Sacred and Profane Love
c. 1514 · Oil on canvas · Galleria Borghese, Rome
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About this work
- Artist
- Titian (c. 1488–1576)
- Year
- c. 1514
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 118 × 279 cm
- Collection
- Galleria Borghese, Rome
- Movement
- Renaissance
Two women who seem modelled on the same person sit at either end of a carved stone fountain built like a Roman sarcophagus: one richly dressed in white and silver with gloves and a bowl, the other unclothed but for a white cloth and a red mantle, holding up a small burning lamp, while a winged boy stirs the water between them. Titian painted it in Venice in about 1514, early in his career. It was probably commissioned by Niccolò Aurelio, secretary to the Venetian Council of Ten, whose coat of arms is carved on the fountain, for his marriage that year to the young widow Laura Bagarotto; the clothed figure is often read as the bride, with Venus beside her. The title is not original and is first recorded only in 1693, and the meaning of the two figures is still debated. Cardinal Scipione Borghese bought the picture in 1608, and it hangs in the Galleria Borghese in Rome.
This exhibition-poster edition shows the whole work beneath original typography set in-house. The original is in the public domain.
Where it works
Two women in silver-white and red at a stone fountain before a dusky landscape with a castle and a bright lake town, for a living room or bedroom above a sofa at 24×36 in natural wood. A cream, deep green or terracotta wall; it pairs with Bacchus and Ariadne.
Style, size & framing detail
- Style
- Exhibition poster of a Renaissance painting
- Era
- 16th century (c. 1514)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Palette
- cream & beige
- Mood
- grand
- Rooms
- living room, bedroom, dining room, hallway or entryway
- Good gift for
- housewarming, art lovers
Size. We'd hang this one at 24×36. Prints at 12×18, 16×24, 24×36 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway; 24×36 as the statement piece above a sofa or bed.
Framing. Exhibition posters sit best in a slim black frame with no mat — the typeset margin is the mat.
Pairing. Pairs as a set of three with other famous painting prints (10% off three or more).
Details & materials
Shipping & returns
Is this the whole painting, or a crop?
Is Sacred and Profane Love in the public domain?
What is it printed on?
When was Sacred and Profane Love painted, and in what medium?
What size works above a sofa or bed?
About this design
The Madten promise
A fine-art print
The same artwork as a clean fine-art print — the image shown large with a minimal caption.
