San Francisco, California.- The de Young Museum in San Francisco is proud to present a global exclusive exhibition, “Masters of Venice: Renaissance Painters of Passion and Power From the Kunsthistorisches Museum , Vienna”, on view through February 12th 2012. The exhibition features 50 magnificent paintings by artists such as Titian, Giorgione, Veronese, Mantegna, and Tintoretto, representing the height of Venetian Renassaince painting. Loaned by the Gemäldegalerie (Picture Gallery) of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, these works are among the museum’s most celebrated holdings from art collections built over centuries by the emperors and archdukes of the royal house of Habsburg.
One of the singular movements in the evolution of Western Art, the Venetian Renaissance forged an artistic vocabulary that took full advantage of the poetic potential of rich atmospheric effects, lustrous color and the sensuous beauty observed in nature. Venetian painters of the cinquecento transcended the spatial, textural and respresentational realism of their predecessors to create works unsurpassed in their emotional and sensual depictions, velvety surfaces and glorious treatment of light. Artists in this exhibition such as Giorgione, Titian, Veronese and Tintoretto were legends in their own time and their paintings were highly prized by discerning collectors across Europe.
Works by painters such as Palma Vecchio , Bordone and Bassano demonstrate the full range of Venetian accomplishment in the Renaissance era. Among the highlights of the exhibition are “Saint Sebastian” (ca.1457–1459) by Andrea Mantegna , which represents early Renaissance painting and is the first of three paintings on this subject by the artist. In this work Mantegna incorporates details of ancient sculpture and architecture which organizes the pictorial space through linear perspective.
The exhibition features four rare works by the enigmatic painter Giorgio da Castelfranco, known as Giorgione . “The Three Philosophers” (ca. 1477–1510), one of the most celebrated works of the 16th century, uses an innovative integration of the figures within the spatial continuum of nature which marks a dramatic advance in the evolution of Western representation imagery. Also featured in the exhibition is his beautiful “Portrait of a Young Woman (Laura)” (1506) and pensive “Youth with an Arrow” (ca. 1508–1510). More than a dozen works by Tiziano Vecellio, know as Titian feature, once Giorgione’s assistant, whose talent soon rivaled his master’s. His work is synonymous with the Venetian style — lustrous pigments, sharply graduated light and shadows delineating robust forms such as his sumptuous “Danaë” (1560s) and the mysterious and moody “Bravo (The Assassin)” (ca.1515–1520). The tapestry-like, shimmering and sensuously colored works by Paolo Caliari, known as Veronese including the grand scaled “Annointing of David” (ca. 1555), and the dishonored heroine “Lucretia” (1528–1588), whose creamy skin and sumptuous fabrics divert the viewer’s eye from her suicide blade.
The Gemädegalerie (Picture Gallery) of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna holds one of the world’s most distinguished collections of Old Master paintings. Collected by the emperors and archdukes of the royal house of Habsburg, this collection is one of the world’s four princely collections that rival those in Paris (the Louvre ), Saint Petersburg (the State Hermitage) and Madrid (the Prado ). The Kunsthistorisches Museum was conceived by Emperor Franz Joseph I to house the impressive art accumulated over the many centuries of Habsburg rule and opened on October 17, 1891. Its collections include paintings, decorative arts, armor, Greco-Roman and Egyptian antiquities, coins and musical instruments. Located on Vienna’s grand boulevard the Ringstrasse, near the Museum of Natural History, City Hall, Parliament, the former Imperial Theater and the Opera House, the Kunsthistoriches Museum’s architecture and interior decoration are as magnificent as its collections.
The de Young Museum opened in 1895 as an outgrowth of the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894. It was housed in an Egyptian style structure which had been the Fine Arts Building at the fair. The building was badly damaged in the earthquake of 1906 and was demolished and replaced in 1929 with a Spanish Renaissance style structure. This building was originally decorated with cast-concrete ornaments on the façade. As part of the agreement that created the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco in 1972, the de Young’s collection of European art was sent to the Legion of Honor. In compensation, the de Young received the right to display the bulk of the organization’s anthropological holdings. These include significant pre-Hispanic works from Teotihuacan and Peru, as well as indigenous tribal art from sub-Saharan Africa. The building was severely damaged by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. It in turn was demolished and replaced by a new building in 2005. Constructed of warm, natural materials including copper, stone, wood and glass, the new de Young blends with and complements its natural surroundings. Ribbons of windows erase the boundary between the museum interior and the lush natural environment outside, and four public entrances segue naturally from the park’s pathways, welcoming visitors from all directions. The building’s dramatic copper facade is perforated and textured to replicate the impression made by light filtering through a tree canopy, creating an artistic abstraction on the exterior of the museum that resonates with the de Young’s tree-filled park setting. The building’s copper skin, chosen for its changeable quality through oxidation, will assume a rich patina over time that will blend gracefully with the surrounding natural environment. Currently the de Young’s collection exceeds 27,000 works of art and is renowned for its holdings in American art of all periods, including painting, sculpture, decorative arts, and works on paper; the art of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas; and costumes and textiles representing a wide variety of Eastern and Western traditions. Visit the museum’s website at … http://deyoung.famsf.org