Young woman in a fur wrap: A Rubens Titianesque beauty

Mon 24 Jun 2024

On 21 June 1982, the Queensland Art Gallery’s new permanent home at South Bank was officially opened, as part of the celebrations, a new acquisition was officially unveiled — Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian) c.1629-30 (illustrated) by Peter Paul Rubens (28 June 1577–1640), made possible through a gift by the Gallery’s Foundation. Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian) is one of the Gallery’s most important old master works by one of the greatest painters of the seventeenth century.

As a celebrated painter of the Baroque, Rubens established new terms and techniques for the rendering of flesh and light. Besides being a prolific artist whose studio undertook commissions from the courts of France, Spain and England, Rubens was also a businessman, scholar, collector, courtier. His education included classical and humanist training and he knew many languages, becoming a major figure in the diplomatic world.

Italian Renaissance painter, Titian (Tiziano Vecellio, 1488–1576) inspired Rubens to paint — Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian) — a tribute of love and tenderness that he kept until his death and stated in his will that it not be put up for sale. He left it to his wife Helena, too intimate a work to be sold to another. But, of course, it was. This is its story.

Peter Paul Rubens ‘Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian)’ c.1629-30

For northern painters of the sixteenth century, the work of the Italians was a necessary course of study. One traveled to see and study and copy these objects at close quarters. Rubens’s copies were more than slavish imitation however, his talent and mastery of his medium was accomplished and confident when he experienced their work in Italy, Spain and England. Young woman in a fur wrap was closely inspired by Titian’s Girl in a fur (wrap) c.1535–37 (illustrated) (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna), completed a century earlier. Titian died in August 1576. Rubens was born in June 1577.

Rubens, like Titian was a court painter to kings, dukes and princes in Italy, Spain and England, he studied and copied the work of many Italian painters, though it was Titian that Rubens appeared to have held a particular fascination and admiration. Copying by doing rather than simply looking was the preferred course for professional painters as it afforded insight into composition, pigments, brush technique, tonal orchestration and colour glazing. While engraved copies of master works circulated at the time, they were entirely inadequate with regard to the colour and texture of pearly flesh or the minute, expressive inflections of a gaze. At the time of Rubens’s death in May 1640 there were 33 copies of Titian’s works in addition to eight paintings and two sketches by the Venetian master in the inventory of Rubens’s estate.

Comparison of Peter Paul Rubens (left) and Titian (right)

Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian) by Rubens anticipates the tenderness and sensuality of his late works, he is unable to resist endowing the Titianesque beauty with that slightly quizzical inviting glance that so often identifies his women, his own distinctive style of fleshy abundance, he has changed the face, and in particular the eyes and there are significant differences when the two paintings are closely compared even though the same pose and garments are worn by the earlier sitter.

‘Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian)’

The depiction of the young woman in QAGOMAs painting — Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian) — is believed to be Rubens’s second wife Helena Fourment (1614–74, married in 1630). Rubens executed at least one other work after the Titian original of his wife some seven years later, Helena Fourment in a fur wrap known as Het pelskin 1636–38 (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna). Reminiscent of the ‘Venus pudica’ of antiquity (a term used to describe an unclothed classic figural pose either standing or reclining), the ‘modest Venus’ covers her nakedness with both arms.

(Left) ‘Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian)’ (Right) ‘Helena Fourment in a fur wrap’

Curatorial extracts, research and supplementary material compiled by Elliott Murray, Senior Digital Marketing Officer, QAGOMA

Peter Paul Rubens Young woman in a fur wrap (after Titian) is on display within the Queensland Art Gallery’s International Art Collection, Philip Bacon Galleries (7-9).