Christ and the Wrong Spouse depict a story from the Gospel in which Christ was challenged by the Pharisees to condemn a woman caught at the scene of the crime of adultery. Although it has previously been widely considered that the painting belongs to Giorgione, now it is usually considered the work of the young Titian. His revolutionary character is clearly evident when seen against the backdrop of the artistic tradition presented by Giovanni Bellini.
The composition of the fifteenth century, even with dynamic narrative objects, tended to be calm and static. Here, in contrast, poses and gestures are bold and frantic, the figures have a new physical reliability, and the colors of the draperies are sensual. Bearing in mind that the fifteenth century paintings were usually painted on the smooth surface of polished wood, it is – as in fact all subsequent works of Titian – painted on a more uneven surface of the canvas and oil paint applied with more visible strokes.
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