Conservation generously funded by Christopher Todd Page.

The Malchiostro Chapel, also known as the Virgin Annunciate Chapel, was commissioned by the canon Broccardo Malchoistro, who served as the deputy legate of Bernardo de’ Rossi, the humanist bishop of Treviso and a sophisticated patron of the arts. Designed by Tullio and Antonio Lombardo and completed in October 1519, the chapel was further embellished by 1523 with frescoes by Pordenone, an altarpiece of the Annunciation by Titian, and two paintings by Paris Bordon. The chapel was built to serve the Scuola dell’Annunziata, a lay confraternity instituted on 25 May 1519 of which Malchiostro was president for life. Most importantly, the space also functioned as Malchiostro’s funerary monument and personal memorial.

Titian’s Annunciation dates to 1520, just a few years after he finished his Assunta (1516-1518) for the high altar of the basilica dei Frari in Venice. The Annunciation testifies to Titian’s unique ability to transform and in fact revolutionize the structure of devotional art. As with the Madonna di Ca’ Pesaro (1519-1526), in the Treviso Annunciation, the artist experimented with asymmetrical space, classical architecture, light, and portraiture. Rather than conceiving a traditional depiction of the Annunciation with the angel Gabriel on the left, and the Virgin Mary on the right, Titian reshaped the iconography of the scene by placing the Virgin in the left foreground facing the viewer. The angel is seen hastily emerging from the right-center of the scene, as divine rays of sunshine break through the clouds in the upper right. It has been suggested that the cloud should be regarded as a symbol of the Virgin, and the sun emerging from it as a reference to the incarnation of Christ, the Sol splendidissimus. The composition was completed by Pordenone’s fresco of God the Father, who once descended from the dome above (unfortunately destroyed during World War II, in the air raid of 7 April 1944).

The most curious detail of the painting is surely the kneeling male figure in the background, peering from behind the architectural backdrop, a portrait of the patron Broccardo Malchiostro himself. Placed in the midst of the composition, this portrait initially outraged the congregation and the clerics alike, who found it to be ostentatious, if not sacrilegious. Some complained about “having to kneel in front of Malchiostro,” and wished someone would eventually “soil it.” Indeed, in 1526 the portrait was vandalized by an unknown assailant who scraped the portrait, and even smeared it with “pitch and other filthy stuff.”

Until recently, the dating of Titian’s Annunciation relied largely on stylistic evidence, fluctuating between 1512 and 1529. The 2021-2022 conservation treatment has led to exciting discoveries. At the bottom of the painting beneath a retouched area, infrared technology revealed the inscription that acknowledged both the patron of the painting, Broccardo Malchiostro, and the artist’s signature and date of 1520: “TITIANVS P[INXIT] MDXX”. Equipped with the promising results of the non-invasive scientific analysis and after consultation with officials from the Ministry of Culture, conservator Francesca Faleschini removed the non-original overpainting to expose the inscription that had been masked for centuries.

The discovery of the inscription provides invaluable new insight that allows scholars to better understand Titian’s early working methods. It also sheds new light on the role played by Malchiostro in directing and supervising the building of the chapel, demonstrating how bishop de’ Rossi probably had very little to do with the commission of the altarpiece, as once believed.

A comprehensive campaign of testing and analysis using non-invasive methods including UV and Infrared photography provided insight into Titian’s working methods and allowed conservator Francesca Faleschini to devise the best treatment plan. She then removed non-original materials from the painted surface including oxidized varnishes, grime, and disfiguring overpainting added in previous treatments. Any small losses to the pictorial surface were then filled and integrated with conservation paints before a final layer of protective varnish was applied. Panel painting expert Roberto Saccuman also treated the structural problems with the painting’s wooden support. Conservation treatment was completed in 2022.

Titian (c. 1488/90 – 1576)
Annunciation
1520, oil on wood
210 x 178 cm
Duomo di Treviso (Cathedral of Saint Peter Apostle), Malchiostro Chapel

Barbisan, Paolo. “L’Annunciazione di Tiziano nella cappella Malchiostro della cattedrale di Treviso. Vicende storiche.” Studi Tizianeschi, 12 (2022): 168-185

Cohen, Charles E. The art of Giovanni Antonio da Pordenone. Between dialect and language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996, 2 vols.

Faleschini, Francesca. “Intervento di restauro.” Studi Tizianeschi, 12 (2022): 186-189

van Kessel, Elsje. A Portrait Defaced: The Donor Portrait of Broccardo Malchiostro in the Duomo of Treviso. In The Lives of Paintings: Presence, Agency and Likeness in Venetian Art of the Sixteenth Century. Boston and Berlin: De Gruyter; Leiden: Leiden University Press 2017, pp. 81-130.

Rosand, David. Titian’s Light as Form and Symbol. “The Art Bulletin,” 57, 1975, pp. 58-64.

Saccuman, Roberto. “Tecnica costruttiva del supporto e stato di conservazione.” Studi Tizianeschi, 12 (2022): 190-195

Smyth, Carolyn. Insiders and Outsiders: Titian, Pordenone and Broccardo Malchiostro’s Chapel in Treviso Cathedral. “Studi tizianeschi,” V, 2007, pp. 32-75.