The painting A Man with a Quilted Sleeve in the Titian exhibition at the National Gallery (until 18 May) makes sense as a self-portrait. The bearded young man looks over his shoulder towards you as an artist would who had turned from canvas to mirror. There are also two undoubted self-portraits here. The Berlin picture (from the mid to late 1540s) shows Titian in vigorous old age - although exactly how old he was is a mystery since his date of birth is uncertain. The one from the Prado, painted something over ten years later, shows him frailer and more contemplative. In all three images the confidence and authority of the faces is matched in the work. But they are all different in style and handling. No painter was less constrained by his own example.

LRB 6 March 2003 | PDF Download