A Procurator of Saint Mark's
Jacopo Tintoretto·c. 1575/1585
Historical Context
Tintoretto's portrait of a Procurator of Saint Mark's from around 1575-85 belongs to his mature phase of official Venetian portraiture, when he had finally achieved recognition from the state machinery that had long favored Titian. The Procurators of Saint Mark were the most senior officers of the Venetian Republic after the Doge, men of enormous wealth and political authority whose portraits served both personal commemoration and institutional display. Tintoretto's approach gives his procurator portraits a characteristic combination of official gravity and physical immediacy—the sitter inhabits a convincing three-dimensional space rather than posing against the neutral backgrounds of earlier Venetian convention. The black senatorial robes, red under-sleeve, and chain of office are rendered with the material precision appropriate to images of civic authority.
Technical Analysis
Tintoretto's oil on canvas employs his characteristic rapid brushwork and dramatic lighting to animate the official portrait, with the rich crimson robe rendered in broad, confident strokes against a dark background.
Provenance
Francis Richard Charteris, 10th earl of Wemyss [1818-1914], Gosford House, Longniddry, East Lothian, Scotland, by 1886;[1] by inheritance to his son, Hugo Richard Charteris, 11th earl of Wemyss [1857-1937], Gosford House; (Wildenstein & Co., New York), by 1929;[2] sold June 1949 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[3] gift 1952 to NGA. [1] The Gosford House collection was largely gathered by the 7th and 10th earls of Wemyss, so it is possible the painting was brought to Scotland by Francis Charteris, 7th earl (1723-1808) and great-great-grandfather to the 10th earl (see David Carritt, "Pictures from Gosford House," _The Burlington Magazine_ 99, no. 655 [October 1957]: 343). However, the painting does not appear in a 1771 inventory of Amisfield House (transcribed and published in _Transactions of the Society of the Antiquaries of Scotland_ [_Archaeologia Scotica_], vol. 1 (1792): 77-84). Waagen records visits to the collection of Lord Elcho, the future 10th earl, at Amisfield House, and to Gosford House (Gustav Friedrich Waagen, _Treasures of Art in Great Britain_, London, 1854: 2:82, and _Galleries and Cabinets of Art in Great Britain_, London, 1857: 437-441), and although this painting is not mentioned by him, he was not given access to the entire collection and so does not describe it completely. The first certain reference to the painting came when it was included in the winter exhibition of the Royal Academy in London in 1886, and was described as belonging to the collection of the earl of Wemyss. References through at least 1923 continue to place the painting at Gosford Hall, and the previous collection given in the Wildenstein invoice (see note 3) is "Lord Wemyss, Gosford House, Scotland." On the collecting by the earls see: _Pictures from Gosford House Lent by The Earl of Wemyss and March_, exh. cat., National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, 1957; "The Earls of Wemyss and March," in _Dutch Art and Scotland: A Reflection of Taste_, exh. cat., National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, 1992: 171; Shelagh Wemyss, "Francis, Lord Elcho (10th Earl of Wemyss) as a Collector of Italian Old Masters," _Journal of the Scottish Society for Art History_ 8 (2003): 73-76. [2] The painting appears in a Wildenstein advertisement in the 27 April 1929 issue of _The Art News_. [3] The Wildenstein invoice to the Kress Foundation for 16 items, including this painting, is dated 23 June 1949 (copy in NGA curatorial files, see also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/81). The painting is described as "Portrait of Francesco Duodo." Some of the Kress Foundation’s paperwork during the acquisition process includes the title _Portrait of a Procurator of St. Mark’s, possibly Francesco Duodo_.
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