Jacopo Tintoretto 1519 1594

Unlike Titian and Paolo Veronese, the other two great Venetian painters of the Reniassance, Jacopo Tintoretto (1519-1594) was born in Venice itself. His extensive body of work is strongly rooted in the history, social structure, and cityscape of his birthpalce. Tintoretto brilliantly synthesized the various artistic influences that came together in the melting pot of Venice in the early modern period - Byzantine spirituality, Venetian sensuality, Northern Alpine realism, and Tuscano-Roman idealism. With persistence and ingenuity, and often ignoring his own economic advantage, this prolific artist gave full expression to his imagination on ever larger surfaces. His powers of invention and his orginality of technique were famous far and wide even during his lifetime. They made him a supreme exponent of the artistic representation of spiritual and otherworldly subjects that almost defy depiction. Tintoretto worked tirelessly o the creation of a parallel world in paint, a world that extends in many ways into the real lives of viewers, captivating, alarming or startling them.