티치아노 베첼리오의 <참회하는 막달라 마리아> 연구

Abstract

The Penitent Mary Magdalene(c. 1530) was commissioned from Titian (Tiziano Vecellio, c. 1485-1576) by Federico Gonzaga as a gift to Vittoria Colonna. The work is based on the legend of Mary Magdalene living a reclusive life of penitence in the wilderness. Traditionally, the image of Mary Magdalene against a background of wilderness was intimately related to the culture of worshipping her. The aim of this thesis is therefore to interpret the meaning of Titian’s work within the context of this culture of worship. The ultimate purpose is to understand the meaning of the work, as deduced by this interpretation, within the context of Colonna’s personal faith, taking into account that it was in fact Colonna who ordered the work. Unlike previous depictions of Mary Magdalene, which showed her as an ascetic who had long been living in reclusion, Titian’s work portrays a young and attractive woman. This sensual depiction can be understood within the context of artistic trends in the early 16th century. Works on worldly themes were popular during this period, and female bodies were painted in a sensual manner. Unlike other works of the time, however,which placed emphasis only on images that recalled Mary Magdalene’s past as a prostitute, Titian’s saint appears as a penitent welling up with emotion,as can be seen in her brimming tears, blood shot eyes, heavenward gaze and half-open mouth. Titian, while accommodating contemporary artistic trends by depicting Mary Magdalene as a sinner, also presents her as a paragon of penitence for salvation, by infusing her with inherent and fervent penitential emotion. The coexistence in Titian’s work of Mary Magdalene’s twin aspects of sinner and penitent can be confirmed through the painting’s iconographical characteristics. The absence of the angel motif that traditionally implies the climax of Mary’s period of meditation in the wilderness suggests that Titian’s Mary is at an early stage of this period. Mary’s tears, too, which symbolize the moment she repents of her sins, indicate that Titian has portrayed the very beginning of her penitence. Titian himself also said that he had painted Mary on the first day of her penitence in order to depict her in a more charming form. This tells us that Titian intended to paint Mary Magdalene in a form closer to that of a sinner than of a penitent saint who had overcome her sins. It was also his intention, however, to show that Mary was experiencing the virtuous emotions of penitence by giving her the facial expression of a saint. Those viewing the painting in the 16th century,moreover, would probably have seen the virtue of a penitent in the saint’s sensual beauty, due to the ideology of Ficino whereby physical beauty is the product of a sacred mind. According to the perspective of its time, ultimately,Titian’s Mary Magdalene can be regarded as the ideal image of a “sacred sinner.”It appears that Titian intended to present Mary Magdalene as an evangelist of hope for salvation, by portraying her as a “sacred sinner.”Traditionally, Mary Magdalene, as a perfect model of penitence, played a role of delivering hope to all sinners that they may attain salvation. She was especially revered among married women, widows and prostitutes, due to the legend that her sins were of a sexual nature. This belief in Mary Magdalene continued until the 16th century. Moreover, Colonna, who ordered the work, as a once married woman, took Mary Magdalene, a sexual sinner and a spiritual guide to prostitutes, as her role model. Titian’s Mary Magdalene, appearing as a repenting sinner, would therefore have been a powerful source of hope to Colonna. Colonna would have felt a sense of kinship with the saint manifested as a sinner; seeing this image would have made her want to emulate the saint and achieve salvation through penitence. The fact that Colonna took Titian’s Mary Magdalene as her model andused the work to galvanize her piety allows us to speculate that the painting was linked to Colonna’s personal faith. Various structural elements in the work point to the conclusion that it was a personal devotional painting for Colonna. All the characteristic elements of a devotional painting that contrives to induce absorption in worship by making the depicted saint approach the viewer as a tangible apparition appear in the work, for example the half-length figure, the close-up view of the saint, the abstract background and the powerful and realistic expression of emotion. These structural characteristics may have allowed Titian’s Mary Magdalene to appear to Colonna not as an image, but as a tangible apparition; this would have prompted deep empathy on the part of Colonna. It can thus be assumed that,through this close-up and realistic appearance of Mary Magdalene, Colonna would have rapidly and intensely experienced messages of the importance of penitence and hope for salvation.