The Feast of the Gods

The painting has two authors, and that is what makes it fascinating. Giovanni Bellini, then in his eighties and the greatest master in Venice, finished it in 1514 for the private study of Duke Alfonso d'Este in Ferrara. Some years later Titian, his former pupil, repainted the landscape at the left and centre, adding the dramatic wooded hill and the bright blue sky to match the other paintings in the room. X-ray studies show Bellini's original screen of trees still lying beneath. Look at the contrast: the figures keep Bellini's calm, precise touch and jewel-like colour, while the mountain behind them has Titian's freer, more atmospheric brushwork. The blue and white porcelain bowls were exotic luxury goods in Venice at the time, and Bellini painted them with obvious delight.

The canvas was one of a set of mythological paintings for Alfonso's Camerino, alongside works by Titian and Dosso Dossi, one of the most celebrated rooms of the Renaissance. The pictures were dispersed in the seventeenth century, and this one passed through Rome and England before the Widener family bought it and gave it to the National Gallery in 1942. It is the only painting from the Camerino in the United States. Notice the small inscription on the wooden tub at the lower right, where Bellini signed and dated his work.

Did You Know? X-rays show that Titian painted his dramatic mountain landscape directly over Bellini's original row of trees.