The Frari - Titian, Donatello and Bellini in Venice

In a nutshell: the Frari is the most satisfying art viewing in Venice - Titian's Assumption, Donatello's Baptist, Bellini's altarpiece, all still in situ. Back to the overview or on to San Rocco.

The Frari

The basilica of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari - “the Frari” for short - offers the most satisfying art viewing in Venice, because so much of its great art remains in situ: exactly where it was painted to be seen, rather than transplanted to a gallery. Because Venice's spongy soil could never bear a true stone Gothic church, the Frari was raised in light, pliable brick on a foundation of white limestone that shields it from the damp earth. It was built by the Franciscans - the “brothers”, hence frari - and consecrated in 1492; the gentle spirit of St Francis of Assisi (c. 1182–1226) suffuses both the building and the art within it, and the Franciscan reverence for all creation later moved Renaissance painters to celebrate the natural world and human feeling. Started in 1340 and finished more than a century afterwards, the church carries the memories and glories of over 500 years of Venetian life. Inside, the plain, airy (110-yard-long), well-lit Gothic interior - rough timber crossbeams, a red-and-white palette - is a striking spectacle: its T-shaped (tau) ground plan is the emblem of the Franciscan order, which St Francis wore on his garments and used in place of his signature. At the nave's centre stands the marble choir, with 124 wooden stalls carved in the 1480s by Marco Cozzi, inlaid with vistas of Venice: the fine marquetry reflects the Renaissance passion for Florentine depth and perspective, and choirs surviving like this one are extremely rare. Many of Venice's great men chose burial here, and their imposing tombs crowd the walls. To the right of the church stretches the old convent, with two beautiful cloisters, today the home of the State Archives, which preserve all the paperwork of the former Venetian Republic.

At the far end of the nave, set within the arch of the choir entrance, glows Titian's Assumption of the Virgin (1516–1518) - red and gold like a stained-glass window, radiating exuberant beauty. At the close of her life (though she looks seventeen here), Mary was miraculously “assumed” into heaven: cherubs bear her upward toward a Jupiter-like God, while the dumbstruck apostles below stretch out their hands toward the floating sphere of light. Unveiled in 1518, the picture scandalised a Venice used to quieter, more reflective church art: the vivid colouring, the contorted poses, the blend of saccharine angels and rough-handed apostles were without precedent, and this Virgin is thoroughly human - a flesh-and-blood woman bathed in heaven's golden glow, not a stiff enthroned icon. The Franciscans felt she stirred excitement rather than devotion and would pay Titian only after the Holy Roman Emperor offered to buy the altarpiece if they refused. With a burst of youthful daring, Titian (c. 1490–1576) redrew the rules of church painting, foreshadowing Mannerism and the Baroque: he charged the scene with a layered design that superimposes a circle (Mary's halo-bubble) on a triangle spanning three registers - God above, mankind below, Mary between them - pulling the eye from the tangle of arms and legs to the radiant, victorious face of Mary, “assumed body and soul into heaven”.

Marble tombs flank the altar on both sides. To its right stands the heavy, elaborate 15th-century tomb of Doge Francesco Foscari (1373–1457), who governed Venice at the summit of its might: he steered the republic's powerful maritime empire and sought to extend it onto the mainland, ending up locked with Milan in a 31-year war of attrition that ravaged northern Italy, while on the exposed eastern front the Ottomans seized Constantinople (1453) and crippled Venice's trade. With the treasury drained, the city fathers compelled Foscari to step down, surrender his ceremonial hat and hand over the keys to the Doge's Palace. In the first chapel to the right of the altar stands Donatello's wooden Statue of John the Baptist (1438): the wild-eyed prophet of the desert - gaunt from a diet of locusts and honey, clad in animal skins - is caught mid-sermon, jaw falling open, face twisting, hand raised as he proclaims the arrival of…the Renaissance. Florentines living in Venice treated the Frari as their own parish church and gave the commission to the Florentine Donatello (1386–1466), in a manner redolent of home; the statues beside John, carved around the same date by lesser hands, are plainly inferior in naturalism. Through the door at the end of the right transept lies the sacristy, its ornate altar packed with reliquaries - the most precious, at the centre, is a vial said to hold a drop of Christ's blood. Facing the relic, step into the room on the right: there hangs Paolo Veneziano's Madonna and Child with Doge Francesco Dandolo (c. 1339), by the first “name” artist in Venice, who took Byzantine icons and set them in motion - the infant Jesus turns to greet the kneeling doge, rosy-cheeked Mary turns toward the doge's wife, St Francis presents “Francesco” Dandolo to the Madonna, and St Elizabeth bends and gestures as naturally as 14th-century icons allow. Note the city's emblematic colours - blue, gold and red - made possible by Venice's thriving glass industry, which supplied painters with a wider and finer range of pigments than their rivals enjoyed. This room also holds a clock carved from a single block of wood. Back in the relic room, the radiant altarpiece at the far end is Giovanni Bellini's Madonna and Child with Saints and Angels (1488), paid for by the Pesaro family: Mary sits on a throne beneath a half-dome, steadying the infant Jesus (who is just finding his feet), flanked by thoughtful saints - from left to right, Nicholas, Peter, Mark and Benedict - while musician angels play. Bellini (c. 1430–1516), the father of the Venetian Renaissance, painted feigned columns and a dome to echo the real ones within the gilt frame, making the picture read as an extension of the room, and finished the illusion with glimpses of open sky. He was instrumental in the shift from medieval tempera to oil painting and practically invented the recipe for the Venetian altarpiece - the sacra conversazione, in which saints appear to converse in a holy gathering. Light enters from the left, yet nothing throws a hard shadow: Mary and the child are wrapped in a soft glow reflected from the golden dome.

Back in the nave, just past the choir on the left, hangs Titian's second altarpiece for the Frari, the Madonna of Ca' Pesaro (1519–1526). Like his master Bellini, Titian places Mary (seated) and the child (standing) on a throne ringed by saints engaged in a holy conversation, with painted columns echoing the church's real ones. But look again: Mary sits off-centre, Titian's idealised saints rub shoulders with Venetians sporting five o'clock shadows, the steps slant away from us on the diagonal; Mary rests on a pedestal rather than a throne, the baby fidgets, and St Peter's precious keys dangle as if nobody noticed. These departures shatter conventional Renaissance symmetry, yet they turn a static group into a real scene: St Peter (centre, in blue and gold, holding a book) gazes down at Jacopo Pesaro, who kneels to thank the Virgin for his naval victory over the Ottomans in 1502, while a standard-bearing lieutenant drags in a turbaned prisoner and St Francis talks with the infant Jesus, gesturing toward more Pesaro family members. The little figure looking out at us (lower right) is the Pesaro heir who managed the trust fund ensuring prayers for his deceased uncle. Titian welds opposites together - a hazy, tender Madonna beside portrait-sharp likenesses, plump winged putti beside a Muslim captive, a Christian cross beside a battle standard - and, in the humanist spirit of St Francis, lets ordinary mortals share the saints' company. The unmissable tomb with black statues in tattered white robes is Longhena's Tomb of Pesaro, raised for the next generation of the wealthy clan and honouring the one member who became doge: it is by Baldassare Longhena, the architect of the extravagant La Salute church, and its busy, theatrical Baroque style features (politically incorrect) black statues of African prisoners who appear to hoist the upper storey on their brawny shoulders - cushioned by pillows - while Doge Pesaro presides above.

Measure Longhena's emotive 17th-century Baroque tomb against the serene Neoclassical lines of the pyramid-shaped Canova Monument (1827), directly across the nave. Antonio Canova (1757–1822) was Venice's supreme sculptor, maker of gleaming white, highly polished figures of beautiful Greek gods and goddesses; the pyramid is timeless, evoking pharaohs' graves and the Holy Trinity, and grieving mourners trudge up to pay respects to the great artist - even the winged lion seems moved. Here is the twist: Canova originally designed this pyramid not for himself but as the burial place of an artist he revered - Titian. The Frari, however, chose a different design for Titian's tomb, so Canova used the pyramid for an Austrian princess…in Vienna. After Canova's death, his pupils recreated the design here in honour of their teacher; Canova is not interred in it, but through the tomb's open doorway you can (just about) make out an urn holding his heart. The immense carved marble monument across the nave - inscribed “Titiano Ferdinandus MDCCCLII” - honours both the artist (the central figure shows a bearded Titian crowned with laurel) and his celebrated pictures (rendered in the reliefs behind). Titian was the supreme Venetian painter, equally at home with uplifting altarpieces, truthful portraits, joyful mythological scenes and sensuous nudes. He came to Venice as a boy, learning first as a mosaicist and then under Giovanni Bellini and Giorgione; he grew rich and renowned, crossing Europe to portray kings and nobles, yet resisted the lure of the big money that pulled so many of his contemporaries to Rome, always returning to his beloved Venice (the winged lion crowns the monument) and his cherished Frari. In old age he produced dark, tragic masterworks, among them the Pietà meant for his own tomb but now in the Accademia; nearing ninety, he struggled to complete it as plague swept Venice, carrying off more than a quarter of the population - including his son and assistant Orazio. Grief-stricken, Titian died shortly afterwards, in August 1576, and was buried in the Frari, his grave barely marked; the triumphal arch in the second bay of the right aisle is said to indicate his resting place, while the remains of Antonio Canova lie in the left aisle near the main entrance. Three centuries on, this grandiose monument was erected to remember and celebrate Titian; its inscription reads: “To Titian from Ferdinand I, the Habsburg Emperor who paid for this.”

The Frari stands on Campo dei Frari, near the San Tomà vaporetto and traghetto stops (lines 1, 2, A and N). Admission is €5, open Mon–Thu 9:00–19:30, Fri until 23:00, Sat until 18:00, Sun 13:00–18:00, with reduced hours in winter; modest dress is advised. Enquiries: +39 041 272 8611, www.basilicadeifrari.it. An audioguide costs €2, and you should set aside an hour - do not miss Titian's Assumption, Donatello's statue or Bellini's altarpiece. The piazza around the church is lined with small, unpretentious, reasonably priced cafés - the Bottega del Caffè Dersut (around to the left, facing the church's flank, indoor seating only) does salads and fresh sandwiches. Bear in mind that the Frari is not covered by the Chorus Pass (which admits church enthusiasts to 17 of Venice's churches and their art for €12, www.chorusvenezia.org), nor by any standard sightseeing pass. For an efficient outing, pair it with the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, directly behind the church; Ca' Rezzonico is a seven-minute stroll away, following signs for Accademia.

Back inside the Frari, a few treasures are easy to overlook. The Cappella dei Milanesi, beside the main altar, holds the tomb of composer Claudio Monteverdi; the Cappella Corner displays Bartolomeo Vivarini's St Mark Enthroned triptych (1474) and Sansovino's delicate marble Baptist; the sacristy houses Giovanni Bellini's tender 1488 Madonna with Child triptych and Francesco Cabianca's ornate reliquary altar in red marble, from 1711; and the Chapter House shows the golden 14th-century votive panel showing Doge Francesco Dandolo together with his wife - reckoned to be the first painted likeness of a doge ever made - glimpsing the Chiostro della Trinità, its largest cloister, through the Chapter House windows. The monks' choir - 124 stalls edged in gold - sits behind a marble tramezzo completed in 1475. The Assunta itself was painted on 22 horizontal poplar planks, stands nearly seven metres tall and is the biggest painting on wooden panels anywhere in the world; a major restoration completed in 2022 earned Giulio Bono, its restorer, the Marino Grimani Prize, and the altarpiece glows most radiantly in afternoon light. Titian died in the plague of 1576 at about ninety; legend says the quarantine rules were relaxed so he could rest near his masterpiece, and the monument across the nave was commissioned by Emperor Ferdinand I in 1838. Canova's heart rests inside the pyramid, sealed inside a porphyry urn; his right hand lies with the Accademia di Belle Arti and everything else of him rests at Possagno's Tempio Canoviano.