Sacred and Profane Love. Sacred and Profane Love is an oil painting by Titian, probably painted in 1514, early in his career.
The painting is presumed to have been commissioned by Niccolò Aurelio, a secretary to the Venetian Council of Ten, whose coat of arms appears on the sarcophagus or fountain, to celebrate his marriage to a young widow, Laura Bagarotto. It perhaps depicts a figure representing the bride dressed in white, sitting beside Cupid and accompanied by the goddess Venus.
The title of the painting is first recorded in 1693, when it was listed in an inventory as Amor Divino e Amor Profano, and may not represent the original concept at all. Although much ink has been spilt by art historians attempting to decipher the iconography of the painting, and some measure of consensus has been achieved, basic aspects of the intended meaning of the painting, including the identity of the central figures, remain disputed.
Two women, who appear to be modelled on the same person, sit on a carved Ancient Roman sarcophagus that has been converted to a water-trough, or a trough made to look like a Roman sarcophagus; the broad ledges here are not found in actual sarcophagi. How the water enters is unclear, but it leaves through a phallic-looking brass spout between the two women, next to an anachronistic coat of arms in the carving.
This belongs to Niccolò Aurelio, whose presence in the picture is probably als
The painting is presumed to have been commissioned by Niccolò Aurelio, a secretary to the Venetian Council of Ten, whose coat of arms appears on the sarcophagus or fountain, to celebrate his marriage to a young widow, Laura Bagarotto. It perhaps depicts a figure representing the bride dressed in white, sitting beside Cupid and accompanied by the goddess Venus.
The title of the painting is first recorded in 1693, when it was listed in an inventory as Amor Divino e Amor Profano, and may not represent the original concept at all. Although much ink has been spilt by art historians attempting to decipher the iconography of the painting, and some measure of consensus has been achieved, basic aspects of the intended meaning of the painting, including the identity of the central figures, remain disputed.
Two women, who appear to be modelled on the same person, sit on a carved Ancient Roman sarcophagus that has been converted to a water-trough, or a trough made to look like a Roman sarcophagus; the broad ledges here are not found in actual sarcophagi. How the water enters is unclear, but it leaves through a phallic-looking brass spout between the two women, next to an anachronistic coat of arms in the carving.
This belongs to Niccolò Aurelio, whose presence in the picture is probably als
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