Robusti is mentioned briefly in
Il Riposo della Pitura e della Scultura by Raffaelo Borghini in 1584. The only known primary source for details of Marietta Robusti's life, however, is in
Life of Tintoretto by
Carlo Ridolfi that was published in 1642 about her father. These two sources disagree on the year of her birth: according to Borghini, she was born in 1555, She probably was born in 1560 since her death during childbirth is recorded as at the age of thirty in 1590. She lived in
Venice all her life. She was the eldest daughter of the painter
Jacopo Robusti, from whom she inherited not only his aptitude, but also her nickname,
la Tintoretta (translated as female "little dyer", after the occupation of her grandfather as a
tintore or dyer). Because of this, she is known variously as Marietta Robusti, Marietta Tintoretto, or "la Tintoretta". The name of her mother is not known.
Ridolfi describes Robusti's close relationship with her father at great length. Not only did she learn at his knee, as a child she would dress as a boy so that she could go everywhere with Tintoretto. She was followed by seven siblings, three half-brothers and four half-sisters born to her stepmother, Tintoretto's wife
Faustina Episcopi. Two of her half-brothers became painters as well, the most famous was
Domenico. Robusti's artistic training consisted of serving an apprenticeship in the collaborative environment of her father's workshop, where she probably contributed to her father's paintings by executing backgrounds and figure blocking, as was the usual distribution of labor in painting workshops of the time. She also served as the subject in many of her father's paintings. It is reported that the grieving Tintorentto created his last portrait of Marietta, postmortem, on her deathbed. Although Robusti's social and economic autonomy was no greater than other artisan women of her time, she had quite a following, changing the ideals of femininity within the arts. After her death, Carlo Ridolfi stated she was one of the most illustrious women of her time, having the same manner of skill as her father while displaying "sentimental femininity, a womanly grace that is strained and resolute". It was said that while Robusti worked in her father's studio, she also worked on altarpieces as an assistant, but her achievements were ascribed to her father. No evidence exists that Robusti received commissions for major religious works such as altarpieces or other church decorations. She was recognized mainly as a portraitist, however,
Emperor Maximilian and
King Philip II of Spain both expressed interest in hosting her as a court painter so knowledge of her skills had to be known to contemporaries. Apparently, her father refused their invitations on her behalf because he couldn't bear to part with her. In 1578, Tintoretto arranged for Marietta to marry a Venetian jeweler and silversmith, Mario Augusta, to ensure that she would remain near him. She died during childbirth and was buried in Santa Maria del’Orto in Venice in 1590. After her death, a noticeable decline in the work produced by Tintoretto was ascribed to his grief over the loss of his daughter, rather than the likelihood that he lost his most skillful assistant. == Attributions and assessment ==