Bacchus and Ariadne

Titian (ca. 1488-1576)


Item type:
painting
Date of creation:
1520-1523
Height:
176.5 cm  (69 1/2 in.)
Width:
191.0 cm  (75 3/16 in.)
Technique / Medium:
oil on canvas
School:
Venetian School

Description

The painting was commissioned by Alfonso d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, for the Camerino d'Alabastro (Alabaster Room) in the Ducal Palace of Ferrara, and belongs to a series for which Giovanni Bellini and Dosso Dossi also contributed. Titian’s painting was a substitute for one with a similar subject, commissioned by the Duke from Raphael. The canvas presents the story of the love of Bacchus and Ariadne as inspired by Ovid’s Classical poem (Metamorphoses). The god of wine, accompanied by his followers, alights from his chariot that is drawn by two cheetahs, and jumps towards Ariadne who was abandoned to the Greek island of Naxos by Theseus (his ship is depicted in the picture’s distance). Titian’s canvas shows Ariadne being initially afraid of Bacchus, who later raised her to heaven and turned her into a constellation as represented by the stars above her head on the canvas. Among Bacchus’ followers is a Bacchante with cymbals.

Iconclass

92L12111
Bacchus alights from his chariot or lifts Ariadne up on to it

Instruments [MIMO Code] (notes)

Cymbals [2451]

RIdIM images


Photo © The National Gallery, London

Image URLs

image link 2
Link to image and information at the National Gallery (London).

Bibliographic references

Lucas, Arthur and Joyce Plesters. "Titian's 'Bacchus and Ariadne'", National Gallery technical bulletin 2 (1978) 25-47. Open access: https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/upload/pdf/lucas_plesters1978.pdf (last accessed: 25.05.2017); JSTOR subscription access: http://www.jstor.org/stable/42616250.

Gould, Cecil Hilton Monk. The studio of Alfonso d’Este and Titian’s Bacchus and Ariadne: A re-examination of the chronology of the bacchanals and of the evolution of one of them (London: National Gallery Company, 1969) ISBN 9780901791009.

Shephard, Tim. Echoing Helicon: Music, art and identity in the Este studioli, 1440-1530 (Oxford: Oxford University press, 2014) ISBN 9780199936137.

Thompson, Graves H. "The literary sources of Titian's 'Bacchus and Ariadne'", The Classical journal 51/6 (1956) 259-264. JSTOR subscription access: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3292884.

Holberton, Paul. "Battista Guarino's Catullus and Titian's 'Bacchus and Ariadne'", The Burlington magazine 128/998 (1986) 344, 347-350. JSTOR subscription access: http://www.jstor.org/stable/882494

Fehl, Philipp. "The worship of Bacchus and Venus in Bellini's and Titian's Bacchanals for Alfonso d'Este", Studies in the history of art 6 (1974) 37-95. JSTOR subscription access: http://www.jstor.org/stable/42618080.

Jaffé, David, ed. Titian (London: National Gallery Company, 2003) ISBN 9781857099041.

Bayer, Andrea, ed. Art and love in Renaissance Italy (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2008) ISBN 978300124118.

Humfrey, Peter. Titian (London: Phaidon, 2007) ISBN 9780714897226.

Marek, Michaela J. Ekphrasis und Herrscherallegorie: Antike Bildbeschreibungen im Werk Tizians und Leonardos (Worms: Werner'sche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1985) ISBN 9783884620359.

Bonicatti, Maurizio. "Tiziano e la cultura musicale del suo tempo", Tiziano e Venezia (Vicenza: Neri Pozza, 1980) 461-477. RILM 1984-06756.

RIdIM record id

4985