✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

You have reached the limit of free articles.


To enjoy unlimited access to Culture Whisper sign up for FREE.
Find out more about Culture Whisper


Sign up by Email or Facebook.

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy

Each week, we sent newsletters and communication featuring articles, our latest tickets invitations, and exclusive offers.

Occasional information about discounts, special offers and promotions.


OR
LOG IN

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

Thanks for signing up to Culture Whisper.
Please check your inbox for a confirmation email and click the link to verify your account.



EXPLORE CULTURE WHISPER
✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy
Forgot your username or password?
Don't have an account? Sign Up

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

If you click «Log in with Facebook» and are not a Culture Whisper user, you agree to our Terms & Conditions and to our Privacy Policy, which includes our Cookie Use

Turning tips into memories

Get started Login
  • Home
  • Going Out
    • Things to do
    • Food & Drink
    • Theatre
    • Visual Arts
    • Cinema
    • Kids
    • Festival
    • Gigs
    • Dance
    • Classical Music
    • Opera
    • Immersive
    • Talks
  • Staying In
    • TV
    • Books
    • Cook
    • Podcast
    • Design
    • Netflix
  • Life & Style
    • Beauty
    • Fashion
    • Gifting
    • Wellbeing
    • Lifestyle
    • Shopping
    • Jewellery
  • Explore
  • Kids
  • Benefits
  • Membership
  • Get Started
  • Membership
  • Benefits
Get the Best of London Life, Culture and Style
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
Visual Arts

In the Age of Giorgione review, Royal Academy ★★★★★

12 Mar 16 – 05 Jun 16, Mon - Sun 10am -6pm, Friday 10am - 10pm

This focused survey on the Venetian Renaissance is, in places, mesmerising

By CW Contributor on 8/3/2016

3 CW readers are interested
Attributed to Giorgione, Portrait of a Young Man, c. 1505, Royal Academy London © Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.
Attributed to Giorgione, Portrait of a Young Man, c. 1505, Royal Academy London © Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.
In the Age of Giorgione review, Royal Academy 4 In the Age of Giorgione review, Royal Academy Ali Godwin
This survey of a forgotten Renaissance master and his contemporaries is fascinating, though baggy in the middle.

The boy standing at the parapet turns his head into the daylight to face us. What is he thinking? His expression is ambiguous: withdrawn and yet questioning, serene yet serious. The gaze is so candid; it is as though we have just caught his eye from across the street.


We do not know who painted the Giustiani portrait (left), which hangs in the first room of the Royal Academy’s new exhibition. Experts cannot agree whether it was Giorgione or Titian (in fact, experts agree on close to nothing when it comes to Giorgione. He is the Renaissance’s most elusive protagonist.) What is certain, however, is that the painting sings of the Venetian portraiture that emerged post-Bellini, in the first decade of the 16th Century.


Giorgione, and then Titian, were the masters of this ambient new style, which was powered by suggestion, not description. They clouded over the crystalline daylight that rinsed Bellini’s portraits clean. Half-lit, their paintings are evasive, suspended between intimacy and obscurity.


Both painters used sfumato to great effect: hazy gradations in colour that lend paintings a fire-lit softness (think Mona Lisa). Giorgione’s beloved Terris Portrait is a fine example of this technique; the delicate, smoky brushwork perfectly captures the warm flesh of the man’s face. The artist painted directly onto the panels, suggesting he wanted to capture the man’s expression, immediate and undiluted.


These new portraits also championed naturalism and psychological immediacy. You almost feel as though you are in conversation with the subjects. Giorgione’s remarkable Antonio Brocardo (lead picture) empathises with us; eyes downcast, he turns towards the viewer, clutching involuntarily at his chest. Giorgione’s archer calls back over his shoulder, commanding us to follow.


From the portraits, the In The Age of Giorgione show moves us through two less-than-thrilling rooms, which makes the exhibition sag somewhat in the middle. A forgettable section charts the emergence of landscapes in this period – a fascinating subject, but he selection is dull and its inclusion seems like a passing thought.


From here, we’re shown a selection of devotional works; altarpieces and the like commissioned for churches or for private domestic worship. Whilst there are some wonderful things here, including Titian’s Virgin and Child with St. Anthony and his gleaming Christ and the Adulteress, with its chaotic foreground and merry little sheep at the back. And yet, these works just don’t have the emotional heft of the portraits. They feel remote and fixed; perhaps because, as biblical scenes, they're unambiguous.


There is a mesmerising show hidden somewhere in The Age of Giorgione, struggling to get out. Why these baggy fillers in the middle? Why not survey Venetian Renaissance portraiture alone? (While we’re at it, why not adjust the lighting? The gleam off the surface of the canvas renders many works near-invisible).



But the final room redeems this show. Or, more precisely, its centrepiece does. Giorgione’s remarkable allegorical portrait La Vecchia draws you toward it, at the same time repelling you. We meet a toothless crone, hair falling out of cap, cheeks sagging. Her wrinkled flesh barely concealed by rags, she surveys us with a gaping mouth and knowing grimace. She holds a banner: “Col tempo”, with time. In a room filled with idealised Renaissance belles, La Vecchia reminds us of beauty's decay. 'With time', they'll become her. It is one of the most startling juxtapositions we’ve seen in a gallery.


by Ella Cory-Wright

What In the Age of Giorgione review, Royal Academy
Where Royal Academy, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, W1J 0BD | MAP
Nearest tube Green Park (underground)
When 12 Mar 16 – 05 Jun 16, Mon - Sun 10am -6pm, Friday 10am - 10pm
Price £11.50 (without donation £10). Concessions available. Friends of the RA and under 16s go free.
Website Click here for more details



Most popular

Things to do this weekend. Picture: NYCB's Prodigal Son
Things to do in London this weekend: 26 - 28 February
James Nesbitt and Charlene McKenna in Bloodlands, BBC One (Photo: BBC)
Bloodlands, BBC One review
Andra Day in The United States vs Billie Holliday, Sky Cinema (Photo: Sky)
What to watch on TV this week

A little more...

  • click for the best
    exhibitions in London


  • 1. A TOAST TO THE BEST ART IN 2016

    Book your tickets early for the RA Summer Exhibition Preview Party

    2. SEE THE PAINTERS' PAINTINGS

    The pieces which inspired artists from Van Dyck to Freud

    3. SATISFACTION AT THE SAATCHI

    The first international exhibition dedicated to the Rolling Stones

    4. RODIN'S DANCERS

    Discover some of the artist's most joyous sculptures

What members say

    A great exhibition, informative and well-structured, with a few beautiful masterpieces of Venitian Renaissance. A great length too!

    Eloise Nosworthy

Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).

We recommend nearby

  • Gazelle

    Walking into Gazelle is like entering a private members' club, discreetly signed, upstairs in an Edwardian Mayfair building with its own elevator. It is perfectly possible to dip inside for pre-dinner cocktail. For a post-dinner moody tryst it is most inviting too.

    Read more...
    Book Map
  • Sabor

    Sabor, meaning flavour in Spanish, is all about traditional Spanish ingredients and cooking methods, but with relaxed dining. At their tables, journey from the tapas bars of Andalucía through to the asadors of Castile to the seafood restaurants of Galicia.

    Read more...
    Book Map
  • The Araki

    The first Japanese restaurant in Britain to be awarded three Michelin stars, The Araki has a simple premise: one menu, eleven courses, all sushi. This is seriously high-end, gourmet stuff and you won't experience anything else like it. The restaurant itself is breathtaking with Edo period-inspired décor and a counter made from a two hundred year-old Japanese cypress.


    Read more...
    Book Map
3

Royal Academy Exhibitions 2016

Royal Academy

Renaissance

Giorgione

You might like

  • Venus after Botticelli (2008) by Xin Yin, Guillaume Duhamel. Photograph: Victoria and Albert Museum

    REVIEW: Botticelli Reimagined, V&A ★★★★★

  • The Assumption of the Virgin, Francesco Botticini artist, Probably about 1475-6, National Gallery London

    Visions of Paradise: Botticini, National Gallery ★★★★★

  • The Other Art Fair, West Handyside Canopy

    The Other Art Fair, West Handyside Canopy

  • Detail Agapanthus Triptych Monet © Saint Louis Art Museum, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, and The Cleveland Museum of Art. This exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanit

    Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse, Royal Academy ★★★★★



  • The Culture Whisper team
  • What is Culture Whisper membership
  • Corporate membership
  • Give a gift membership
  • Retrieve a gift membership
  • Contact us
  • Press
  • FAQ
  • Privacy
  • Terms and conditions
  • Cookies
  • Discover
  • Venues
  • Restaurants
  • Stations
  • Boroughs
Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
×