Renaissance

Giorgione

Giorgione (c. 1477–1510) was the mysterious pioneer of the Venetian High Renaissance, master of mood, atmosphere and poetic landscape. He died young, leaving only a handful of enigmatic, much-debated paintings.

Back to library View chronology

1477–1510 · Venetian Renaissance painter

Giorgione invented the dreamy, mood-driven painting that Titian and all of Venice would build upon.

Creator story

Surprising fact

The meaning of his Tempest has baffled scholars for centuries — no one is sure who the figures are or what story, if any, it tells.

Source: Wikipedia / Wikimedia

Portrait of Giorgione — Portrait: Wikimedia Commons / Wikipedia.

Pioneered atmospheric, poetic painting in Renaissance Venice.
His Tempest remains one of art's great unsolved mysteries.
Died around 33, probably of plague, leaving very few works.

Key works

A key work by Giorgione

These works make it easiest to see how the artist changed form, content, and the very way art could exist in culture.

1506

The Tempest

In The Tempest, Giorgione makes the structure, scale, and logic of renaissance especially legible.