Johanna Fassl

Sacred Eloquence: Giambattista Tiepolo and the Rhetoric of the Altarpiece

Art critics and historians have appreciated Giambattista Tiepolo for the facility of his brush and the brilliance of his colors. They have had problems in acknowledging that Tiepolo is also a deeply religious painter. The difficulties stem from the interpretive framework.  Tiepolo's religious canvases cannot be understood when viewed through a Renaissance lens. He occupies a particular position in the history of art: firmly embedded in the eighteenth century, he is one of the last great painters of the classical tradition, and, at the same time, one of the precursors of modernity.

Johanna Fassl's book addresses Tiepolo's transitional status by focusing on the pictorial language in his altarpieces.  In four chapters, it discusses four different forms of rhetoric in the respective types of altarpieces: iconic, narrative, silent, and visionary. Each discourse calibrates the images within their contemporary religious and philosophical context. Deliberately concentrating on what is not painted rather than what is in the picture, the book deals with Tiepolo's rhetoric of absence as a characteristic eighteenth-century phenomenon rather than an anachronistic oddity. Overall, it is a valuable reference for both art historians and historians of religion and philosophy.

Sacred Eloquence: Giambattista Tiepolo and the Rhetoric of the Altarpiece . Peter Lang 2010.