CF STUDIES JOURNAL 09 - Flipbook - Page 109
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A gamechanger for Giorgione
A gamechanger for Giorgione
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By contrast, Sebastiano del Piombo was assured and
witty in his correspondence, whether with Michelangelo
or Pietro Aretino; his letters were well written in his own
hand. Although nothing is known about Sebastiano’s
education or early life, his letters reveal him to be well
educated, even better educated than Titian. Paintings
now believed to have been by his hand were earlier
attributed to Giorgione, such as the unfinished painting
of the Judgment of Solomon at Kingston Lacy, Dorset, first
attributed to Giorgione by Ridolfi, or the San Crisostomo
Altarpiece, which may be dated to within Giorgione’s
life, as Rodolfo Gallo has shown. Of all Giorgione’s
pupils Sebastiano’s handwriting is closest to the writer
of the inscription, as is evident when compared with
Sebastiano’s letter to Michelangelo of 3 July 1525 (fig. 9),35
but not so close as to identify him as the writer.
Among the three hundred and eighty-nine
correspondents whose letters Aretino included in
his intentionally innovatory book of letters in the
vernacular, Lettere a Pietro Aretino (Venice, 1552),36 only
three were painters, Titian, Sebastiano, and Vasari.
There were only two letters by Titian,37 three from
Sebastiano,38 and three from Giorgio Vasari,39 perhaps a
value judgement from the inventor of a book of letters
in the vernacular on the value of artists’ letters. Only
two architects were represented, Francesco Sansovino
with seven letters and one from Sebastiano Serlio.
Fig. 8 / Letter from Titian to
Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle,
from Innsbruck, 20 October
1548, Madrid, Real Biblioteca
del Palacio Real, RMa., II-2267,
fol. 153.
Although Titian is famous as a letter writer, he
composed very few letters in his own hand. It is
possible to identify his characteristic writing in the
few he composed and also the style of his writing, as
Erica Tietze-Conrat defined it in his literary corpus
in an excellent article.32 Her approach is developed
in Lionello Puppi’s exemplary edition of Titian’s
letters.33 Titian’s correspondence was mostly written
by his literary friends, throughout his entire life, the
most famous “ghost writers” being Pietro Aretino and
Giovanni Maria Verdizotti, whose roles were first
recognized by Carlo Ridolfi. Puppi and others concur
that Titian’s letters to Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle
are in his own hand (fig. 8) and allow us to rule him out
as the author of the inscription in Sydney.34 As TietzeConrat remarked, Titian collaborated with others both
in his paintings and letters, seemingly indifferent to
what we would call attribution or for being responsible
for what was by his hand, in letter writing, but also
maybe in his studio.
Fig. 9 / Letter from Sebastiano
del Piombo to Michelangelo, 3
July 1525, Florence, Fondazione
Casa Buonarroti.
An example of Vincenzo Catena’s handwriting is in
the first of his four wills, written on 3 February 1513,
according to his own testimony on the seventh line of the
first page (fig. 10): “de sua mano proprio” – in his own
hand. Although Catena, the friend of humanists, might
seem the ideal candidate as the author of the inscription,
as a person who could have read and interpreted Dante
with Giorgione, and who could have owned such a book,
he is excluded by his own handwriting as shown in his
testament: if we can take his assertion for real that his
testament is written in his own hand, then alas he is not
the author of the inscription.40
