Titian

Introduction & Top Questions
Early life and works
Mature life and works
- Mythological paintings
- Religious paintings
- Portraits
Late life and works
- Travels and commissions
  - Portraits
  - Religious paintings
- Last years in Venice
  - Portraits
  - Religious paintings
  - Mythological paintings

References & Edit History Quick Facts & Related Topics

Images

Titian: Portrait of the Venetian Painter Giovanni Bellini, 1511–1512

Painting by Titian showing two clothed men playing instruments and two nude women, one seated and one standing by a fountain, in a pastoral landscape with trees and distant buildings.

Painting by Titian showing Christ standing and holding a staff as Saint Mary Magdalene kneels before him, reaching out, with a landscape and buildings in the background.

Titian: Portrait of Gerolamo (?) Barbarigo

Painting Bacchus and Ariadne by Titian shows Bacchus leaping toward Ariadne as she recoils, surrounded by revelers, leopards, and a landscape under a dramatic sky.

At a Glance

Titian summary

Quizzes

Color pastels, colored chalk, colorful chalk. Hompepage blog 2009, arts and entertainment, history and society

Ultimate Art Quiz

Close-up of a palette held by a man. Mixing paint, painting, color mixing.

Artists, Painters, & Architects

63 Questions from Britannica’s Most Popular Visual Arts Quizzes

Tate Modern extension Switch House, London, England. (Tavatnik, museums). Photo dated 2017.

Can You Match These Lesser-Known Paintings to Their Artists?

"The Birth of Venus," tempera on canvas by Sandro Botticelli, c. 1485; in the Uffizi, Florence.

Who Painted the Most Expensive Paintings in the World?

Related Questions

How did Giovanni Bellini influence Titian’s early paintings?
How did Michelangelo’s art affect Titian’s later paintings?
How did Raphael influence Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin?
How did Titian influence painters such as Veronese and Tintoretto?
How did Titian portray rulers in his state portraits?
How did Titian rework paintings before considering them finished?
How did Titian use color and light in his paintings?
How did Titian’s late style help prepare the way for Baroque painters such as Peter Paul Rubens?
How did Titian’s later painting technique differ from his earlier style?
How does Martyrdom of St. Lawrence use light to create drama?
How does Titian depict Jupiter in Danae with Nursemaid?
How does Titian reveal tension within the Farnese family in his group portrait?
How is Assumption of the Virgin organized into earthly and heavenly levels?
How many children did Titian have with Cecilia?
What ancient literary sources inspired Titian’s Bacchus and Ariadne?
What new composition did Titian create in the Pesaro Madonna?
What was Titian’s first independent commission?
When did Titian paint Assumption of the Virgin?
When was Titian born?
Where did Titian spend most of his career?
Where did Titian travel to paint portraits for the Habsburg court?
Where is Titian’s Assumption of the Virgin displayed?
Where was Titian born?
Where was Titian buried?
Which artists’ works did Titian see during his visit to Rome?
Which details in Titian’s Venus of Urbino have been interpreted as allegorical?
Which episode from Ovid’s Metamorphoses is shown in Diana and Actaeon?
Which features of Venetian painting appear in Titian’s work?
Which landscape did Titian add to Giorgione’s unfinished Sleeping Venus?
Which members of the Farnese family did Titian portray in Paul III and His Grandsons Ottavio and Cardinal Alessandro Farnese?
Which miracle of St. Anthony of Padua did Titian paint for his early fresco commission?
Which mythological paintings did Titian make for Alfonso I d’Este at Ferrara?
Which painting established Titian’s reputation as Giovanni Bellini’s successor?
Which project did Titian and Giorgione work on together in 1508?
Which religious paintings did Titian create late in his life?
Who completed Titian’s Pietà after his death?
Who was Titian’s first teacher in Venice?
Who were Titian’s most important patrons?
Who were Titian’s parents?
Why did Assumption of the Virgin cause a sensation when it was unveiled?
Why did Emperor Charles V reward Titian with a knighthood?
Why did Titian move from Pieve di Cadore to Venice as a child?
Why did Titian sometimes let the prepared canvas show through in his late paintings?
Why is it difficult to tell some early paintings by Titian and Giorgione apart?
Why was Titian’s Pietà left unfinished?
Where was Titian born?
What is Michelangelo best known for?
Why is Michelangelo so famous?
How did Michelangelo paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel?
What was Michelangelo like as a person?
What makes Michelangelo a Renaissance man?
Why is Sandro Botticelli so famous?
What was Sandro Botticelli’s family like?
How was Sandro Botticelli educated?
What is Masaccio best known for?

Visual Arts Painting Painters

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External Websites

White Rose Research Online - Titian, Metaphor, and the Body (PDF)
Web Gallery of Art - Biography of Tiziano Vecellio
World History Encyclopedia - Titian
National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - The age of titian
The National Gallery, London - TitianÂ’s Painting Technique before 1540 (PDF)
Art in Context - Titian Tiziano Vecellio - The Famous Renaissance Artist
The Met - Titian
Art UK - Titian
National Gallery Art - Titian
The Art Story - Biography of Titian

Britannica Websites

Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students.

Titian - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)

Titian

Italian painter

Also known as: Tiziano Vecelli, Tiziano Vecellio

Written by

Harold E. Wethey

Professor of the History of Art, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 1946–72. Author of Colonial Architecture and Sculpture in Peru; El Greco and His School; The Complete Paintings of Titian.

Harold E. Wethey

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Britannica Editors

Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....

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Last updated

Sep. 30, 2026 •History

Titian (born 1488/90, Pieve di Cadore, Republic of Venice [Italy]—died August 27, 1576, Venice) was the greatest Italian Renaissance painter of the Venetian school. He was recognized early in his own lifetime as a supremely talented painter, and his reputation has in the intervening centuries never suffered a decline. In 1590, the art theorist Giovanni Lomazzo declared him “the sun amidst small stars not only among the Italians but all the painters of the world.”...

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