2023-12-12 01:10:04
We have taken a tour of the Prado Museum, stopping in front of some of its best-known portraits to see how the way we age has evolved and to ask ourselves if the real age of the characters corresponds to what we would give them today, with the eyes of the century. XXI. Under this question we propose a game to see if you can guess the exact age of the protagonists of nine paintings that we have selected with the help of Celia Guilarte, museum curator and worker at the Prado, who provides some interesting touches that help us understand the work. and to contextualize it in the historical period in which it was painted. Celia, who has art in her last name, reminds us that all portraits have their intention, that none is casual or neutral; So under this premise we started walking.
How to play?
Swipe and guess the age of the protagonists
Dürer’s self-portrait
1498
Here I was… 0 years old
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Dürer (1471-1528) is 26 years old and does not speculate with age in his ‘selfie’ because his intention is to elevate his status from artisan to artist and for the person portrayed, that is, himself, to convey dignity and bearing, underlining not only his skill with the brush, but also his intellectual vein. Under the window sill you can read “I painted it according to my figure” and it states its age, a note that makes this canvas one of the few works that provides that information, or as Celia Guilarte illustrates, “age forms part of one’s own self-portrait.
Self-portrait of Titian
1562
Here I was… 0 years old
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Titian (ca. 1490-1576) portrays himself as older than he was. At 72 years old, he is already an old man for his time (16th century), but he wants to appear even older so that he can be associated with the previous generation, that of Giorgione, and not the next, that of Tintoretto. Giorgione, the great revolutionary of Venetian painting, was twelve or thirteen years older than Titian and preceded him in generation. Titian dies at the age of 86, long after painting a self-portrait and far exceeding the life expectancy of those times: 60 years for artists (who generally enjoy a quality of life much higher than that of the rest of us), as as collected in ‘The artist grows old’, by Philip Sohn, a curious study of the middle ages of painters dying over the centuries.
Mary Tudor, by Antonio More
1554
Here I was… 0 years old
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Mary Tudor (1516-1558) poses for Antonio More the same year she married Philip II. She is already 38 years old and died at 42. The work belongs to the Germanic school, more ‘realistic’ than the Italian school, the other great current of the time, which tends to ‘sweeten’ severity. Celia Guilarte sees here a “clearly” coded portrait in which she is interested in expressing the attitude of the sovereign of England above her physical appearance. “It is not interesting to show her beautiful because what she has to take precedence is her majestic air and her harsh gesture.” Bloody Mary, as the English popularly called her due to the cruel repression against the Protestants in their attempt to restore Catholicism, is said to have been not very attractive, but she loved Philip II very much, her young 26-year-old husband, and whom He could not give a son, the heir to two great thrones, which could have changed the history of Europe and Spain.
Charles V at the Battle of Mühlberg, by Titian
1548
Here I was… 0 years old
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This painting has its parallels with that of Mary Tudor. We return to the majestic portrait. Charles V (1500-1558) has himself painted as a Roman Caesar, but Titian softens his face by ‘shrinking’ his jaw. Charles V suffered from prognathism, a deformation of the chin so prominent that it prevented him from chewing normally and gave him a complex. “His chin must have been tremendous, he suffered from severe mandibular prognathism,” Guilarte recalls. Of all the artists who immortalized the emperor, Titian is the first to lower his jaw and soften the emperor’s physiognomy. Charles V is 48 years old there, but it is not about flattering him by taking away his years (age was not considered something negative, but was associated with leadership and experience) but rather by disguising part of his physical appearance.
Philip II, of Sofonisba Anguissola
1565
Here I was… 0 years old
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Philip II (1527-1598) may seem older to us in this courtly portrait in which the great Sofonisba is recreated in her pose and costume. “Felipe II controls his image a lot,” details Celia Guilarte, who tells an anecdote related to this matter. In 1593, the king ordered a batch of three portraits destined for France to be intercepted because one of them showed him aged. “It seemed to him that he was represented as too old and since he didn’t like it, that painting never left Spain.”
Philip IV, the elder, of Velazquez
1653
Here I was… 0 years old
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Philip IV (1605-1665), grandson of Philip II, does not like to look old either, but this portrait in which he is ‘only’ 48 years old, is titled, ‘Philip IV, old man’, because he already is: the The king is old and the ‘weight’ of an empire in decline is evident on his shoulders. The last of the Philips of the House of Austria preserves the majestic countenance, and still transmits the power of an empire worn down by wars, but in which the Sun still has not set. Celia Guilarte has dusted off a letter that shows how little he Philip IV liked to look old. “I have not sent you my portrait,” the king tells a correspondent, “because none has been made for nine years and I am not inclined to go through the phlegm of Velázquez (they say that the Sevillian artist painted very slowly) as “so as not to see myself getting older.” That said, Velázquez paints the monarch very sober, with an austere black suit and without the apparatus of the fleece, gloves, chairs… and other symbols of power of the Hispanic monarchy.
Charles III, child, in his cabinet, by Jean Ranc
1724
Here I was… 0 years old
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This child portrait of Charles III (1716-1788) is another world compared to the Austrian paintings. The fourth of the Bourbons, portrayed by the Frenchman Jean Ranc in 1724, is only eight years old. «We start from French portraiture, it is no longer Italian or Germanic, and in this case the son of Philip V is portrayed in his transition from childhood to adolescence. He is no longer a child, he is a prince and is shown as a prince, but it is not a severe or majestic portrait, nor does it respond to the typical court portrait. He is kind, childish and I would even say affectionate, and he does justice to his age,” says Guilarte.
María Josefa de Borbón y Sajonia, Infanta of Spain, by Goya
1800
Here I was… 0 years old
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María Josefa de Borbón y Sajonia (1744-1801) is portrayed in this sketch by Goya in preparation for the great painting ‘The Family of Charles IV’, in which the king’s older sister appears in the background on the left, easily distinguishable by her famous false mole on her temple, an ‘accessory’ that in those years was already completely out of fashion. María Josefa looks almost like an old woman even though she was only 56 years old. She appears to be a much older, old-fashioned woman, an infanta who, being the king’s older sister, also had to appear so.
Ferdinand VII with royal mantle, by Goya
1815
Here I was… 0 years old
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Goya always stands out for his ability to capture the psychology of the characters he paints, and in this case he portrays Fernando VII (1784-1833) as if he knew the deepest part of his soul, as if he knew the most intimate secrets of his feelings. thoughts. Here Goya catches the devious gaze of the monarch, who went from being ‘The Desired’ to the ‘Felon King’. It is a portrait painted from life and is a faithful photograph of absolutism. The age of the king, barely 31 years old, is the least important thing. What matters is the costume (which makes him look older), the bearing, the pose, the color… and the introspection of the character that Goya’s mastery brings to light.
And here we conclude this tour of the ‘Ages of the Prado’, in which with the help of the conservator Celia Guilarte we have verified through art how the ages of two or four hundred years ago have little to do with those of now. What would a 48-year-old man say if they called him “old man” like Philip IV in his portrait, or who sees a woman in her fifties looking at María Josefa de Borbón. The game of life continues its course and perhaps in another two or three centuries someone will propose playing the ages again.
Credits
The images of the paintings have been provided by the Museo Nacional del Prado.
#Guess #age #Prados #famous #selfies