From Titian to Bellucci, from Danaë to Danaë. A dialogue with a problematic painting

A late Venetian Baroque painting was recently sold on the art market with an attribution to Antonio Bellucci. But, the painting is actually also a late copy from Titian’s Danaë. Both its attribution and its copy status raise questions: what is the meaning of the myth for a Baroque painter? What are the visual options for a painter depicting Danaë? How does a copyist relate to Titian, 150 years later? The present essay starts from these questions, analyzing the Titiansque sources of the painting, discussing its attribution to Bellucci and trying to understand the myth of Danaë at the dawn of a hedonistic eighteenth century