Here I’m posting some photographs I took of the back of Titian’s 1520 painting “Madonna and Child with Saints Francis and Alvise with the Donor Alvise Gozzi” from Ancona’s picture gallery. While the photographs aren’t great, I thought I’d put them up because I haven’t seen any others on the web. The black chalk drawings are on the reinforcing panels behind the picutre panel and have been known since 1948 – 51, when Giovanni Urbani restored the picture.
Titian | Detail of Back of Ancona Altarpiece | Black Chalk on Wood Panel | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
Titian | Madonna and Child with Saints Francis and Alvise with the Donor Alvise Gozzi | Oil on Panel | 320 x 206 cm. | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
Titian | Back of Ancona Altarpiece | Black Chalk on Wood Panel | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
Titian | Detail of Back of Madonna and Child with Saints Francis and Alvise and the Donor Alvise Gozzi | Black Chalk on Panel | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
Titian | Detail of Back of Ancona Altarpiece | Black Chalk on Wood Panel | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
Titian | Detail of Back of Ancona Altarpiece | Black Chalk on Wood Panel | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
Titian | Detail of Back of Ancona Altarpiece | Black Chalk on Wood Panel | 1520 | Pinacoteca | Ancona
The most worked up head is probably a study for the Christ Child, and not one of the flying putti, because of the hint of halo. Its direction differs from both Christ’s and the putti heads. The other heads, usually in profile, are more doodle caricatures. Harold Wethey thought that the Christ Child’s head and the head of a woman should be considered autograph and the others school. Bert Meijer, with slight reservation, thought the drawings all by Titian. This seems more sensible. Great masters shouldn’t be precluded from the great fun of doodling.
References –
Giovanni Urbani, “Schede di restauro,” Bollettino dell’Istituto Centrale di Restauro, Nos. 9 – 10, 1952, pp. 61 -79.
Bert W. Meijer, “Titian Sketches on Panel and Canvas,” Master Drawings, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Autumn 1981), pp. 276 – 353.
Harold E. Wethey, “Titian’s Drawing of a Christ Child in Ancona,” Burlington Magazine, Vol. 124, No. 950 (May, 1982), pp. 294 – 290.
Two amazing 15th century drawings are Jan Van Eyck’s St. Barbara (Royal Museum, Antwerp) and Giovanni Bellini’s Lamentation (Uffizi, Florence). Both are on gesso covered panels and painted with fine, fine brushes. The Bellini is a large work and measures 74 x 118 cm., and the Van Eyck small at 31 x 18 cm. They are often referred to as grisaille paintings. To me they are much more drawings than paintings, and if I were a drawings curator at the Uffizi or in Antwerp, I’d surely agitate to have them in my department. The limiting of drawings to paper or animal skin supports seems too arbitrary.
Jan Van Eyck | St. Barbara | 1437 | Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten | Antwerp
Giovanni Bellini | Lamentation | Tempera on Panel | 74 x 118 cm. | c. 1490 | Galleria degli Uffizi | Florence
Bellini | Lamentation | Detail
Scholars are undecided as to whether these are finished or unfinished works. To modern eyes, it would seem insane to do such detailed works, only to be covered with paint. (The colored paint in the sky of the Van Eyck work was added later, not by Van Eyck.) Fifteenth century painters were meticulous in their preparation, but to this extent?
The possibilities:
– Unfinished, meant to be completed with paint
– Meant to be exactly as they are
– Meant to be used as teaching/workshop models
Or, maybe we’re dealing with instances of “quit while you’re ahead.”