# Art > Art & Art History >  Giorgione and the Venetian School

## stlukesguild

I have gone out of my way to see the works of any number of artists in real life in retrospectives and exhibitions... but I can only think of a single exhibition that so overwhelmed me that I had to go back... driving some 400+ miles... a second time... and only a week later. I had traveled to Washington DC with three artist friends to see an exhibition of *Anselm Kiefer*'s paintings at the Hirschhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. The show was quite impressive... with several paintings that struck me as truly masterful. Yet at the same time I could not help but recognize that Kiefer's work was somewhat limited. So much gray... and so many charred and wasted landscapes... and so many allusions to the horrors of WWII and the Holocaust. It was like watching _Schindler's List_ again and again. Undoubtedly, it is a brilliant film... but how many times in a row can you watch it without wanting to slit your wrists? I found myself calling out for something that spoke of life and sensuality and color... and then we headed over to the National Gallery. At the same time as the Kiefer exhibition, there in the National Gallery, was a visiting exhibition of Venetian Renaissance painters... primarily *Giovanni Bellini, Giorgione*, and *Titian*.

The Italian High-Renaissance is commonly seen as being divided between the Florentine/Roman School and the Venetian School. The Florentine/Roman School, exemplified by *Michelangelo* and *Raphael* stressed sculptural form, sharp contours, clean, bright colors and even light. The Venetian School stressed color first and foremost, atmosphere, soft contours, and sensuality. There have been many theories for the divide between the Florentine/Roman and Venetian Schools put forth by art historians... all containing a degree of truth. Some have pointed out the fact that the Florentine/Roman painters benefited from direct exposure to the examples of Classical Roman statuary. Others have pointed out that the Florentine/Roman preference for egg-tempera and fresco reinforced a linear/sculptural approach to painting. Some have even pointed out that the homosexuality of major Florentine/Roman artists (*Donatello, Leonardo, Michelangelo*) and the church dictates against the use of the nude female models resulted in a focus upon the more sculptural male figure.

By way of contrast, the Venetians developed a preference for oil painting... and pushed the possibilities of this medium far further than anyone else. Up until this point, the primary approaches to painting were fresco (painting on wet plaster) and egg-tempera. Smaller "panel" paintings were rendered in egg-tempera... a fragile media that needed a stable surface such as a wood panel to minimize cracking. Egg-tempera is an incredibly time-intensive medium. To achieve the illusion of a gradual modeling of form, the painter must layer dozens... even hundreds of layers of single-hair brushstrokes in a cross-hatching method. *Botticelli*'s painting, _Primavera_, took over a year to complete... with the artist painting 8-12 hours a day, 6 days a week:


-Sandro Botticelli- _Primavera (Spring)_

Not only did egg-tempera make painting extremely time-consuming... and thus expensive... but being painted on wood panels... in the days before plywood... made the paintings... especially a large painting like _Primavera_... quite heavy and difficult to move or transport. The medium also limited the amount of changes a painter might make to a painting. Large scale composition changes were nearly impossible... requiring the surface be sanded down and the new passages be feathered into the old.

Oil painting was developed in the North by Netherlandish painters such as *Jan van Eyck*:


Jan van Eyck- _The Arnolfini Wedding_

and *Rogier van der Weyden*:


Rogier van der Weyden- _St. Luke Drawing a Portrait of the Madonna and Child_

These Flemish masters had discovered that they could achieve the most brilliant colors and the most subtle modeling of forms by the application of thin, semi-transparent layers of oil paint (known as "glazes") over an under-painting of egg-tempera. Quickly they discovered that egg-tempera could be done away with all together. Art patrons and collectors across Europe were in awe of the phenomenal detail and illusion of real space and form that the Flemish painters could achieve. Naturally, they were quite protective of their techniques. 

The development of oil painting in Venice, owes much to fortune. The painter, *Antonella da Messina*, settled in Venice, bringing with him the knowledge of the new technique. 


Antonella da Messina- Portrait of a Young Man


Antonella da Messina- _St. George in his Study_

There are various notions as to how da Messina acquired a grasp of oil painting, but the best theory is that he learned the technique from *Jan van Eyck*'s pupil, *Petrus Christus*:


Petrus Christus- _Portrait of a Young Lady_


Petrus Christus- _The Annunciation_

As both *Antonello* and *Petrus Christus* were in Milan at the same time... and as *Antonella* left Milan with a grasp of oil painting while *Petrus Christus* soon after exhibited the first examples of the use of linear perspective in Northern painting (a development then known only to the Italians), there is a strong likelihood that the two artists exchanged "trade secrets". 

Settling in Venice, the technique of oil painting spread from *da Messina* to the leading Venetian painters... including *Giovanni Bellini*:


Giovanni Bellini- _Portrait of a Gentleman_


Giovanni Bellini- _The Portrait of Doge Leonardo Loredan_

The early Italian attempts at oil paint did not vary far from the Flemish models. The primary concern remained cracking. But with time it became apparent that oil paint had a flexibility that avoided this problem. At the same time, Venice was asserting itself as a cultural center... but was unable to compete with the epic fresco paintings of Florentine masters such as *Giotto, Fra Angelico, Simone Martini*, etc... The humidity and constant flooding of Venice led to the rapid deterioration of attempts at fresco... and painting on an epic scale on wood panels was wholly impractical. Again, fortune came to the aid. Do they not say "Necessity is the Mother of Invention." Venice, as a great naval power, had developed into a leading maker of canvas for sails... made with Flemish linen. At some point it was recognized that the flags on ships and decorations on the sails were essentially paint on canvas, and so the artists began to experiment with oil on canvas... primed with rabbit's skin glue to avoid the deterioration of the linen fibers caused when oil came into contact with the fabric. The artists began timidly... but soon realized that oil paint held up incredibly well... and that they could work in a direct manner... without detailed drawings... immediately on the canvas... making changes as they saw fit.

For much of the later 15th century, the Bellini Family dominated painting in Venice. There was *Giovanni Bellini*'s father, *Jacopo Bellini*:


Jacopo Bellini- _The Annunciation_


His brother, *Gentile Bellini*:


-Gentile Bellini- _The Miracle of the Bridge of San Lorenzo_

and their Brother-in-Law, *Andrea Mantegna*:


Andrea Mantegna- _The Arrival of the Cardinal Francesco Gonzaga_

Giovanni began his career as a talented and poetic painter and was quickly recognized as the leading painter in Venice. He established stylistic conventions that would be followed by later Venetian artists such as his approach to the theme of the Madonna and Child:


Giovanni Bellini- _Madonna and Child_

And his large altarpiece paintings that are among the first epic-scaled paintings in Venice:


Giovanni Bellini- _The Baptism of Christ_


Giovanni Bellini- _The San Zaccaria Altarpiece_


Giovanni Bellini- Detail from the _San Zaccaria Altarpiece_

These painting began to establish the Venetian tradition of atmospheric painting. Bellini establishes the _sfumato_ ... the softened, smoky edges that suggests the illusion of depth as edges become increasing blurred as the recede in space. This technique will be famously adapted by Leonardo da Vinci in the landscape backgrounds of his paintings:


Leonardo da Vinci- _La Gioconda/Mona Lisa; Portrait of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Francesco del Giocondo_

But Bellini and the Venetians bring to this technique a brilliance of color... owed to the Flemish painters. This was achieved through layers of semi-transparent "glazes" until that the paintings literally glow like stained glass. 

Bellini stands as one of the great artists of art history whose work continued to grow and develop as the artist was open to ideas developed by younger artists. The two most important younger painters in Venice were *Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco* (or *Giorgione*) c. 1477/8  1510, and *Tiziano Vecellio* (or *Titian*) c. 1488/1490  27 August 1576. In spite of his short life span and limited oeuvre, *Giorgione* is one of the most important painters in the history of Western Art. If the greatest loss to music due to an early death was Mozart or Schubert, *Giorgione*'s premature death must be among the greatest losses to the visual arts.

In the ten years, from 1500 until *Giorgione*'s death in 1510, the triumvirate of* Bellini, Titian,* and *Giorgione* worked so closely together... physically and stylistically... that it is often difficult to discern who painted what. 500 years later, there remain disputes concerning major paintings.

Giorgione's early works echo elements of Bellini's portraits...


Giorgione- _Portrait of a Man_


Giorgione- _Portrait of a Gentleman_


Giorgione- _Portrait of Francesco Rovera_

Yet by the time of his _Portrait of a Gentleman_...


Giorgione- _Portrait of a Gentleman_

... he is already suggesting stylistic elements that will later be employed by *Titian*...


-Titian- _Portrait of a Gentleman in Blue Sleeves_

... and eventually *Raphael*...


Raphael Sanzio d'Urbino- _Portrait of Baldasarre Castiglione_

and even *Rembrandt*:


Rembrandt van Rijn- Sketch after Raphael's _Portrait of Baldasarre Castiglione_


Rembrandt van Rijn- _Self Portrait_ 1659

*Giorgione*'s religious paintings build upon *Bellini*'s use of atmosphere and brilliant color. Some art historians have suggested that these elements owe much to the natural environment of Venice... the humidity as a result of the location of Venice leading to a blurring of edges... and refraction of colors. The effect in person is almost akin to that of stained glass... as the paintings virtually glow.


Giorgione- _The Holy Family_


Giorgione- _Sacrae Conversazion_


Giorgione- _Sacrae Conversazione_


Giorgione- _The Virgin and Child in a Landscape_


Giorgione- _Judith_


Giorgione- _The Adulteress Brought before Christ_ 


Giorgione- _The Madonna and Child Enthroned_


Giorgione- _The Judgment of Solomon_


Giorgione- _Moses' Trial by Fire_

Whatever the truth may be, few paintings have ever glowed as richly as those of the Venetian School... and it is not surprising that many painters deem the School of Venice... from Bellini through *Tintoretto, Veronese,* and *Tiepolo*... 


Tintoretto- _The Birth of the Milky Way_


Veronese- _Perseus and Andromedae_


Giovanni Battista Tiepolo- _Apollo and Daphne_

...as the peak of Western painting. While the art historian, *Giorgio Vasari* was rather dismissive of the whole Venetian School, this was to be expected. *Vasari* was himself a painter... deeply schooled in the lessons of the Florentine/Roman School and artists such as *Michelangelo* and *Raphael* who stressed line and form... drawing above all else. The Venetian School stressed color and brushwork... and as such they would become the model for all future "painterly" approaches... including *Peter Paul Rubens*:


Sir Peter Paul Rubens- _The Judgment of Paris_

... Rococo painters such as Boucher...


Francois Boucher- _Portrait of Mademoiselle O'Murphy_

... Romantics such as Delacroix...


Eugene Delacroix- _Algerian Women_

... the Impressionists...


Pierre Renoir- _La Loge_

... and beyond:


-Henri Matisse- _Zora on the Terrace_


Philip Guston- _For M._

One of *Giorgione*'s last religious paintings is the magnificent _Adoration of the Shepherds_.
This is one of those paintings open to dispute as to authorship. There are elements suggestive of *Bellini*'s last paintings, and some suggest it was begun by Bellini. There are also elements that point toward early *Titian*... and paintings such as *Noli me tangere*:


Titian- _Noli me tangere_ ("Touch me not...")

Whatever the case may be, the _Adoration of the Shepherds_ is an absolutely stunning painting... and one of my absolute favorites. I never fail to spend a good time with it whenever I visit Washington D.C. and the National Gallery.


Giorgione (Bellini?)- _Adoration of the Shepherds_

The structure or composition of paintings prior to the *Giorgione* and the Venetian School tends to be obvious... often based on geometric structures. If we were to make a comparison to literature, we might draw an analogy with formally structured works such as sonnets... or Dante's _terza rima_. *Giorgione* and the Venetian School employed a far more organic approach to composition. Again, if we were making a comparison with literature, we might draw a comparison with Wordsworth or Whitman and a far freer structure. *Giorgione* ties the _Adoration of the Shepherds_ together with a repetition of arches... the cave moth, the bodies of the participants, the shrubs, and even the rocks... but the effect is as if this were all natural... not as if the artist had intentionally composed the work, but rather as if he had merely painted what was before his eyes.

*Giorgione*'s most innovative works are those that some have termed "poesies". These are paintings in which the artist has broken with the expectation that outside of the realm of portraiture (and the genre of landscape has yet to have evolved) the goal of all painting is to illustrate a narrative... from history, from literature, from mythology... or from the Bible. The painter today takes it for granted that he or she may paint whatever comes to mind... whatever interests them. But prior to *Giorgione*, this was not so. 

Looking at a painting such as _Nymphs, Children, and Shepherds in a Landscape_:


Giorgione- _Nymphs, Children, and Shepherds in a Landscape_

... we are immediately baffled as to just what the hell the subject is. Ultimately, it is just what it is: nymphs, children, and shepherds lolling about in some bucolic landscape. WE can struggle to uncover some Greco-Roman mythology involving Venus and other goddesses... but there are no elements to suggest such.

Let's look at another of the poesies: the _Landscape with Sunset_:


Giorgione- _Landscape with a Sunset_

There are few (if any) true landscapes prior to those of Albrecht Dürer...


Albrecht Dürer- _House by the Pond_

At a time in which travel was dangerous and the great untamed distances between cities were filled with bears and wolves and highway robbers, nature... and landscape... had not yet been romanticized. And yet... here *Giorgione* seemingly offers a painting that is first and foremost a landscape. There is a figure rearing on a horse before a serpent... possibly St. George... and there's a couple of men sitting in the foreground... one apparently helping the other with his boot (perhaps he's broken or sprained an ankle)... but the painting is essentially a landscape... one of the first in the genre.

Another painting that has similarly baffled art historians is the so-called "Tempest":


Giorgione- _The Tempest_

What we are presented with is an image of a nearly nude woman breastfeeding in the forest landscape outside a city. To the left stands a soldier, and the dark clouds and a flash of lighting suggest an on-coming storm... the "tempest" of the title. Some have suggested that the painting represents the flight of the holy family into Egypt... but to present Mary nude would have verged upon heresy. And where is Joseph? Who is the soldier? Where are any symbols that might lead us to recognize that this is indeed an image of the Holy Family? Where painters were expected to illustrate known narratives employing recognized symbols and iconography, _Giorgione_ has essentially invented a narrative of his own... and challenged us to interpret it.

This is as true of his stunning nude, the so-called _Dresden Venus_:


Giorgione- _The Dresden Venus_

The absolute wealth of female nudes in Western painting has resulted in a failure by many to recognize just how innovative this painting by *Giorgione* was. *Giorgione* has essentially invented the genre of the "reclining nude". Where *Botticelli*'s _Primavera_ revived the Greco-Roman tradition of the _Three Graces_ and his _Birth of Venus_...


Sandro Botticelli- _The Birth of Venus_

... revived the tradition of the Greco-Roman standing Venus... especially per the example of the _Medici Venus_...


Roman after a Greek original: _The Medici Venus_

*Giorgione*'s Dresden Venus in one fell swoop virtually establishes the tradition of the reclining nude. There were Etruscan and Roman precursors to *Giorgione*'s reclining figure... but these are nearly all clearly portraits... or representations of Venus or other goddesses. But is we look at *Giorgione*'s sleeping nude, there is absolutely nothing that suggests that she is indeed Venus. *Giorgione* has simply presented us with an image of a beautiful nude woman sleeping in the warm hills outside of Venice. Where art historians often argue that the purpose of painting the nude has some higher, symbolic value... *Giorgione* offers us a painting in which he has simply painted a beautiful nude woman because he finds her attractive... beautiful. The painterly manner in which she is rendered... the lack of hard contours and sculptural form... and the sensuality of the brushwork, the softened edges, and the warm and atmospheric color stresses the sense of touch.

Subsequent artists would jump on the subject after Giorgione opened the door. Shortly thereafter we get *Titian*'s _Venus d'Urbino_:


Titian- _Venus d'Urbino_

and in the 19th century, we get *Manet*'s *Olympia*:


Edouard Manet- _Olympia_

Both paintings outraged members of the audience for the simple reason that like *Giorgione*'s audacious painting, they did not disguise the sexual or erotic _raison d'etre_ behind the work.

*Giorgione*'s most famous painting, along with the _Dresden Venus_, most certainly must be the stunning _Fête champêtre_:


Giorgione (Titian?)- _Fête champêtre_

This is yet another painting open to dispute with regard to authorship. Some art historians ascribe the painting to *Titian*... or suggest that it may have been completed by *Titian*, while others... pointing to the open-ended narrative... attribute the work to *Giorgione*. This painting again became the source of a work by *Manet*, _Le déjeuner sur l'herbe_:


Edouard Manet- _Le déjeuner sur l'herbe_

*Manet* was astutely struck by the fact that the _Fête champêtre_ was essentially nothing more than a painting of a couple of fashionable dressed young men accompanied by a couple of naked women sitting about enjoying the landscape on a warm summer's day. *Manet* recognized that the subject matter of the _Fête champêtre_... or rather its lack of any legitimate narrative... was diffused by the perfume of time. One of the prize possessions of the Louvre, no one questioned what was really going on in the _Fête champêtre_... but when *Manet* ironically modernized the theme matter and set the same subjects in a park in 19th century Paris, the result was outrage. 

There have been attempts to assign a narrative to the _Fête champêtre_. Some have suggested that the manner in which the men seem oblivious to the presence of the nude women as well as the classical robes of the woman on the left implies that the women are actually invisible muses to the pair of musicians. Regardless, *Giorgione* has again presented us with an open-ended narrative... rather than a clear illustration of a known narrative using accepted symbols and iconography.

I had the chance to see the _Fête champêtre_ in person in the National Gallery, Washington some few years ago. The painting absolutely glows and exudes an unbelievable sense of warmth and atmosphere. It stands among my favorite paintings of all time.

The year before he died, *Giorgione* completed work on the so-called _Three Philosophers_:


Giorgione- _The Three Philosophers_

The work was commissioned by Taddeo Contarini, a Venetian merchant with an interest for occult and alchemy. It was later partially reworked by *Sebastiano del Piombo* and the painting was cut down... somewhat unbalancing the work. Again, the subject matter of the painting is left open-ended and uncertain. Some have suggested that the three men represent three Greek Philosophers... and there are constant disputes as to just which philosophers. Another intriguing interpretation suggests that the three men represent the three great Abrahamic religions: the bearded figure on the right being Moses (or Abraham), holding the law; the turbaned central figure representing Muhammad, and the young, seated figure being Matthew of Patmos writing down his visions and Revelations. Still other interpretations suggest the three represent the 3 Magi, or the ages of European Civilizations (the Classical Age, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance), or merely the Three Ages of Mankind (Youth, Middle Age, Old Age). The manner in which the young man looks into the darkened void of the cavern is especially intriguing (Matthew... Youth looking into the future?). Again, the painting glows with a sensuality and a warmth that will be valued by generations of subsequent painters.

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