Tintoretto's Portraits Take Center Stage at the Met in New York

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York presents "Celebrating Tintoretto: Portrait Paintings and Studio Drawings," a major exhibition exploring the portrait technique of Jacopo Robusti, known as Tintoretto (Venice, 1519–1594). The show runs from October 16, 2018, to January 27, 2019. Curated by Andrea Bayer and Alison Manges Nogueira, the exhibition features works from the Met's collection, including "Finding of Moses," as well as loans such as "Head of a Man" from the Royal Collection in London and numerous portraits from around the world. The exhibition also examines the relationship between Jacopo and his son Domenico Tintoretto through drawings, sketches, and paintings. Tintoretto, celebrated in Venice over the older and envious Titian, gained prominence first as a portraitist, then as one of the leading artists of his generation. His portraits are characterized by two types of gaze: a more intimate, less austere one revealing the private essence of the sitter, and an official, serious representation following a rigid scheme. In 2019, the world prepares to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Tintoretto's birth. A preceding exhibition in Paris at the Musée du Luxembourg investigated the first fifteen years of his career, addressing the question of who Tintoretto was before becoming Tintoretto.