'Titian partakes of a cappuccino and a glass of red'
Oil on canvas 240 x 180cm (approx) 1997 The inspiration for this painting came from Titian’s ‘Christ Crowned with Thorns’ (see below). In this work the central figure of Christ is surrounded by soldiers, gesturing and wielding spears, and I enjoyed the vigorous gestures and the movement that connects the figures and flows through the painting. I was reminded by the soldier on the left carrying his spear aloft of an enthusiastic waiter brandishing a very large pepperpot in an Italian restaurant. A few sketches later, Christ became a slightly languid young man surrounded by his friends at a café table, fingering a glass of wine and being brought a cappuccino. My two daughters (one titian-haired) were models, together with several of their friends. I wanted to keep a vigorous sense of movement so that the eye flows around the painting, from the slightly tilted tabletop and up through the raised arms to the angle of the tray of dishes at the top. Titian’s baroque style uses a lot of muscular flesh and drapery, sharply lit against a dark background – I used as many bare limbs as seemed appropriate to the context, plenty of deeply folded fabric, and a contrasted light/dark tonality. The painting was completed in Australia, and the interior props (columns, chairs etc) were an amalgam of Fremantle cafes. The knobs on the chair in the foreground are a response to the decorative armour of Titian’s foreground soldier. |
Titian
'Christ Crowned with Thorns' Oil on panel 303 x 180cm Paris, Louvre |