In Moscow, an exhibition of paintings by Titian

Last week, an extraordinary exhibition was opened at the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts (Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts). As part of a large art project, 11 paintings of Titian were brought to Moscow. At home in Italy, all canvases are in different museums, so this exposition is a good opportunity to enjoy the best examples of the work of the great Renaissance artist, collected in one place. The exhibition will run for three months.

The paintings flew to Moscow on a special flight. Each canvas was “dressed” in a special box that protects the work of art not only from the effects of an adverse external environment, but also from possible damage and accidents. On the plane, on board of which special climatic conditions were created, the masterpieces were delivered accompanied by armed guards. Representatives from each museum will be located next to the paintings throughout the exhibition, monitoring their safety.

The costs of the project were incredibly high. As the curator of the exhibition, Giovanni Villa, noted, only the amount of insurance coverage is about 1.5 billion euros. Note that the most expensive canvas to date, Titian was sold for 360 million euros. The very process of organizing this very complex exhibition took 4 years and was accompanied by numerous negotiations. And it’s easy to understand. Today, Titian is an absolute icon of fine art. He is called the "king of artists and the artist of kings."

Titian’s work had a significant impact on most of the later artists, including Rubens, Goya, Gauguin, Cézan, etc. The Italian side’s interest in holding this exhibition is precisely to show the role of Italy in the artistic Renaissance and the whole world history of art, to tell about the artistic traditions of this small country from the point of view of geography, about what made it great. And from this point of view, cooperation with the Pushkin Museum and the Hermitage, the two largest museums in Russia, comparable in value to the Prado (Madrid) or the Metropolitan Museum (New York), is incredibly important for Italian museums.

The exhibition will present all the main directions in the work of Titian, his portrait and religious painting. A similar exposition in Rome came to see more than 250 thousand people, making it the most visited art exhibition in the last five years.

Speaking about the role of Titian in the development of painting, there are several main points. In his portraits, he always sought to emphasize the social status of a person, especially his clothes. It was he who introduced into the art the image of a beautiful Venetian, with all its characteristic features. In religious painting, Titian literally turned over the canons of his time, catching the essence of the sacred and surpassing everything that had been created before him.

Titian became the first artist who began to use special light in his painting, which scatters color and gives the image in the picture even more realism. He was inherent in a special color palette. Still, talking about shades, art critics use the expression "red of Titian" and "white of Titian". This great artist was able to summarize in his work everything that was in his world and the world of art in general, everything that was created before him. In terms of the contribution to the development of painting, only a few later masters managed to surpass this outstanding Renaissance painter.

Anna Sidorova © Gallerix.ru