Marietta Robusti
Encyclopedia
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
painter of the Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
period. She is one of very few known female artists of this period, a group that included Sofonisba Anguissola
Sofonisba Anguissola
Sofonisba Anguissola was an Italian painter of the Renaissance.-The Anguissola family:...
, Lucia Anguissola
Lucia Anguissola
Lucia Anguissola was an Italian mannerist painter.Very little is known about Lucia’s life. No birth records remain, although her death has been traditionally dated to 1565. Few of Lucia’s paintings are known and only two extant are signed.Born in Cremona, Italy...
, Lavinia Fontana
Lavinia Fontana
Lavinia Fontana was an Italian painter.-Biography:Lavinia Fontana was born in Bologna, the daughter of the painter Prospero Fontana, who was a prominent painter of the School of Bologna at the time and served as her teacher...
, and Diana Scultori Ghisi
Diana Scultori Ghisi
Diana Scultori Ghisi was an Italian artist, also known under the name Diana Mantovana.The Renaissance is the first time period where women artists gained international reputations. Perhaps this growth of art among women was due to cultural shifts, such as a move towards humanism, there were many...
.
Biography
The only known primary source for details of Marietta Robusti’s life is Carlo Ridolfi’sCarlo Ridolfi
Carlo Ridolfi was an Italian art biographer and painter of the Baroque period.-Painter:He was born in Lonigo near Vicenza, and died in Venice. He was a pupil of the painter Antonio Vassilacchi . He painted a Visitation for the Ognissanti and an Adoration of the Magi for San Giovanni Elemosinario...
Life of Tintoretto, first published in 1642, although she is mentioned briefly in Raffaelo Borghini’s Il Riposo della Pitura e della Scultura of 1584. These two sources disagree on the year of her birth: according to Borghini, she was born in 1555, but Carlo Ridolfi
Carlo Ridolfi
Carlo Ridolfi was an Italian art biographer and painter of the Baroque period.-Painter:He was born in Lonigo near Vicenza, and died in Venice. He was a pupil of the painter Antonio Vassilacchi . He painted a Visitation for the Ognissanti and an Adoration of the Magi for San Giovanni Elemosinario...
indicates that she was born in 1560.
Marietta was born and died in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
, the eldest daughter of the painter Jacopo Robusti, from whom she inherited her nickname, la Tintoretta (translated as little dyer girl, after Jocopo’s father’s occupation as a tintore, or dyer). She is thus variously known as Marietta Robusti, Marietta Tintoretto, and la Tintoretta.
Since conventions of the time dictated that women remained in the privacy of the domestic sphere and were not welcome in the public world of art production and sale, Marietta and her female contemporaries gained access to the art world through their artist fathers or brothers. Marietta's artistic training consisted of serving an apprenticeship in the collaborative environment of her father’s workshop, where she probably contributed to her father’s paintings with backgrounds and figure blocking, as was the usual distribution of labor in painting workshops of the time.
Evidence suggests that Marietta received no commissions for major religious works such as altarpieces or other church decorations, and that she was mainly a portraitist.
Ridolfi
Carlo Ridolfi
Carlo Ridolfi was an Italian art biographer and painter of the Baroque period.-Painter:He was born in Lonigo near Vicenza, and died in Venice. He was a pupil of the painter Antonio Vassilacchi . He painted a Visitation for the Ognissanti and an Adoration of the Magi for San Giovanni Elemosinario...
describes Marietta’s close relationship with her father at great length. Not only did she learn at his knee, as a child she also liked to dress like a boy so that she could go everywhere with Jacopo. Emperor Maximilian
Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor
Maximilian II was king of Bohemia and king of the Romans from 1562, king of Hungary and Croatia from 1563, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation from 1564 until his death...
and King Philip II of Spain
Philip II of Spain
Philip II was King of Spain, Portugal, Naples, Sicily, and, while married to Mary I, King of England and Ireland. He was lord of the Seventeen Provinces from 1556 until 1581, holding various titles for the individual territories such as duke or count....
both expressed interest in hosting her as a court painter, but her father refused their invitations on her behalf because he couldn’t bear to part with her. In 1578 he arranged for her to marry a Venetian jeweler, Mario Augusta, to ensure she would always stay near him. Jacopo also had Marietta instructed in singing and playing the harpsichord, clavichord, and lute.
She died of unrecorded causes in 1590, and was buried in Santa Maria dell’Orto in Venice.
Attributions and assessment
The only painting that can be conclusively attributed to Marietta Robusti is her Self Portrait (c. 1580; Uffizi Gallery, Florence). This portrait depicts Marietta posed before a harpsichord, holding a musical text that has been identified as a madrigal by Philippe VerdelotPhilippe Verdelot
Philippe Verdelot was a French composer of the Renaissance, who spent most of his life in Italy. He is commonly considered to be the father of the Italian madrigal, and certainly was one of its earliest and most prolific composers; in addition he was prominent in the musical life of Florence...
, "Madonna per voi ardo". It has been postulated that the inclusion of this text, whose opening lines are "My Lady, I burn with love for you and you do not believe it", suggests that the painting was created for a male viewer, possibly Marietta's husband.
Other attributions include: Old Man and a Boy (c. 1585; Kunsthistorisches Museum
Kunsthistorisches Museum
The Kunsthistorisches Museum is an art museum in Vienna, Austria. Housed in its festive palatial building on Ringstraße, it is crowned with an octagonal dome...
, Vienna); Portrait of Ottavio Strada (c. 1567-68; Stedelijk Museum
Stedelijk Museum
Founded in 1874, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam is a museum for classic modern and contemporary art in Amsterdam in the Netherlands. It has been housed on the Paulus Potterstraat, next to Museum Square Museumplein and to the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh Museum and the Concertgebouw, in Amsterdam Zuid...
, Amsterdam); and two small paintings of the Virgin and Child (dates unknown, Cleveland Museum of Art
Cleveland Museum of Art
The Cleveland Museum of Art is an art museum situated in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on Cleveland's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian art, the museum houses a diverse permanent collection of more than 43,000...
, Ohio). Portrait of Two Men (Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister
The Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden features major works of art. It is located in the gallery wing of the Zwinger....
, Dresden), signed "MR", is thought to be Marietta Robusti's only surviving signed work.
See also
Internal Links- Sofonisba AnguissolaSofonisba AnguissolaSofonisba Anguissola was an Italian painter of the Renaissance.-The Anguissola family:...
- Lucia AnguissolaLucia AnguissolaLucia Anguissola was an Italian mannerist painter.Very little is known about Lucia’s life. No birth records remain, although her death has been traditionally dated to 1565. Few of Lucia’s paintings are known and only two extant are signed.Born in Cremona, Italy...
- Lavinia FontanaLavinia FontanaLavinia Fontana was an Italian painter.-Biography:Lavinia Fontana was born in Bologna, the daughter of the painter Prospero Fontana, who was a prominent painter of the School of Bologna at the time and served as her teacher...
- Diana Scultori GhisiDiana Scultori GhisiDiana Scultori Ghisi was an Italian artist, also known under the name Diana Mantovana.The Renaissance is the first time period where women artists gained international reputations. Perhaps this growth of art among women was due to cultural shifts, such as a move towards humanism, there were many...
- High RenaissanceHigh RenaissanceThe expression High Renaissance, in art history, is a periodizing convention used to denote the apogee of the visual arts in the Italian Renaissance...
External Links
- Self Portrait at Scholars Resource (thumbnail)
- Portrait of Ottavio Strada at Web Gallery of Art
- Marietta Robusti in Dictionary of Painters and Engravers: Biographical and Critical by Michael Bryan
- Women Artists in History by Wendy Russ
- La Renaissance- WebMuseum, Paris by Nicolas Pioch