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English Pages 239 [254] Year 2005
PHILLIPS ACAO
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Titian and Tragic Painiing
Thomas' Puttfarken
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TITIAN
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PAINTING Painting Aristotle’s Poetics and the Rise of the Modern Artist * C- > ” ■
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Thomas Puttfarken
Late in his life Titian created a series of paintings - the ‘Four Sinners’, the ‘poesie’ for his patron Philip n of Spain, and the ‘Final Tragedies’ - that were dark in tone and content, full of pathos and physical suffering.
In this major reinterpretation ofTitian’s art, Thomas Puttfarken shows that the often dramatic and violent subject matter of these works was not, as is often argued, the consequence of the artist’s increasing .uB and sense of isolation and tragedy. Rather, these paintings were influenced by discussions of Aristotle’s Poetics that permeated learned discourse in Italy in the mid-sixteenth century. The Poetics led directly to a rich theory of the visual arts, and painting in particular, that enabled artists like Titian to consider themselves on equal footing with poets. Puttfarken- investigates Titian’s late works in this context and analyses his relations with his patrons, his intellectual and humanistic contacts and his choices of subject matter, style and technique. a
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