What emotions is this person feeling?
Orazio Vecellio
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Bright emotions
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Not at all Extremely
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Quiet emotions
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Not at all Extremely
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Heavy emotions
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Not at all Extremely
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Sombre emotions
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Not at all Extremely
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Orazio Vecellio
Date
c. 1550–1565
Description
Creator of the image: Titian
Date of the image creation: c. 1550–1565
Medium of the image: Oil on canvas
Person depicted: Orazio Vecellio
This evocative image leaves itself open to a number of quite different interpretations. In the painting, three human faces and three animal faces are depicted. Titian’s mature son and assistant, Orazio Vecellio is the focus of this detail from the full painting. He is depicted above the image of a lion. Written in the background is a Latin sentence that translates as, ‘From the experience of the past, the present acts prudently, lest it spoil future actions’.
In the full painting the youthful Marco Vecellio, Titian’s nephew and assistant, is on the right, depicted above the image of a dog. Titian himself appears on the left as an old man, above the image of a wolf. The three men can be thought of as representing the ages of a person — youth, maturity and old age — or possibly past, present and future. It could be about the inheritance of Titian’s property, the portrayal of an artistic dynasty, or about sin and penitence across a lifetime.
The great Italian master known in English as Titian (c. 1488-1576) was a seminal figure in the sixteenth century. He painted this 'Allegory of Prudence', a complex and symbolically rich image, towards the end of his long life.
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Choose different variables below, and see the patterns of response reflected in the circle of emotion above. Your responses are the coloured wedges. Others' responses are averaged in the spider graph of lines and dots.
