Date : between 1742 and 1745
Material : Oil on canvas
Acquisition : Bequest of James Deering (1925)
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European Painting
Painting (Th?me mythologique)
Area related
Italy
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Tiepolo's Tasso Cycle
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1699 - 1770) was the most important and imaginative Venetian painter of the eighteenth century. Among Tiepolo's most lyrical works is this series of four paintings illustrating Torquato Tasso's (1544 - 1595) celebrated poem "Jerusalem delivered (Gerusalemme liberata)", first published in 1581.
In these paintings Tiepolo attempted to create a style that is a visual equivalent of Tasso's exalted poetry. In a fanciful account of the first crusade of 1099 and the subsequent capture of Jerusalem, Tasso described the Christian knight Rinaldo and the enchanting sorceress Armida. In his depiction of Rinaldo's struggle to overcome the charms of Armida and fulfill his mission to save the Holy Land, Tiepolo emphasized the conflict between love and duty.
A recently discovered inventory suggests that the Rinaldo and Armida series was originally displayed in a Venetian palace owned by the eminent Cornaro (Corner) family. Apparently, these four pictures, together with at least three oval paintings (now in the Galleria nazionale d'Arte Antica in Rome and the Norton Simon Art Foundation in Pasadena) and perhaps four narrow, vertical canvases (now in the National Gallery in London) once adorned a chamber in the Cornaro palace known as the "gabinetto degli specchi", or "the small room of mirrors". This location would partly account for the prominence of mirrors and mirrored surfaces in Tiepolo's paintings.
Rinaldo and Armida the Magus of Ascalon
In Palestine, the Magus of Ascalon - a magician - uses Rinaldo's shield to conjure up the heroic deeds of his ancestors, thereby inspiring the knight to engage his enemy in battle and liberate Jerusalem :
Rinaldo, hush'd and still,
Great wisdom heard in those few works compil'd;
The hermit by his bashful looks his will
Well understood, and said; - Look up, my child,
And painted in this precious shield behold
The glorious deeds of thy forefathers old.
(Torquato Tasso, Jerusalem Delivered, XVII,64)
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