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The Power of the Portrait: Titian’s Construction of Patrician Venetians

During the Renaissance, the people of Venice were consumed, much like our society of today, by the need for social representation and prominence. It seems that for humans, it is never enough to have wealth and success, we must also display our accomplishments for peer recognition, approval, and envy. Such was the case with Venetian nobility of the sixteenth-century; they utilized portraiture to construct and emphasize an image of the ideal elite lifestyle. This paper will explore the fabrication of patrician Venetians’ identity and social standing by taking a comparative look at the formal aspects and histories of four Titian portraits: The Vendramin

Family Venerating a Relic of the True Cross completed between 1550 and 1560 (Fig. 1),

Ranuccio Farnese of 1542 (Fig. 2), Man with a Glove of the early 1520’s (Fig. 3), and Clarissa

Strozzi of 1542 (Fig. 4). The subjects and their attire, inclusion of important historical symbols, and contextualization of the portraits all work to construct and maintain the power of the patrician Venetians’ image.

Before assessing images of patrician Venetians, though, it is important for one to understand the history and conditions of being a part of such an elite group. The Venetian nobility were known for their exclusivity and functioned around the idea that the strength of the family was more important than the power of the individual.1 As such a prominent aspect of

Venetian history, it is interesting to note that prior to the 13th century there was not a distinct and sustaining “nobility.” Noble status was based loosely on who temporarily held a position in the government and who had the most money, but it wasn’t until the creation of the Maggior

1 James C. Davis, The Decline of the Venetian Nobility as a Ruling Class (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1962), 15, 25. !2

Consiglio, the Great Council, that a true Venetian noble class emerged.2 The Great Council was a segment of Venetian government that, over time, became increasingly exclusive to the patrician families through a network of laws passed by existing members that made it next to impossible to gain access without social noble standing.3 By virtue of these laws, the noblemen members had the power to elect their equally elite friends and relatives, further cutting off outside access to an already competitive institution.4 Members of the Great Council filled the important government offices, thus making a certain level of wealth and political influence synonymous5 and by the early fourteenth-century, the patriciate families had a monopoly on political authority.6

By the sixteenth-century, Venetian nobles either worked in government public service or specialized in trade.7 The importance of family success over individual profit still prevailed, and was expressed through the fraterna or family partnership in business matters. Patrician boys were born into familial responsibility, and would start learning the affairs of the family at the age of 15.8 For government affiliated families, young men would come into political adulthood at the age of 20 to 259 and as author Donald Queller notes,

The nobles, who’s birth gave them the right to govern the state, in turn offered to it the most

admirable devotion. From infancy, the young noble was raised to believe that he owed his entire being to

2 Ibid., 16, 28. 3 David Chambers and Brian Pullan, Venice: A Documentary History, 1450 - 1630 (Massachusetts: Blackwell Publications, 1992), 261. 4 Donald E. Queller, The Venetian Patriciate (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1986), 87. 5 Davis, 18. 6 Queller, 29. 7 Davis, 28. 8 Ibid., 26. 9 Chambers and Pullan, 242. !3

the Republic. All his life he willingly subordinated his own interests to the state. He could not refuse

public office. He moved from one duty to another… always working for the good of the city.10

Though noble women were not involved in governmental affairs, they were not free of expectation. For the young women, strict laws were made concerning marriage and childbirth that forbade anyone of non-noble standing from marrying into an elite family. All noble marriages and births were recorded in the Libro d’Oro, the Golden Book, to show that a family’s blood was pure.11 When looking at historical social patterns, it is important to understand the nature of laws which is that they are always made in response to the cultural shifts of the time period. In the case of patrician Venetians, their socially constricting laws and practices are evidence of the cultural importance of constructing a strong elite identity to maintain a certain level of visible and traceable power. And what better a way to represent a lasting noble status than a physical image, the portrait?

The Renaissance ushered in a search for and appreciation of, “beauty, aesthetic, and moral expression,”12 making portrait painting a revered art and one of the most lucrative areas of

Venetian state patronage. To construct their portraits, the Venetian government had strong influence on the artists and their guilds. Like the noble families, the government was opposed to the idea of individual fame, however, they were still able to use portraiture to take political advantage of the arts to achieve a sense of unity. To portray this unification, individual portraits were painted of the government officials wearing the same attire as one another. The result was many visually linked images that together put up a united and powerful front.13 Each Doge was

10 Queller, 14. 11 Davis, 15, 19. 12 Satya Datta, Women and Men in Early Modern Venice: Reassessing History (Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate Publishing, 2003), 89. 13 Chambers and Pullan, 388. !4 also required to have their portrait painted on the frieze of the Hall of the Great Council, many of which were painted by one of the most universally revered and influential painters, Titian.14

In the beginning of Titian’s career as a painter, he wrote to the Venetian government that

“…mastering painting was ‘not so much out of desire for profit as to seek the acquisition of some small fame.’”15 This quote is a revealing insight into the mind of Titian and shows that while he most often painted for patriciate families and the government, his motivation was not their hefty payments but more-so the possibility of recognition via their social connections.

Titian would go on to paint the most distinguished families of the time, among them were the

Vendramin family and the Farnese family. 16 The well-known families boasted their established lineages and legacies through the arts by imaging certain events and including symbols that refer to those events in other paintings.17 Gentile Bellini’s painting, Miracle of the True Cross on the

Bridge of San Lorenzo (1500) (Fig. 5) shows a fourteenth-century member of the Vendramin

Fig. 5 —Titian, Miracle of the True Cross on the Bridge of San Lorenzo, 1500

14 Ibid., 392. 15 Datta, 100. 16 Luba Freedman, Titian’s Portraits through Aretino’s Lens (Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995), 153. 17 Blake de Maria, Becoming Venetian (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010), 28. !5 family, Andrea I, saving the relic of the True Cross. Andrea Vendramin was the head of the

Scuola Grande di San Giovanni Evangelista which received a piece of the True Cross as a donation in 1368. During the customary ritual procession through the city displaying the new relic, the mass of excited people caused the relic to be knocked towards the water. It is said that

Andrea I saved it before it was submerged which can be seen portrayed at the bottom of Bellini’s painting.18 This event is the Vendramin family’s legacy in Venice, and the painted documentation of the event ensures that the story will continue to be remembered and referenced for decades to come.

One such reference to the event at the Bridge of San Lorenzo can be seen in Titian’s, The

Vendramin Family Venerating a Relic of the True Cross (Fig. 1). The family portrait shows all nine male members of the Vendamin family, young and old, gathered around the relic of the True

Cross that Andrea I had saved from the water. This painting is an example of the power and complexity a patrician portrait can have. At first glance, a portrait can appear to just be a simple reconstruction of what a person looks like. The wonder of a portrait is often reduced to how well

Fig. 1—Titian, The Vendramin Family Venerating a Relic of the True Cross, 1550-1560

18 Ibid., 29. !6 the sitter was captured, and the sheer magic of a painter turning paint into a person. On the contrary, though, portraits are much more complex. Certainly the paint as substance and ability to produce a likeness of the sitter is necessary and impressive, but there is much more to a portrait than that; within a portrait the expectations of both the artist and the subject must be met and by extension, the cultural influences and conventions of the time are conveyed.19 The patron’s wishes for their portrait are a reflection of the important personal and political tastes of the time period and reveal much more than just a painter’s aptitude.

The Vendramins imaged in Titian’s family portrait were heirs to the fortune their ancestor

Andrea I had made from manufacturing soap and oils.20 So not only did Andrea Vendramin I provide his family with a symbolic legacy by saving the True Cross, but he positioned them well financially which is what allowed them to become such powerful noble figures. In Titian’s portrait of the family, Andrea I’s great nephews, Gabriele and Andrea are imaged with their children. Gabriele was said to be a good friend of Titian’s and it is through him that this portrait was most likely commissioned.21 The eldest man is thought to be Gabriele while the man in the red cloak at left-center is his brother Andrea. The problem with this assignment, though, is that

Gabriele was three years older than his brother Andrea while the painting puts far more age between them. It is conceivable, then, that though Andrea I would have passed on many years earlier, that the Vendramin family would have still wanted him to be imaged in their family portrait and used an aged Gabriele to, “…suggest the posthumous presence of the Vendramin patriarch Andrea in commemoration of the original receiver of the True Cross and founder of the

19 Freedman, 27. 20 Sheila Hale, Titian: His Life (New York, HarperCollins Publishers, 2012), 413. 21 Ibid., 414. !7 family fortune and its patrician status.”22 The hand Gabriele rests on the relic’s altar as well as his knowing and inclusive gaze that connects to the spectator suggests the presence of Andrea I through him. Without the inclusion of the relic at the top right of the painting much of the meaning of the portrait would be lost. The True Cross is a historical symbol of the role the

Vendramin family played in Venice and the subsequent power that the family would gain in the years to come.

Titian’s portrayal of the family as inviting to the spectator is important for the construction of a subliminally powerful image. The subjects’ hands placed over their hearts in veneration for the relic softens the image while the stairs that lead to the edge of the painting seem to be inviting viewers to join in the admiration of the symbol of the family’s legacy.23 In this case, the religious prominence of the relic is not of importance, but rather it is the family’s role in the relic’s journey that is being commemorated. Gabriele was said to have asked for this painting to be made so that it would be a reminder to all the Vendramins to come that, “their welfare depended on this precious and protective object of veneration.”24 The gazes of Gabriele and one of the Vendramin children in the bottom right corner combine to symbolize the power of the family that once was, in Andrea I’s time, and the power of the family that is to continue through its youngest heirs. In this portrait, the family’s historically significant symbol of the True

Cross and the connection between the gazes of young and old capture 200 years of the

Vendramin family’s history and foreshadow their sustaining noble status.25

22 Ian G. Kennedy, Titian (Germany: Taschen, 2006), 61. 23 Ibid. 24 Hale, 415. 25 de Maria, 29. !8

The Vendramin’s weren’t the only patriciate family who felt the need to image their healthy and capable children to represent the continuation of their power in the future, among many, the noble Roman Farnese family did the same. Though the Farneses weren’t Venetian,

Titian’s portrait, Ranuccio Farnese (Fig. 2), was painted from Venetian soil. At the time the portrait was painted, the sitter Ranuccio was eleven years of age and had been living in Venice since the age of four as a part of the church of San Giovanni di Malta.26 Ranuccio was the second youngest of Pope Paul III’s four grandsons, putting him in a position of expectation and obligation to assume a position of power once he was to come of age.27 Because of the high status of their parents, children from noble families were often painted as if they were adults.28

Such is the reason for Ranuccio’s attire in his portrait; the knightly dress he wears is a reflection of the grown-up responsibilities that were being projected onto the young boy. He is dressed as a

Knight of Malta who were crusaders that worked to protect pilgrims on their way to the Holy

Land and started many hospitals along the way. Ranuccio’s attire is important because though he

Fig. 2—Titian, Ranuccio Farnese, 1542 26 Hale, 436, 437. 27 Ibid., 436. 28 Kennedy, 62. !9 is not of age to be a knight, his clothing reflects the expectations of his family to take up knighthood. Titian painted the Maltese Cross, the symbols of the Knights of Malta, hovering above Ranuccio’s sword handle to show his preparedness to fight and the future strength of the family.29

While Ranuccio’s portrait is evidence of familial strength, it is also a show of the family’s wealth. The prosperity of the family is represented in the portrait in two aspects of the subject’s attire: his undershirt and gloves. The ruffle of his undershirt that shows itself around his collar is a symbol of the wealth of his family because undershirts were considered a perk that only the noble classes could enjoy. Thus, the sly reveal of multiple shirts shows that one was wealthy enough to afford such a luxury. The gloves that Ranuccio holds in his hand are another social symbol of the noble class. Gloves kept the hands clean and were removed when greeting someone of notability. Again, gloves symbolized that a person would be interacting with elite individuals on a regular basis and needed the gloves to be prepared for such meetings. The symbol of gloves can be seen in another of Titian’s portraits, Man with a Glove (Fig. 3).

Fig. 3—Titian, Man with a Glove, early 1520’s

29 Professor Allan Langdale, “Reading Venetian Portraiture,” Lecture, University of California, Santa Cruz, March 1, 2017. !10

Man with a Glove is unique because though there is no indication as to whom this individual is, we can tell from his attire that he is a man of nobility. His undershirts are even more prominently displayed around the collar and wrist than Ranuccio’s and his gloves are presented at the forefront of the image. This portrait uses the subject’s attire as a strong show of nobility and wealth by framing both the white undershirt and gloves against a solid dark background. With this framing technique, these symbols of wealth become the subject’s concetti, the signifiers of the essence of the person’s social image.30 The sitter’s face and hand are the only other light points to the image, making the noble status symbolized by the equally lit undershirt and gloves synonymous with the sitter’s face and identity.

A comparison of Ranuccio Farnese’s portrait with one of the earliest independent portraits of a child, Clarissa Strozzi (Fig. 4), emphasizes the maturity of Ranuccio’s portrait though he himself was still a child. Titian’s Clarissa Strozzi shows the daughter of the Strozzi family at two years of age. Like Ranuccio, Clarissa is dressed as if she were an adult, though the discrepancy in ages between the two makes Clarissa’s attire seem even more misplaced than

Ranuccio’s. Clarissa wears pearls and a bejeweled sash that to viewers of today seem like a definite choking hazard. Though her attire is that of an adults, there is still a very childlike air about her. Her dress is white which alludes to the purity of a child and similarly, the addition of the dog gives the portrait an aspect of play as Clarissa holds a treat to it’s mouth. The dog in

Clarissa’s portrait bears a striking resemblance to the dog in the hands of the young Vendramin boys in their family portrait. The addition of a puppy in portraiture, then, can be read as a symbol of youthfulness and the naive and trusting nature of children and dogs. Similar to the puppy, the

30 Freedman, 27. !11 putti that adorn the table in Clarissa Strozzi also represent a youthfulness. They have a similar shape to Clarissa’s own body and introduce an amount of playful movement to the image. One can imagine that after a second of standing for this portrait, the mind of a two-year-old would take hold and Clarissa would be off playing just like the putti.31

Fig. 4 (above)—Titian, Clarissa Strozzi, 1542

Beyond the interest of age and appropriate clothing, the fact that Clarissa is a girl holds a lot of importance. Though Gabriele, from Titian’s portrait of the Vendramin family, had seven daughters, none of them were included in the family’s portrait because it would not have been considered appropriate.32 The idea that the Strozzi family commissioned a great painter such as

Titian to paint an individual portrait of their daughter at such a young age shows not only that the family adored their daughter, but also that they could monetarily afford to image a traditionally unimportant aspect of patrician life. Unlike Ranuccio’s portrait which was painted to show the

31 Kennedy, 62. 32 Hale, 414. !12 powerful future of the family, Clarissa’s portrait seems to be about capturing a moment, and perhaps showing the family’s superfluous wealth.

If portraiture is meant to, as Luba Freedman puts it, “…covey a dominant characteristic of the person portrayed,” and, “…signify the essence of the person’s social image,” it is clear that patrician Venetians would want to use portraiture to emphasize their power monetarily, socially, and politically. As we saw in Titian’s The Vendramin Family Venerating a Relic of the True

Cross, the noble Vendramin’s used portraiture to emphasize their claim to Venetian history by including a relic that was historically significant to the wellbeing of their family. Similarly,

Ranuccio Farnese’s portrait attire, looked at in conjunction with Man with a Glove, illustrates the importance of the appropriate dress when constructing an image of noble power and wealth. And lastly, it is Titian’s portrait, Clarissa Strozzi, that is the ultimate show of a family’s surplus of wealth. It is by examining Titian’s portraits of nobility that we may come to better understand the nature of how the Venetian Patriciate exhibited and maintained power through the portrait.