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Portrait of a Man with a Falcon

painting by Titian

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 27, 2026
Entity authorityQ3937416 ↗
Source-derived summary

Portrait of a Man with a Falcon, also called Portrait of a Man of the Cornaro Family with a Falcon or Giorgio Cornaro with a Falcon, is an oil on canvas painting by the Italian painter Titian. It is variously dated from the late 1520s to the 1540s. The painting is in the collection of the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha.

History

The Joslyn Art Museum dates this portrait to the late 1520s and attributes it to Titian alone, although this attribution is not accepted by some modern scholars. According to Georg Gronau, it was painted in Titian's middle period, about 1530 to 1540.

The work was "sadly damaged" by the time it went to the United States in the early 1900s, and some students of Venetian art then thought it a copy. Charles Ricketts thought this impression was due mainly to the repainting, in brown, of the background, formerly grey, with the consequent weakening of the contours and falsifying of the shadows; and the reduction in the quality of the pigment by ironing or relining. Extensive conservation work was completed by senior conservator Mark Leonard at the Getty Museum in 2008.

Provenance

The picture was formerly in Castle Howard, Yorkshire. It was sold to the private collector E. F. Milliken of New York some time before 1904.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Portrait of a Man with a Falcon” as painting by Titian. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA productive route into publication, performance and collection histories when the underlying object or edition remains clearly identified. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1530, 1540, 2008, 1904—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1537. The account is most persuasive where Portrait, Falcon and painting can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as painting by Titian. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3937416. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1530, 1540, 2008 and 1904.

Critical limits

Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Portrait of a Man with a Falcon”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Portrait of a Man with a Falcon primary sources, Portrait of a Man with a Falcon archive and Portrait research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Portrait of a Man with a Falcon”?
  2. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
  3. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Portrait of a Man with a Falcon” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.