MOSCOW, August 7. /TASS/. A Venus and Adonis version exhibited at Moscow’s Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts has been attributed to Titian. Moreover, it has been found to be the earliest version of the painting, the museum’s director, Marina Loshak, said on Monday.
The attribution was done by the museum’s principal researcher Victoria Markova, Doctor of Fine Arts.
The painting is displayed in Russia for the first time, at the exhibition Renaissance Venice. Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese. From Italian and Russian Collections that opened at the museum on June 9.
"Until now, the Venus and Adonis version of Madrid’s Museo del Prado has been generally agreed to be the earliest of the surviving versions. Victoria Markova has not merely made a sensational attribution of the earlier unknown version, she believed from the very beginning that this painting was the original or prime version that was copied by Titian later on," Loshak said.
Markova said she had first seen the painting back in 2005 when a Russian art collector had asked consultancy after buying this painting at that Saint-Germain-en-Laye Auctions as a composition by an unknown Venetian artist.
"Just a glance at the painting was enough for me to see it was a Titian," Markova said, adding that after the restoration of the painting that had been carried out in Venice the picture’s attribution to Titian was backed by a number of acclaimed researchers.
"So, the painting has found a new life. We would like this Venus and Adonis to be part of our museum. So far, we can only promise that after the Renaissance Venice exhibition is over, the painting will stay as part of the museum’s permanent collection for a year," the museum’s director pledged.
The project Renaissance Venice. Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese. From Italian and Russian Collections gives an opportunity to see 23 masterpieces by the three greatest artists in one place. The paintings belong to the collections of Russian and Italian museums, with some of them being never displayed outside Italy.