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Titian Masterpieces
I Frari's crowning glory is Titian's 1518
Assunta
(Ascension) altarpiece, showing a
radiant Madonna stepping onto a cloud and escaping this mortal coil in a swirl of
Titian-red robes. Both inside and outside the painting, onlookers gasp and point at
the sight: with careful 2012 restoration by Save Venice, Titian's Madonna is posit-
ively glowing. According to local lore, the glimpse of the Madonna's luminous
wrist has led monks to recant their chastity vows.
Titian upstaged his own 1526 Pesaro altarpiece, a dreamlike composite family
portrait of the Holy Family with the Venetian Pesaro family. The great painter was
lost to the plague at 90 in 1576, but legend has it that in light of his masterpieces,
Venice's strict rules of quarantine were bent to allow Titian's burial inside I Frari.
Side Altars
I Frari's other Madonna masterpiece is in the sacristy: Bellini's achingly sweet and
startlingly 3D
Madonna with Child
triptych. The Capella Corner honours Venice's
patron saint in Bartolomeo's
St Mark Enthroned
, showing the fluffy-bearded saint
serenaded by an angelic orchestra.
Monuments
Setting the stage for Titian's masterpiece is the magnificent marquetry
coro
(choir
stall), with architectural puzzlework details worthy of MC Escher. Baldassare
Longhena's eerie Doge Pesaro funereal monument is hoisted by four burly, black-
marble figures. Disconsolate mourners dab at their eyes with the hems of their
cloaks on Canova's marble pyramid mausoleum, originally intended as a monu-
ment to Titian.
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