CHAPTER FIVE

THE ENIGMA OF CARPACCIO’S VENETIAN LADIES

The Problem of Artistic Genre

The fragmentary state of the panel by Vittore Carpaccio, and the dispersion of its extant portions, the so-called Venetian Ladies on a Balcony and Hunting in the Lagoon, in two different museums (the Correr Museum in and the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, Figs. 27–29), have promoted various misconceptions in the art-historical literature. Hinges were originally attached to the top and bottom of the left- hand side of the painting in order to adapt it to some function.1 The amputation of the lagoon scene in the upper background from the ladies on the terrace below came later. It cannot be assumed, however, that this was the vandalism of some eighteenth or nineteenth century art dealer; there is evidence indicating that the division dates from the Renaissance. The former misreading of the painting as an intimate family portrait is inconsistent with the original size and iconographical context as we can now tentatively reconstruct it.2 The total height of the present painting, reconstituted from its two extant parts, measures 169.9 cm. The width of the lower section with the Venetian ladies is 63.5 and that of the lagoon scene is 63.8, the difference of only 3 mm confi rming that this was the width of the entire panel from the time the hinges were attached and until the division. Needless to say, there were

1 Regarding the restorations of the Correr painting, see S. Vedovello, “Vittore Car- paccio. Due Dame veneziane,” in A. Dorigato (ed.), Carpaccio, Bellini, Tura, Antonello, e altri restauri quattrocenteschi della Pinacoteca del , Venezia, 1993, 177–85. On the more recent cleaning and restorations of the Getty panel, see Y. Szafran, “Carpaccio’s ‘Hunting on the lagoon’, a new perspective,” Burlington Magazine, 1995, vol. 137, 148–58. For an excellent review of the literature on this painting, including issues of , dating, restoration and the matching of the two panels, see catalogue entry by E.M. dal Pozzolo, in B. Aikema & B.L. Brown, Renaissance Venice and the North, exhibition catalogue, Venice, 1999, 236–39. 2 The suggestion that this is a genre-like enlargement of a portrait was made by J. Lauts, Carpaccio, London, 1962, 251 & cat. no. 83. The double portrait theory was elaborated by F. Polignano, “Ritratto e sistema simbolico nelle Dame di Vittore Carpaccio,” in Il Ritratto e la Memoria, Roma, 1993, 229–51. 96 chapter five

Fig. 28. Vittore Carpaccio, Hunting on the Lagoon, ca.1495, Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum.

Fig. 27. Vittore Carpaccio, Venetian Ladies on a Balcony, ca.1495, Venice, Museo Civico Correr.