Giovanni Bellini, 'Portrait of Fra Teodoro of Urbino as Saint Dominic', about 1515

This painting shows us a holy man with deep, sad eyes. He wears the habit of a Dominican friar. A halo circles his head. In his hands he holds symbols of his faith: a white lily for purity and a red leather-bound book. The label on the book cover reads ‘Sanct[us] Dominic[us]’. It names him as Saint Dominic, founder of the Dominican Order.

But the man has two identities. Words on the marble ledge say ‘IMAGO FRATRIS THEODORI URBINATIS’. This means ‘Image of Brother Teodoro of Urbino’. In the Renaissance it was common for real people to be painted as holy figures. Both religious people and ordinary citizens did this. Another unidentified friar asked Bellini to portray him as A Dominican, with the Attributes of Saint Peter Martyr (National Gallery, London). Changes in the painting reveal it was always meant to be both a portrait of the living Fra Teodoro and a devotional image of Saint Dominic. The lily and book were painted first. The hand was then added over them. You can see their outlines underneath.

This is Bellini’s last known portrait and one of his final paintings before he died in 1516. The painting is signed ‘IOAN[N]IS BELLINI’ on a small paper label, or cartellino. The date M.D.XV (or 1515) appears below it. This is Bellini’s only surviving portrait painted on canvas. However, the inscription identifying Fra Teodoro and the date were probably added later. They may be based on knowledge passed down over time.

Fra Teodoro was an important member of the Dominican church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. Bellini and his family had long-time connections with this friary. Bellini painted other works for the church and was buried there. Although it is not certain whether Fra Teodoro was the artist’s spiritual father or confessor, Bellini clearly knew him well.

This shows in the way the portrait captures not just how the friar looked but how he felt. We can see this psychological approach in other Bellini portraits, such as the Doge Leonardo Loredan from about 1501–2 (National Gallery, London). In the Portrait of Fra Teodoro, Bellini goes even further. The painting is nearly life-size. It is larger than any other Bellini portrait. The friar appears from the waist up in a three-quarter view that Bellini had learnt from German and Flemish artists to depict psychological realism.

Fra Teodoro’s black cap and cloak draw our eyes to his pensive face. We can see a V-shaped strip of his white scapular beneath his chin. His face looks long and sad. His eyes seem unfocused. His thin lips are pressed together and turn down at the corners. Light and shadow emphasise his hooked nose, hollow cheeks, and the creases between his eyebrows and beside his mouth.

Bellini played with space in this picture. Fra Teodoro fills almost the entire frame. He seems squeezed between the marble ledge and the curtain behind him. His hand reaches forward to rest on the ledge that separates him from us. His fingers curl around the lily and book. The curtain closes off the background. Its floral pattern is green, red and white. These colours match the real flowers and the book. The lily flowers seem to grow from the decorative ones. The halo runs in front of the lily, creating spatial confusion. It might be a later addition, not original to Bellini’s design.

This realistic style responded to newer artists. Sebastiano del Piombo, Palma Vecchio and Titian all produced more natural portraits around 1510–15 and influenced Bellini’s approach here.