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Title:Doge Andrea Gritti (1455–1538)
Artist:Workshop of Titian (Italian, Pieve di Cadore ca. 1485/90?–1576 Venice)
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:40 1/4 x 31 3/4 in. (102.2 x 80.6 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:The Friedsam Collection, Bequest of Michael Friedsam, 1931
Object Number:32.100.85
the artist's son, Pomponio Vecellio, Venice (until 1581; sold to Barbarigo); Cristoforo Barbarigo, Venice (from 1581, as by Titian); by descent to the Barbarigo della Terrazza family, San Polo, Venice; by descent to conte Sebastiano Giustiniani Barbarigo, Padua (by 1861–at least 1881; sold to Lenbach); Franz von Lenbach, Munich (sold to Von Heyl); General Baron von Heyl zu Herrnsheim, Darmstadt (?in 1910); [Kleinberger, Paris, in 1914]; Michael Friedsam, New York (by about 1929–d. 1931)
Florence. Casa Guastalla. "Oggetti d'arte del medio-evo e dell'epoca del risorgimento dell'arte fatta in Firenze," 1861, no. 8 (as "Ritratto di Andrea Gritti Doge di Venezia," by Titian, lent by conte Sebastiano Giustiniani).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Michael Friedsam Collection," November 15, 1932–April 9, 1933, no catalogue.
Dallas Museum of Fine Arts. "30 Masterpieces: An Exhibition of Paintings from the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art," October 4–November 23, 1947, unnumbered cat.
Iowa City. State University of Iowa, School of Fine Arts. "30 Masterpieces: An Exhibition of Paintings from the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art," January 9–March 31, 1948, unnumbered cat.
Bloomington. Indiana University. "30 Masterpieces: An Exhibition of Paintings from the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art," April 18–May 16, 1948, no catalogue.
Milwaukee Auditorium. "Metropolitan Art Museum $1,000,000 Masterpiece Exhibition," March 7–14, 1953, unnumbered cat. (p. 5).
Austin, Tex. City Coliseum. "Texas Fine Arts Festival: Metropolitan Museum $1,000,000 Collection of Old Masters," April 18–26, 1953, unnum. checklist.
Columbus, Ohio. Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts. "International Masterpieces Exhibit," November 8–December 16, 1956, no. 32.
Little Rock. Arkansas Arts Center. "Five Centuries of European Painting," May 16–October 26, 1963, unnumbered cat. (p. 13).
Stamford, Conn. Stamford Museum and Nature Center. "Renaissance Paintings," May 2–17, 1964, no catalogue.
Decatur, Ga. Agnes Scott College. October 1965, no catalogue?
Staten Island Community College. October 9–12, 1969, no catalogue?
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Venetian Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum," May 1–September 2, 1974, no catalogue.
Carlo Ridolfi. Le maraviglie dell'arte. Venice, 1648, part 1, p. 181, as a portrait of Doge Andrea Gritti by Titian, in the Barbarigo collection, San Polo; mentions that there are many copies of the work.
Alessandro De Marchi. Guide. 1856, p. 413 [see Ref. Zeri and Gardner 1973], lists it as a work by Titian.
Pietro Selvatico. "Di alcuni abbozzi di Tiziano e di altri dipinti nella galleria del conte Sebastiano Giustinian Barbarigo in Padova." Giornale di Padova (December 15, 1874) [repr. as pamphlet, Padua, 1875, p. 13], lists "Ritratto in tela di Doge Andrea Gritti (120 x 100 cm.)".
Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle. Unpublished manuscript. [ca. 1875] [Biblioteca Marciana, Venice, 2031/12272/II], notes that the background is repainted, and that the hand is the best preserved part; records an inscription, which he says is modern [see Notes].
G[iovanni].-B[attista]. Cavalcaselle and J[oseph].-A[rcher]. Crowe. Tiziano, la sua vita e i suoi tempi. Vol. 1, repr., 1974. Florence, 1877, pp. 268–69 [English ed., "The Life and Times of Titian," London, 1881, vol. 1, pp. 299–300], state that it may be an authentic work by Titian, later altered by retouching and restoring; identify it with the picture mentioned by Ridolfi [see Ref. 1648].
Detlev von Hadeln inLe maraviglie dell'arte. Ed. Carlo Ridolfi and Detlev von Hadeln. Vol. 1, Berlin, 1914, p. 200 n. 7, gives the location as Kleinberger, Paris, and calls it a workshop picture.
Bernard Berenson in The Michael Friedsam Collection. [completed 1928], pp. 85–86, attributes it to Titian and dates it about 1538; suggests that "it may be the sketch for the effigy of this Doge that was to be placed in the Hall of Great Council no later than 1540".
Oskar Fischel. Tizian: Des Meisters Gemälde. Stuttgart, [1929?], pp. 311–12, ill. p. 95, as in the Friedsam collection; considers the attribution to Titian strengthened by the Barbarigo provenance.
Francis Kleinberger in "Tributes to Dr. Bode." Art News 27 (March 9, 1929), p. 12, gives provenance information.
Detlev von Hadeln. "Dogenbildnisse von Tizian." Pantheon 6 (July–December 1930), p. 490, ill. p. 493, attributes it to Titian.
Lionello Venturi. Pitture italiane in America. Milan, 1931, unpaginated, pl. CCCLXXXII.
Bernhard Berenson. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Oxford, 1932, p. 573.
Bryson Burroughs and Harry B. Wehle. "The Michael Friedsam Collection: Paintings." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 27, section 2 (November 1932), pp. 40–41, no. 69, attribute it to Titian, and state that it is probably unfinished.
"Friedsam Bequest to be Exhibited Next November." Art News 30 (January 2, 1932), p. 13, prints Bryson Burroughs's survey of the Friedsam paintings.
Lionello Venturi. Italian Paintings in America. Vol. 3, Sixteenth to Eighteenth Century. New York, 1933, unpaginated, pl. 515, attributes it to Titian and calls it a late work, possibly painted after Gritti's death in 1538.
Wilhelm Suida. Tizian. Zürich, 1933, p. 81, attributes it to Titian and notes its sketchy appearance.
Bernhard Berenson. Pitture italiane del rinascimento. Milan, 1936, p. 493.
Hans Tietze. Tizian: Leben und Werk. Vienna, 1936, text vol., p. 133; plate vol., p. 303.
August L. Mayer. "A propos d'un nouveau livre sur le Titien." Gazette des beaux-arts, 6th ser., 18 (December 1937), pp. 308–9, calls it an unfinished work by Titian, from his final period.
Harry B. Wehle. The Metropolitan Museum of Art: A Catalogue of Italian, Spanish, and Byzantine Paintings. New York, 1940, pp. 194–95, ill., suggests that it may have been in an unfinished state when bought by the Barbarigo family from Titian's son.
E. Tietze-Conrat. "Titian's Workshop in his Late Years." Art Bulletin 28 (June 1946), pp. 81–82, fig. 2, calls it a preparatory sketch by Titian, later turned into a finished painting, perhaps when it was sold by Titian's son; notes that the version formerly in the collection of Nathan Allen, Kenosha, Wisconsin, was made from the MMA painting.
Hans Tietze. Titian: The Paintings and Drawings. 2nd, rev. ed. London, 1950, pp. 26, 387, fig. 168, dates it about 1540; agrees with Tietze-Conrat [see Ref. 1946] that it is a preparatory sketch by Titian, finished at a later time, and that the Allen version is based on it.
Rodolfo Pallucchini. Tiziano: Lezioni tenute alla Facoltà di Lettere dell'Università di Bologna durante l'Anno 1953–54. Bologna, [1953–54], vol. 1, p. 205.
Josephine L. Allen and Elizabeth E. Gardner. A Concise Catalogue of the European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1954, p. 96.
Gian Alberto Dell'Acqua. Tiziano. Milan, 1955, p. 120, as ascribed to Titian.
Bernard Berenson. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Venetian School. London, 1957, vol. 1, p. 189.
Francesco Valcanover. Tutta la pittura di Tiziano. Milan, 1960, vol. 1, p. 102, pl. 215B [English ed., "All the Paintings of Titian," New York, 1960, vol. 2, p. 129, pl. 215b], attributes it to Titian's workshop.
Simona Savini-Branca. Il collezionismo veneziano nel '600. Padua, 1964, p. 186.
Francesco Valcanover inL'opera completa di Tiziano. repr., 1978. Milan, 1969, p. 112, no. 216, ill.
Rodolfo Pallucchini. Tiziano. Florence, 1969, vol. 1, pp. 82–83, 274; vol. 2, pl. 250, attributes it to Titian and dates it about 1538–40.
Harold E. Wethey. The Paintings of Titian. Vol. 2, The Portraits. London, 1971, pp. 109–10, no. 51, pl. 234, calls it "at best a workshop replica" and dates it about 1535–38; states that it is partly based on the version in the National Gallery of Art, Washington (formerly Czernin collection, Vienna).
Elizabeth E. Gardner. "Dipinti rinascimentali del Metropolitan Museum nelle carte di G. B. Cavalcaselle." Saggi e memorie di storia dell'arte 8 (1972), p. 74, figs. 29, 30–31 (sketches by Cavalcaselle), publishes two sketches made by Cavalcaselle when he saw the picture in about 1875 in the Giustiniani Barbarigo collection in Padua.
Burton B. Fredericksen and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth-Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972, pp. 202, 514, 607.
Federico Zeri with the assistance of Elizabeth E. Gardner. Italian Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Venetian School. New York, 1973, pp. 76–77, pl. 92, state that the face and some other minor elements are by Titian and that the cloak and background curtain were added by another painter in the late sixteenth century or the first half of the seventeenth century; date it to the late 1520s; state that "it is quite reasonable to believe that the picture was only a sketch from life made by Titian for use in portraits to be painted in his workshop".
Mina Gregori, ed. Tiziano nelle gallerie fiorentine. Exh. cat., Palazzo Pitti. [Florence], 1978, p. 351.
Fern Rusk Shapley. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. Washington, 1979, vol. 1, p. 490 n. 9.
Lionello Puppi. "Iconografia di Andrea Gritti." "Renovatio urbis": Venezia nell'età di Andrea Gritti (1523–1538). Ed. Manfredo Tafuri. Rome, 1984, pp. 219, 231 n. 14, fig. 2.
David Alan Brown inTitian: Prince of Painters. Exh. cat., Palazzo Ducale. Venice, 1990, p. 252, under no. 37, observes that it may only be a product of the workshop, but that it seems to depict Gritti's official image.
Annette Weber. Venezianische Dogenporträts des 16. Jahrhunderts. Sigmaringen, 1993, pp. 122–23, no. I.1, attributes it to Titian and his workshop and lists six additional versions of this composition, calling five of them repetitions after the MMA portrait, and the sixth a nineteenth-century copy after one of the repetitions.
Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 79, ill.
Peter Humfrey inThe Age of Titian: Venetian Renaissance Art from Scottish Collections. Exh. cat., Royal Scottish Academy Building. Edinburgh, 2004, pp. 128, 432 n. 5 under no. 37, fig. 119, argues that a variant of this composition (no. 37, private collection) is closer to the sixteenth-century copy in the Palazzo Ducale, Venice, and therefore to the lost original by Titian.
Andrea Bayer. "Collecting North Italian Paintings at The Metropolitan Museum of Art." A Market for Merchant Princes: Collecting Italian Renaissance Paintings in America. Ed. Inge Reist. University Park, Pa., 2015, pp. 94, 124 n. 31.
Old Masters: Evening Sale. Sotheby's, London. December 7, 2016, pp. 72, 74–75, fig. 1, under no. 14.
The painting has been cut down on both sides and at the bottom. The former dimensions are recorded by Selvatico (1874) as 120 x 100 centimeters. Cavalcaselle (1875) and Cavalcaselle and Crowe (1877) record an inscription appearing on a parapet along the bottom of the picture: ANDREAS GRITTI VENETIA[R.] DUX.
A second version of this picture was in the collection of Margaret Allen Whitaker, Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 1971 (formerly Nathan Allen, Kenosha). Humfrey (2004) records a variant in a private collection.
Another portrait of Gritti attributed to Titian, with a different composition, is in the National Gallery of Art, Washington (formerly Czernin collection, Vienna).
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