Concert Champetre: Giorgione? or Titian

Tabarek Aldabbagh,

 Hello everyone! Today's blog will be about a very famous painting and artist. More so, an article about them.

Le Concert Chapetre, Titian 1509.
(The Louvre, Paris)

 The article I will be discussing is Francis Haskel's "GIORGIONE'S CONCERT CHAMPÊTRE AND ITS ADMIRERS". It talks about Giorgione(c. 1477-1510), an Italian artist, and his painting in detail. The difference is that this article brings something new to light, the audience. It focuses on what kind of audience gravitates towards said painting. "What it may have meant to the man who ordered and paid for it, to the artist's contemporaries and successors, to the critics and historians of the time or later - all this tends to be neglected".(Haksel, 544) This article almost feels like a criticism of the way art historians discuss art. 

     Comparing the information in the article with the information in chapter 13 of Cunningham & Reich's Culture and Values Volume 2. I found that the text glosses over the controversial past of this painting. It's simply mentioned "Giorgione died before he could finish the painting. It was completed by Titian."(Cunningham, 310).  This sentence makes it seem like it was Giorgione's painting, with full creative credit; Titian is only a skilled helper. In the article, however, this is said: "Many people would now deny that the artist who created it was, in fact, Giorgine - over the last ten years or so more and more scholars have come round to the view that it is an early picture by Titian"(Haksel, 544). This flips the script and suggests that Titian deserves more credit than what the text gives. I even went on google and simply searched the painting, and in most links, it is under Titian's name. I even titled it that way for the included picture, as that is what the link provides as truth. 

     This video also discusses the painting, and begs the question, "Giorgione? to Titian?". Of course, it doesn't answer it, as I'm afraid there's no answer.

Pastoral Concert by Giorgione or Titian

     In all honesty, I selected this article because there weren't many available articles that tackled the topic that I wanted to discuss. The JSTOR search engine is quite limiting, for a good reason if I may add, but nonetheless limiting. I appreciated the way this article seems to be speaking to the audience and trying to sound reasonable, not intelligent. Thus, being able to deliver the point across easier. Francis Haskell goes all detective Sherlock Homles on the people that repainted or bought the painting to try and figure everything out, and it is interesting. Unfortunately, he just ends up saying "Does any of this matter? I have shamefully (and perhaps cunningly) left myself no time to answer what is perhaps the only significant question raised by this talk. The Concert Champetre has (with only one or two exceptions) always been loved"(Haksel, 554). I want to answer his question with "no!". I honestly believe that it does not matter anymore since both artists are gone and no longer benefitting from the painting's fame. All that is left to do now is admire it. Which is the point of this article, and as de Piles says "Ha, viola qui est beau!" 

WORK CITED

Francis Haskell, GIORGIONE'S CONCERT CHAMPETRE AND ITS ADMIRERS, July 1971. Journal of the Royal Society of Arts

Cunningham & Reich, Cultures and Values Volume 2.

Pastoral Concert by Giorgione or Titian, Youtube video by LearnoutLoud, June 21st, 2011.