Giorgione (1478–1510): 32

Artists Who Died Untimely Deaths

Tomasso Masaccio (1401–1428): 27

“Expulsion of Adam and Eve”credit: Scala/Art Resource, New York

It is remarkable to imagine making such a splash in a lifetime that spanned less than three decades, especially when there is no record of your life before the age of 20. Nothing is known of Masaccio, master Florentine painter of the early Italian Renaissance, until 1421. In just seven years, he transformed art with his mastery of linear perspective and ingenious use of chiaroscuro—dramatic light and dark. In other words, he could create in two-dimensions the illusion of three, as in his fresco of the expulsion from Eden (c. 1427).

Giorgione (1478–1510): 32

Famous and highly esteemed in his day, very little substantive information remains on High Renaissance Venetian painter, Giorgione. He is credited with having introduced the practice of painting with pigments that had been mixed with oil and flexible resins on canvas, which resulted in a luminous, jewel-like effect. Only five paintings that can be reasonably attributed to him survive. He was a contemporary of Titian, who went on to have the career Giorgione might have—had he not been killed at age 32 by the plague.