all the visionary, bold and wholly unconventional painting of Jacopo Robusti, known as Tintoretto.
The son of a dyer, Tintoretto knew how to challenge the tradition embodied by Titian, overwhelming it and choosing to
innovate: not only with daring technical and stylistic solutions, but also with
iconographic experiments that marked a turning point in the history of Venetian
painting of the sixteenth century.
Susannah and
the Elders –
c. 1555
oil on canvas
oil on canvas
photograph Jacopo Robusti il “Tintoretto” –
courtesy MUVE and
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Gift of Marion R. Ascoli
and the Marion R. and Max Ascoli Fund in honor of Lessing Rosenwald
Two self-portraits with which the exhibition opens and closes are
emblematic and revealing; one was painted at the beginning and one at the end
of Jacopo’s career. In particular, in the youthful portrait executed
around 1546/47, defined by the curators as the first “autonomous” self-portrait
in European art, we can already sense the strength of personality, the
ambition and the energy of painting that would connote the whole of Tintoretto’s
career, but also the absolute novelty of his restless and sometimes mysterious
art, with forceful brushstrokes interrupted by highlights of clumps of paint
and that sought-after sense of the unfinished.
Self-Portrait - c. 1546-1548
oil on canvas, 45 × 38 cm
“Jacopo Tintoretto
created a distinctive and enormously influential style, centering on three factors above all. The first is the painterly quality of
his art, with its bold brushwork that emphasizes strong contours as it exploits
and energizes the canvas surface. His innovative pictorial techniques enabled
him to paint rapidly and — with his deft management of a busy workshop that
facilitated ever-larger volumes of production—inspired countless later artists,
from El Greco and Rubens to French painters of the romantic
period. Second, Tintoretto’s
efficient working methods were grounded in the fundamental building blocks of
his compositions: muscular human figures in dynamic motion. Facial expressions
and physical settings are of less consequence than the energies that flow
through the active human body. Third,
Jacopo deserves recognition as perhaps the most dedicated practitioner of
religious painting in Italy,
certainly in Venice, during the
second half of the sixteenth century.”
The Curators
Frederick Ilchman and Robert Echols
preface - catalogue - Tintoretto 1519-1594 – Marsiglio
Study from a Model of a Standing Male Nude
black chalk – heightened with white – blue paper – recto and verso
Simone Bianco – Active 1512-1553
Portrait Bust in Antique Style – Julius Caesar – Marble
black chalk – heightened with white – blue paper – recto and verso
Simone Bianco – Active 1512-1553
Portrait Bust in Antique Style – Julius Caesar – Marble
Venus, Vulcan and Cupid – 1545-1546
Oil on canvas
Oil on canvas
“Contemplating Jacopo
Tintoretto’s Crucifiixion at the
church of San Cassiano in Venice, the writer Henry James exclaimed, “It seemed to me
I had advanced to the uttermost limit of painting.” Today, five centuries after
his birth, Tintoretto’s works continue to astonish. Even to audiences familiar with
abstract expressionism, action
painting, informalism, and the
gigantic proportions of some contemporary
art, Tintoretto’s superhuman scale,
dynamism, bold brushwork, and often-hallucinatory combination of fantastic and quotidian worlds still push at the boundaries of what painting can
encompass. Although often linked with Titian
and Veronese as one of the
foremost painters of sixteenth-century
Venice, Tintoretto remains an artist unlike any other.”
Gabriella Belli
- Fondazione
Musei Civici di Venezia
Paola Marini - Gallerie dell’Accademia - Venice
directors’ foreword - catalogue - Tintoretto 1519-1594 – Marsiglio
Paola Marini - Gallerie dell’Accademia - Venice
directors’ foreword - catalogue - Tintoretto 1519-1594 – Marsiglio
Gabriella Belli
photograph Jacopo Robusti il “Tintoretto” –
courtesy MUVE and Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, John Stewart Kennedy
Fund
Doge Alvise Mocenigo Presented to the Redeemer – 1571-1574
oil on canvas, 97 × 198 cm
oil on canvas, 97 × 198 cm
Photograph
Manfredi Bellati
Tarquin and Lucretia – c. 1578-1580 - detail
oil on canvas
oil on canvas
This
story of the rape of the virtuous matron Lucretia
by the son of the last king of Rome
was frequently depicted as an allegory of wifely virtue. Tintoretto
presents a scene of brutality and struggle, as the villainous Tarquin drags Lucretia towards him with
her own garment, toppling one of the bedposts and breaking her pearl
necklace. Notice home some of the
falling pearls still hang in mid-air – a superb example of a Tintoretto Freeze- Frame.
Photograph
courtesy MUVE
Tintoretto at Palazzo Ducale - Sala degli Inquisitori – ceiling-detail
The Return of the Prodigal Son
Faith – Justice - Harmony – sides
The Return of the Prodigal Son
Faith – Justice - Harmony – sides
Tintoretto an extraordinary storyteller, skilled
director of painted actions, and sophisticated colorist, who used the full range of
pigments available in the Venice of his time. Tintoretto reveals himself as a fascinating interpreter in all the different
genres he explored, from religious
subjects to great history paintings,
and from portraiture to profane and mythological themes, of
which the exhibition offers illuminating examples thanks to loans from
important museums all over the world and from some prestigious private
collections.
The Abduction of Helen – c.1576-1577
oil on canvas
oil on canvas
The Wedding of Ariadne and Bacchus – 1578
oil on canvas
oil on canvas
A Young Man of the
Doria Family –
c.1560
oil on Canvas
oil on Canvas
Jacopo Tintoretto and
Workshop
The Nativity – 1571 with reuse of earlier figures
oil on canvas
The Nativity – 1571 with reuse of earlier figures
oil on canvas
Mariacristina Gribaudi
President - Musei Civici di Venezia
President - Musei Civici di Venezia
Paola Marini –
director Gallerie
dell'Accademia di Venezia
Mattia Agnetti - Organizing Secretary MUVE
Mattia Agnetti - Organizing Secretary MUVE
Photograph
courtesy MUVE
Minerva Protecting Peace and Abundance from Mars – 1578
oil on canvas, 148 × 168 cm
Palazzo Ducale - Venice - conservative treatment - financed by Save Venice Inc – 2018
https://savevenice.org/
Melissa Conn – director Venice office Save Venice Inc.
Daniela Ferretti – exhibition designer and director Palazzo Fortuny
Jacopo and Domenico
Tintoretto
Saint Justina with Three Treasures and Their Secretaries – 1580 oil on canvas
Saint Justina with Three Treasures and Their Secretaries – 1580 oil on canvas
Self-Portrait – c. 1588
oil on canvas
oil on canvas
Around Venice – Project
Tintoretto 500
Besides the two
major exhibitions - The Young Tintoretto
at the Gallerie dell’Accademia di
Venezia and Tintoretto 1519-1594
at Palazzo Ducale don’t miss the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, one of the
key points for the master’s activity, it is the custodian of an imposing series
of paintings. Also, the Patriarchal Curia with its many churches that still today conserve
precious works by Tintoretto.
Fundamental for all this has been the support of Save Venice Inc. which over these past two years has sponsored the
technical examination and restoration of many of the artist’s masterpieces in Venice (eighteen paintings and the
artist’s tomb), so allowing the public now to admire them in all their
splendor, either in the two major shows or on a tour of the city specifically
arranged by the Fondazione Musei Civici
di Venezia in collaboration with the Patriarchal
Curia.
