Gipsy Madonna

The title of the painting became established at an early date and has traditionally been retained. It refers to the fact that this Madonna is of an unusually dark type. Here the young Titian is still closely modelling his Madonna on those of his teacher Giovanni Bellini. Typical of Bellini’s artistic repertoire are the distinctive motif of the fabric hung in the background, the view of a Venetian landscape and the balanced triangular composition. The colours of the main motif return gently and a shade lighter in the landscape, an artistic choice that gives both areas – the intimate closeness of the devotional motif and the idyllic landscape – a prevailing mood of unity. This had also been one of the formal principles of Titian’s teacher. The younger artist emancipated himself in another respect: his special ability to model and characterise the volume of the bodies and the surface of the objects using minimal nuances of colour, sparse white highlights and subdued shadow distinguished him from his Venetian contemporaries, among them Giorgione, who also studied in Bellini’s workshop. © Cäcilia Bischoff, Masterpieces of the Picture Gallery. A Brief Guide to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna 2010