, the great master of colour, was born at the castle of Caclor in
, the great master
of colour, was born at the castle of Caclor in Friuli, 1480.
His education under Sebastiano Zuccati, of Trevigi, and
afterwards under Giovanni Bellini, rendered him a diligent
and subtle observer of every object that strikes the senses:
so that when at a inaturer age he entered into a competition of finish with Albert Durer, and painted at Ferrara the
picture of “Christ with the tribute-mon^y,
” now at Dresden, he excelled, in nicety of penciling, that master of
minuteness; with this difference of result, that though the
hairs on the heads and hands of his figures might be counted, though every pore of the flesh was discriminated, and
the objects reflected in the pupils of the eyes, the effect of
the whole was not diminished, but seemed to gain more
breath and grandeur by distance. To this work, however,
he made no companion, and at an early period appears to
have adopted that freer and less anxious method found by
Giorgioue, his. fellow-scholar first, and then his rival. Some
portraits painted by Titian during that short period cannot be distinguished from those of Giorgione himself; but
he soon found a new style, perhaps less vapoury, not so
fiery nor so grand; but sweeter a style which ravishes
the beholder less by the novelty of its effect than by a
genuine representation of truth. The first work of this
style, all his own, is the “Archangel Raphael leading Tobiah, in the sacristy of S. Marziale,
” painted in his thirtieth
year; and the “Presentation of the Virgin
” at the Carita,
one of his richest and most numerous compositions remaining (for many perished by fire), is said by Ridolft to have
followed it at a very short interval.