Titian, 'Portrait of a Lady ('La Schiavona')', about 1510-12

Portrait of a Lady ('La Schiavona')

Titian

Not on display

About the work

Overview

Titian painted this picture when he was in his early twenties, at a time when private portraits of individual women were still rare. We don‘t know the identity of the sitter, if indeed this is a portrait in the traditional sense, rather than a general picture of a woman designed to encourage such commissions. The title La Schiavona, meaning ’the Dalmatian woman‘, was given to the picture in the seventeenth century.

’La Schiavona‘ is self-possessed and has a commanding gaze unlike any woman in an earlier European portrait. Titian’s approach is original not only because the painting is three-quarter length and apparently life-sized but also because it was painted to make an impact from a distance.

The profile bust portrait, inspired by ancient Roman sculpture and cameos, appears to represent the sitter herself but may commemorate a member of her family. It may relate to the contemporary debate about the rival merits of painting and sculpture. The letters ’T.V.' inscribed on the parapet stand for Tiziano Veccellio (Titian).

In-depth

Titian painted this portrait when he was in his early twenties. The title La Schiavona, meaning ‘the Dalmatian woman’, was given to the picture in the seventeenth century. Dalmatia, on the eastern shores of the Adriatic, was a colony of the Venetian Republic from 1420 to 1797.

We don‘t know the identity of the sitter, who appears remarkably self-possessed and has a commanding gaze unlike any woman in an earlier European portrait. The very strong sense of realism and physical presence was also new. The picture is original not only because the portrait is three-quarter length and apparently life-sized – it is unusually large for a portrait – but also because it was painted to make an impact from a distance.

Portraits of women were unusual in Venice and also uncommon in Titian’s work in the early years of the sixteenth century. Those he did paint, with the exception of anonymous beauties, were the wives of great princes. This has led some to believe that this portrait represents Catarina Cornaro (1454–1510), the exiled Queen of Cyprus. However, since she retained her rank in exile she would probably have been portrayed with some evidence that she was a queen, and she does not look much like confirmed portraits of Caterina.

Although she wears two thin gold rings set with gems on her left hand, a fine gold chain around her neck and there are gold threads in her silk hair bag, the woman’s costume is not opulent. Her dress is made of dyed wool, and the tiny tufts of blue and red thread at the neckline suggest that it is woven from both colours. It has been painted with a crimson glaze over a pale ultramarine blue. In his handling and treatment of transparent fabrics, such as the veil over the woman’s shoulders, we see the starting point of Titian’s mature style.

Her dress and hair are very like those of the mother depicted by Titian in his fresco The Miracle of the Speaking Child for the Scuola del Santo, Padua, dated 1511. It seems likely that he used the same model, suggesting that this portrait may not have been commissioned by a Venetian aristocrat but that it was painted by Titian to encourage such commissions, rather than being a portrait in the traditional sense.

Many changes were made during painting. Originally there was part of a circular window in the upper right of the canvas. The shape of the parapet was also altered. As the paint of the parapet has become more transparent with age, the woman’s dress has started to show through the raised portion decorated with the profile relief. Evidence of a foreshortened dish and a skull has also been found, although neither was finished.

The profile bust portrait, inspired by ancient Roman sculpture and cameos, appears to represent the sitter herself but may commemorate a member of her family. It must have prompted Titian’s more educated public to think of the contemporary debate about the rival claims made for the arts, particularly painting and sculpture. If the painting was not a commissioned portrait but was perhaps made from a model in the sitter’s household, it may always have been intended to prove the powers of painting over those of sculpture. The letters ’T.V.' inscribed on the parapet below the woman stand for Tiziano Veccellio (Titian).

Key facts

Details

Full title: Portrait of a Lady ('La Schiavona')
Artist: Titian
Artist dates: active about 1506; died 1576
Date made: about 1510-12
Medium and support: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 119.4 × 96.5 cm
Inscription summary: Signed
Acquisition credit: Presented through the Art Fund by Sir Francis Cook, Bt., in memory of his father, Sir Herbert Cook, Bt., 1942
Inventory number: NG5385
Location: Not on display
Collection: Main Collection

Provenance

Mentioned in a letter of 17th November, 1640 (quoted by A. Venturi in his catalogue of the Crespi collection) addressed to Conte Alessandro Martinengo Colleone of Brescia, who had been outlawed in 1634. It appears from this letter that the Count had obtained the picture from a ‘mercante di negri’. Described in detail in a related document of 12th August, 1641: un quadro di pittura detto la Schiavona dal ginocchio in sù, qual tiene la mano su una testa finta in pietra di marmo bianco, et sotto improntato colie lettere T.V. che è di mano di Titiano pittore. The picture was by this time in the hands of Contessa Giulia Olmo, the wife of Conte Alessandro. In the latter document Contessa Giulia was required to surrender the picture within three days of 12th August, 1641. She had not, however, done so by the 11th November of that year and presumably evaded doing so altogether since Sala’s engraving of 1817 states that the picture was then in the possession of Conte Vincenzo Martinengo of Brescia. Recorded by Crowe and Cavalcaselle (Titian, vol. II, 1877, p. 58) as belonging to Signor Francesco Riccardi of Bergamo who was the brother-in-law of Conte Venceslao Martinengo Colleoni di Cavernago. By 1900 in the Crespi Gallery, Milan. Sold by Crespi, c. 1911–12, to Wildenstein, from whom bought, 1914, by Herbert Cook. Exh. Burlington Fine Arts Club, 1914 (55) (lent Cook), R.A., 1930 (385) (lent Cook). Presented through the N.A-C.F. by Sir Francis Cook, Bart., 1942, in memory of his father, Sir Herbert Cook, Bart.

Additional information

Text extracted from the ‘Provenance’ section of the catalogue entry in Cecil Gould, ‘National Gallery Catalogues: The Sixteenth Century Italian Schools’, London 1987; for further information, see the full catalogue entry.

Exhibition history

2009

Sculpture in Painting

Henry Moore Institute

10 October 2009 - 10 January 2010
2012

Titian's First Masterpiece: The Flight Into Egypt

The National Gallery (London)

4 April 2012 - 19 August 2012
2017

Monochrome: Painting in Black and White

The National Gallery (London)

30 October 2017 - 18 February 2018
2021

Titian’s Vision of Women

Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien

5 October 2021 - 30 January 2022
2023

Masterpieces from the National Gallery

Shanghai Art Museum East

17 January 2023 - 7 May 2023

National Museum of Korea

2 June 2023 - 9 October 2023

Hong Kong Palace Museum

22 November 2023 - 11 April 2024

Chimei Museum

2 May 2024 - 1 September 2024

Bibliography

1886

G.M. Bonomi, Il quadri di Tiziano della famiglia Martinengo- Colleoni, Bergamo 1886
1901

F. Malaguzzi Valeri, 'Un quadro di Tiziano', Rassegna d'arte, I, 1901, pp. 41-3
1907

H.F. Cook, Giorgione, London 1907
1914

C.J. Holmes, '"La Schiavona" by Titian', The Burlington Magazine, XXVI/139, 1914, pp. 15-6
1955

O.J. Brendel, 'Borrowings from Ancient Art in Titian', Art Bulletin, XXXVII/2, 1955, pp. 113-25
1959

Gould, Cecil, National Gallery Catalogues: The Sixteenth Century Venetian School, London 1959
1961

C. Gould, 'New Light on Titian's "Schiavona" Portrait', The Burlington Magazine, CIII/701, 1961, pp. 334-40
1969

H.E. Wethey, The Paintings of Titian: The Religious Paintings, 3 vols, London 1969
1975

C. Gould, Delaroche and Gautier: Gautier's Views on the 'Execution of Lady Jane Grey' and on other Compositions by Delaroche, London 1975
1975

N.T. Grummond, 'Vv and Related Inscriptions in Giorgione, Titian, and Dürer', Art Bulletin, LVII/3, 1975, pp. 346-56
1980

C. Hope, Titian, London 1980
1980

Tiziano e Venezia: Convegno internazionale di studi, Venezia, 27 settembre - 1 ottobre 1976, Vicenza 1980
1983

S.L. Caroselli, 'A Portrait Bust of Caterina Cornaro by Tullio Lombardo', Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts, LXI/1-2, 1983, pp. 47-57
1983

D. Rosand, 'The Portrait, the Courtier, and Death', in D. Rosand and R.W. Hannings (eds), Castiglione: The Ideal and the Real in Renaissance Culture, New Haven 1983, pp. 91-129
1984

P. Hecht, 'The Paragone Debate: Ten Illustrations and a Comment', Simiolus, XIV/2, 1984, pp. 125-36
1987

Gould, Cecil, National Gallery Catalogues: The Sixteenth Century Italian Schools, London 1987
1987

L. Freedman, 'The Schiavona": Titian's Response to the Paragone Between Painting and Sculpture', Arte veneta, XLI, 1987, pp. 31-40
1989

D. Sutton, 'Sir Herbert Cook: An Amateur of the Old School', Gazette des beaux-arts, CXXXI/114, 1989, pp. 301-4
1990

L. Campbell, Renaissance Portraits: European Portrait-Painting in the 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries, New Haven 1990
1992

J. Shearman, Only Connect: Art and the Spectator in the Italian Renaissance, Princeton 1992
1995

A. Luchs, Tullio Lombardo and Ideal Portrait Sculpture in Renaissance Venice, 1490-1530, Cambridge 1995
1996

P. Fortini Brown, Venice and Antiquity: The Venetian Sense of the Past, London 1996
1997

P. Kathke, Porträt und Accessoire: Eine Bildnisform im 16. Jahrhundert, Berlin 1997
1997

R. Goffen, Titian's Women, New Haven 1997
1999

P. Hills, Venetian Colour: Marble, Mosaic, Painting and Glass, 1250-1550, London 1999
1999

B. Aikema and B.L. Brown, Renaissance Venice and the North: Crosscurrents in the Time of Bellini, Dürer and Titian, (exh. cat. Palazzo Grassi, 5 September 1999 - 9 January 2000), Milano 1999
2000

F. Ames-Lewis, The Intellectual Life of the Early Renaissance Artist, New Haven 2000
2000

J. Cranston, The Poetics of Portraiture in the Italian Renaissance, Cambridge 2000
2001

C. Baker and T. Henry, The National Gallery: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
2001

P. Joannides, Titian to 1518: The Assumption of Genius, New Haven 2001
2001

F. Pedrocco, Titian: The Complete Paintings, London 2001
2001

G. Fiorenza, 'Pandolfo Collenuccio's "Specchio d'Esopo" and the Portrait of the Courtier', I Tatti Studies, IX, 2001, pp. 63-87
2001

L. Iamurri, '"Questo bellissimo quadro ha una lunga storia": Note sulla vendita della "Schiavona di Tiziano"', Ricerche di storia dell'arte, LXXIII, 2001, pp. 49-56
2002

E. Carrara, 'Francesco Sansovino letterato e intendente d'arte', Arte veneta, 59, 2002, pp. 229-38
2003

D. Jaffé (ed.), Titian, London 2003
2003

J. Dunkerton and M. Spring, 'The Technique and Materials of Titian's Early Paintings in the National Gallery, London', Restoration, III/1, 2003, pp. 9-22
2003

C. Hope et al., Titian (exh. cat. The National Gallery, 19 February - 18 May 2003; Museo Nacional del Prado, 10 June - 7 September 2003), London 2003
2003

P. Holberton, 'To Loosen the Tongue of Mute Poetry: Giorgione's Self-Portrait as "David" as a Paragone Demonstration', in T. Frangenberg (ed.), Poetry on Art: Renaissance to Romanticism, Donington 2003, pp. 29-47
2003

T. Frangenberg (ed.), Poetry on Art: Renaissance to Romanticism, Donington 2003
2004

E. Danziger, 'The Cook Collection: Its Founder and Its Inheritors', The Burlington Magazine, CXLVI/1216, 2004, pp. 444-58
2006

P. Hills, 'Titian's Veils', Art History, XXIX/5, 2006, pp. 771-95
2006

D.A. Brown et al., Bellini, Giorgione, Titian and the Renaissance of Venetian Painting (exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 18 June - 17 September 2006; Kunsthistorisches Museum, 17 October 2006 - 7 January 2007), New Haven 2006
2007

F. Russell, 'Titian: Canvas Joins and Design', Studi tizianeschi, V, 2007, pp. 182-8
2008

E.M. Dal Pozzolo, Colori d'amore: Parole, gesti e carezze nella pittura veneziana del Cinquecento, Treviso 2008
2008

G. Cassegrain, 'Titien. Actualité des études', Perspective, 2, 2008, pp. 205-26
2009

P. Curtis (ed.), On the Meanings of Sculpture in Painting (exh. cat., Henry Moore Institute, Leeds), Leeds 2009
2009

V. Deliuevin and J. Habert (eds.), Titien, Tintoret, Véronèse...Rivalités à Venise (exh. cat., Musée du Louvre,Paris), Paris 2009

About this record

If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the National Gallery Library.

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You've viewed 6 of 19 works

Titian, 'Portrait of a Lady ('La Schiavona')', about 1510-12

About the work

Overview

In-depth

Key facts

Details

Provenance

Additional information

Source

Exhibition history

Bibliography

About this record

Images

More works by Titian