2-26 ARTISTS AND AUTHORS TITIAN By Giorgio Vasari* 1477-1576 T' ^itian was born in the year 1480, at Ca- dore, a small place distant about five miles from the foot of the Alps ; he belonged to the family of the Vecelli, which is among the most noble of those parts. Giving early proof of much intelligence, he was sent at the age of ten to an uncle in Venice, an honorable citizen, who, seeing the boy to be much inclined to painting, placed him with the excellent paint- er, Gian Bellino, then very famous. Under his care, the youth soon proved himself to be en- dowed by nature with all the gifts of judgment and genius required for the art of painting. Now, Gian Bellino and the other masters of that country, not having the habit of studying the antique, were accustomed to copy only what they saw before them, and that in a dry, hard, labored manner, which Titian also acquired; but about the year 1507, Giorgione da Castel Franco, not being satisfied with that mode of proceeding, began to give to his works an unwonted softness and relief, painting them in a very beautiful manner ; yet he by no means neglected to draw from the life, or to copy nature with his colors as closely as he could; and in doing the latter he shaded with colder or warmer tints as the living object might demand, but with- out first making a drawing ; since he held that, to paint with the colors only, without any drawing on paper, was the best mode of proceeding, and most per- fectly in accord with the true principles of design. Having seen the manner of Giorgione, Titian early resolved to abandon that of Gian Bellino, although well grounded therein. He now, therefore, devoted himself to this purpose, and in a short time so closely imitated Giorgione that his pictures were sometimes taken for those of that master, as will be related below. Increasing in age, judgment, and facility of hand, our young artist executed nu merous works in fresco which cannot here be named individually, having been dis persed in various places ; let it suffice to say, that they were such as to cause ex-
- Giorgio Vasari, a contemporary of Titian, and himself a painter of no mean rank, wrote a series of lives
of the Italian artists, from which the following is extracted. There are several slight inaccuracies in his work Titian was born, not in 1480, but in 1477, and died in I 576. He was in coloring the greatest artist who ever lived.
