Francisco de Zurbaran Defence of Cadiz against the English Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 12, 2009
Defence of Cadiz against the English by Francisco de Zurbaran
1634
Oil on canvas, 302 x 323 cm
Museo del Prado, Madrid
Francisco de Zurbaran Apostle St Andrew Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 12, 2009
Apostle St Andrew by Francisco de Zurbaran
1631
Oil on canvas, 146,7 x 61 cm
Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest
Zurbar’s picture of St Andrew is in marked contrast to Ribera’s dramatic representation of the crucifixion of the saint. There is the same close observation of detail, but Zurbar’s picture has the calm majesty seen in the work of El Greco. These various qualities Zurbar blends into a unity with an individual touch of his own. Just as the figure in El Greco’s picture is suffused with blue-green shades, so here the figure of the wise old man is suffused with warm greenish browns. St Andrew is seen leaning against two beams or branches which serve, in a quite uncontrived way, to identify the saint, being in the form of the cross of St Andrew, his attribute. It is obvious at a glance that this picture dates from Zurbar’s finest period: the lined face of the saint, the peasant hands roughened by hard work and the austere folds of the robes, together create an impression of the serenity and permanence so characteristic of Zurbar’s still-lifes as well as his large compositions.
In all probability the painting once adorned an altar in the Carmelite church of St Adalbert of Seville, together with its companion piece, the painting of the Archangel Gabriel, which is now in the Montpellier Museum.
Michael Pacher Annunciation Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Annunciation by Michael Pacher
1465-70
Panel, 100 x 97 cm
Alte Pinakothek, Munich
The picture shows one of the panels of the St Lawrence Altarpiece, an early work of the artist
Michael Pacher Coronation Of The Virgin Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Coronation Of The Virgin by Michael Pacher
1471-81
Wood, gilt and polychromed
Parish Church, St. Wolfgang
The picture shows the central portion of the altarpiece of the parish church at St. Wolfgang, Austria.
In a setting of supernal radiance enraptured angels assist Divine Omnipotence and Benevolence in the courtly ceremony of welcoming human modesty, come to Paradise in the form of the Virgin Mary. Michael Pacher, a Tyrolean artist, was a master in both painting and sculpture, and combines the two techniques in some of his works. He assimilated the examples of Donatello and Mantegna while on a journey of apprenticeship in Italy, but his temperament caused him to lean more towards the northern style of sculpture, which he brought to its highest level of achievement. This altarpiece, executed between 1479 and 1481, is one of the many including scenes from the life of the Virgin produced by the great triad of German sculptors, Pacher, Stoss and Riemenschneider.
Michael Pacher Flagellation Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Flagellation by Michael Pacher
1495-98
Panel, 113 x 139,5 cm
terreichische Galerie, Vienna
The panel was part of the altarpiece in the parish church of Salzburg. It was the last painting executed by the artist.
Michael Pacher Mary of Burgundy Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Mary of Burgundy by Michael Pacher
c. 1490
Oil on wood, 47,5 x 35 cm
Heinz Kisters Collection, Kreuzlingen
The painting, attributed to Michael Pacher, is possibly the only portrait composed by the artist. The sitter shown in profile was the first wife of Emperor Maximilian. She died at an early age in a hunting accident.
Michael Pacher St Catherine Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
St Catherine by Michael Pacher
1465-70
Panel, 511 x 49,5 cm
Tiroler Landesmuseum Ferdinandeum, Innsbruck
The panel is part of the predella of the St Lawrence Altarpiece
El Greco Angelic Concert Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Angelic Concert by El Greco
c. 1610
Oil on canvas, 115 x 217 cm
National Gallery, Athens
The painting originally was the upper part of the Annunciation.
In 1608 El Greco contracted to paint three altarpieces for the church of the Hospital of St John the Baptist (the Tavera Hospital). Located just outside the walls of Toledo, the hospital was founded in 1541 by Cardinal Juan Tavera (1472-1545), who is buried in the church. Of this project for the altarpieces, three pictures survive: an Annunciation (Colecci髇 Santander Central Hispano, Madrid, the upper portion showing a choir of angels has been cut and is in the National Gallery, Athens), a Baptism (installed on a side altar in the church), and The Opening of the Fifth Seal (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).
El Greco Adoration of the Shepherds Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Adoration of the Shepherds by El Greco
1596-1600
Oil on canvas, 346 x 137 cm
National Museum of Art of Romania, Bucharest
Probably originally on the left of the retable of the Colegio de Doña Maria, and painted following the Annunciation. A small version, possibly the model for the large painting, is in the Galleria Corsini, Rome. The scrolls borne by the angels bear the inscription in Latin: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill towards men (Luke II, I4); another popular subject in El Greco’s repertoire, painted throughout his life. It was one of the subjects of the Modena Triptych, and of his first commission in Spain, that for the church of Santo Domingo el Antiguo, and was the subject chosen for his own burial chapel in Santo Domingo.
A comparison with the earlier painting of the same subject in Santo Domingo shows the advance made in the process of developing a style appropriate to the expression of the supernatural. There is no reference to the ordinary conception of space of this world, there are no allusions to the corporal quality of the figures, whose gestures also belong to the realm of imagination and not to that of ordinary experience. Light is the important dematerialising and expressive element in this painting. The Santo Domingo painting can still be related to a human event.
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El Greco Adoration of the Shepherds Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Adoration of the Shepherds by El Greco
1596-1600
Oil on canvas, 346 x 137 cm
National Museum of Art of Romania, Bucharest
Probably originally on the left of the retable of the Colegio de Doña Maria, and painted following the Annunciation. A small version, possibly the model for the large painting, is in the Galleria Corsini, Rome. The scrolls borne by the angels bear the inscription in Latin: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill towards men (Luke II, I4); another popular subject in El Greco’s repertoire, painted throughout his life. It was one of the subjects of the Modena Triptych, and of his first commission in Spain, that for the church of Santo Domingo el Antiguo, and was the subject chosen for his own burial chapel in Santo Domingo.
A comparison with the earlier painting of the same subject in Santo Domingo shows the advance made in the process of developing a style appropriate to the expression of the supernatural. There is no reference to the ordinary conception of space of this world, there are no allusions to the corporal quality of the figures, whose gestures also belong to the realm of imagination and not to that of ordinary experience. Light is the important dematerialising and expressive element in this painting. The Santo Domingo painting can still be related to a human event.
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El Greco Apostle St Andrew Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Apostle St Andrew by El Greco
1610-14
Oil on canvas, 97 x 77 cm
Museo de El Greco, Toledo
Apostle, was brother of Peter, a Galilean fisherman, and the first to follow Christ (John 1:40-41). The gospels contribute little to his iconography; the chief source is the apocryphal book of the ‘Acts of Andrew’ (3rd century), retold in the Golden Legend. According to this he made missionary journeys to Scythian Russia, Asia Minor and Greece, preaching and performing many acts of healing. At Nicaea he delivered the inhabitants from seven demons who plagued them in the shape of dogs. At Thessalonica the parents of a young man whom he had converted to Christianity set fire to his house, with Andrew and their son in it. When the young man miraculously extinguished the fire by sprinkling a small bottle of water over the flames, his parents, still seeking vengeance, tried to enter the house by climbing ladders, but were immediately struck blind. The Golden Legend tells of a bishop dining with the devil, disguised as a courtesan. Just as he was about to yield to Satan, Andrew entered in the garb of a pilgrim, and drove the devil away. Andrew was executed by Egeas, the Roman governor of Patras in the Peloponnese. The governor’s wife, Maximilla, being cured of a fatal sickness by the apostle, adopted Christianity and was persuaded by him to deny her husband his marital rights ever again. This, and not his preaching, seems to have been the cause of Andrew’s imprisonment and subsequent crucifixion.
Andrew is the patron saint of Greece and Scotland. Among differing accounts of his relics, one tells of their being carried to the town of St Andrews in Scotland in the 4th century.
Apostle St Andrew in Art
He is usually portrayed as an old man, white-haired and bearded. His chief attribute is a cross in the shape of an X, or saltire, though in earlier Renaissance painting he may have the more familiar Latin cross. He sometimes has a net containing fish, or a length of rope (he was bound, not nailed, to the cross). His inscription from the Apostles’ Creed is: ‘Et in Jesum Christum, filium ejus unicum Dominum nostrum’. All these episodes from the legends are depicted, also the stages of his martyrdom: scourging; led by soldiers to his execution; being tied to the cross; crucifixion; burial, assisted by Maximilla.
El Greco Antonio Covarrubias Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Antonio Covarrubias by El Greco
c. 1600
Oil on canvas, 67,5 x 57,5 cm
Musee du Louvre, Paris
The sitter, Antonio de Covarrubias y Leiva (1524-1602) was the son of a Toledan architect, the master of works at Toledo Cathedral, who also designed the fade of the Alcar in the city. Antonio studied law at the University of Salamanca. He became a noted jurist, antiquarian, philosopher, poet, humanist and Hellenist. He was ordained in 1581 and made a canon of Toledo Cathedral. It was about this time that El Greco met Covarrubias. The two men felt at ease with each other, possibly speaking together in Greek. As a tribute to his friend, El Greco included Covarrubias in his Burial of the Count of Orgaz, where he is seen in profile towards the right.
In this austere yet sensitive representation El Greco demonstrates his skill as a portraitist. The sitter’s black costume contrasts with his white beard and the light flesh tones of his face. He seems lost in thoughts, his watery eyes looking into the void. The portrait was probably painted around 1600, when Covarrubias had become completely deaf.
Soon afterwards El Greco produced a copy of the portrait, which he paired with a posthumous portrait of Antonio’s brother Diego de Covarrubias, a distinguished canonist and adviser to Philip II. These paintings are now in the Museo de El Greco in Toledo.
El Greco Apostle St Bartholomew Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 10, 2009
Apostle St Bartholomew by El Greco
1610-14
Oil on canvas, 97 x 77 cm
Museo de El Greco, Toledo
The New Testament mentions the apostle by name only, but says nothing of his acts. The Golden Legend tells of a missionary journey he made to India, and of his death in Armenia by being flayed alive.
He is usually portrayed as dark-haired, bearded and of middle age. His invariable attribute is the knife with which he was flayed. Not uncommonly the flayed skin hangs over his arm, or is held in his hand, as in the Last Judgement in the Sistine Chapel (said to be a self-portrait of Michelangelo). His inscription, from the Apostles’ Creed, is ‘Credo in Spiritum Sanctum’. Typical narrative themes from Renaissance art show him preaching, exorcizing demons, baptizing, and being hauled before the authorities for refusing to worship idols. The most usual scene is the rather gruesome flaying. Artists sometimes follow the Hellenistic sculpture from Pergamum of the flaying of Marsyas.
Domenico Ghirlandaio Adoration of the Shepherds Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Adoration of the Shepherds by Domenico Ghirlandaio
1482-85
Panel, 167 x 167 cm
Santa Trinità, Florence
“He painted in tempera, as a companion to this work, a Nativity of Christ which must excite the wonder of every thinking man, introducing his own portrait and some heads of shepherds, which are considered divine” (Vasari).
The Sassetti Chapel is consecrated to the birth of Christ, and as a result much in the chapel is conceived with that event in mind. The altarpiece the Adoration of the Shepherds is the chapel ‘s key work not only in subject, but also in artistic merit. This composition was so successful that other artists frequently repeated it. Ghirlandaio himself appears in the scene, dressed as a shepherd. He is even allowed to come closer to the Christ Child than the donors, who appear in frescoes to the right and left, praying outside the confines of the panel. The artist, who is leading the shepherds, is kneeling and bringing the miracle of the birth of Christ to the attention of both the shepherds and the observers of the picture. His left hand, with which he is pointing to the Christ Child, is finely drawn and is superbly modelled in three dimensions. With his right hand, his painting hand, he is pointing to his chest, as he does in a later fresco in the Tornabuoni Chapel. As Ghirlandaio is pointing both at the child and the garlands on the Roman marble sarcophagus, it is possible that the gesture is saying: “This holy child was painted for you by me, the garland-maker Ghirlandaio.”
The classical sarcophagus in the picture is not just a manger for the ox and ass. It also has an iconographical significance indicated by the Latin inscription along its front: Ense cadens. Solymo. Pompei Pului[us] Augur Numen. Ait. Quae me conteg[it] Urna Dabit. [While Fulvi(us), augur of Pompey, was falling by the sword in Jerusalem he said: the urn that covers (conceals) me shall bring forth a god]. This is an ancient prophecy by Fulvius. The animals’ manger will serve as a crib for the Christ Child. In his Adoration of the Shepherds, Ghirlandaio combines this reference to the Roman classical age with knowledge of Flemish art and turns them into an integrated whole.
An historic event that took place a few years before this work was painted clearly left its mark behind on Ghirlandaio’s work. An altarpiece ordered by Tommaso Portinari from Hugo van der Goes in Bruges reached Florence in May 1483. Florentine artists saw van der Goes’ Adoration of the Shepherds as a shining comet showing new ways of painting. In Ghirlandaio’s altarpiece, the shepherds pushing their way into the picture from the right, with their harsh, life-like features, are drawn directly from this Flemish model. Ghirlandaio’s landscape in the background also displays features from north of the Alps.
Domenico Ghirlandaio An Old Man and His Grandson Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
An Old Man and His Grandson by Domenico Ghirlandaio
c. 1490
Tempera on wood, 62 x 46 cm
Musee du Louvre, Paris
Ghirlandaio incorporated portraits of his contemporaries in many biblical scenes. It is probably for precisely that reason that he was so popular among the rich Florentines, who were particularly keen on self portrayal. This makes it all the more astonishing that so few secular portraits by Ghirlandaio have survived.
There are two paintings dating from about 1490, in the Paris Mus閑 du Louvre and in Madrid, that are masterpieces of his art and yet fundamentally different: Giovanna Tornabuoni is idealized to the extent of becoming an “icon” of beauty for young Florentine girls, while the old man with the boy is painted with a pitiless degree of realism. Ghirlandaio does not shrink even from depicting his nose in all its disfigurement.
In his double portrait in the Mus閑 du Louvre, the artist succeeds not only in portraying the two figures with great tenderness, but also in conveying the deep affection between them. The boy is gently snuggling up to the old man. Their eyes meet on a diagonal: this balances the composition, and also excludes the observer from the intimate scene. The boy is looking upwards along the old man’s outline, which means that he is actually looking directly at the enormous nose projecting towards him. The contrast makes the little boy’s snub nose, and the way his mouth is opened in astonishment, appear all the more childlike. The old man is sitting in the corner of a room in front of an open window The delicacy of the beautiful view of the landscape is, so to speak, a commentary on the profound companionability of the two generations. A soft light is falling an the faces through the window, and the old man is lit from the right and the boy from above. As the lit halves of their faces are turned towards each other, and the same bright red is used for the garments and cap, producing a richness that contrasts with the gray wall behind, the two figures seem to merge to form one. The picture is entirely composed with their unity in mind. Flemish influences are unmistakable in both the choice of the corner of the room and the landscape, bringing to mind both Dirck Bouts’ Portrait of a Man in London dating from 1462 and several portraits by Petrus Christus.
The identity of the sitters is no longer known, it cannot be stated with certainty whether they are indeed, as is supposed, grandfather and grandson. The man’s nose, disfigured by a skin disease called rhinophyma, has in recent years led to the writing of several medical essays. Scratches in the paint layer disfigured it even further. This damage was removed by restoration work carried out in 1996.
Domenico Ghirlandaio Adoration of the Magi Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Adoration of the Magi by Domenico Ghirlandaio
1487
Tempera on wood, diameter: 171 cm
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence
In 1487, Ghirlandaio painted another Adoration of the Magi, a large circular painting for the Tornabuoni family. The date is confirmed by Roman numerals: MCCCCLXXXVII.
Such tondos were particularly popular as decorative items in private rooms, and their circular form required a particularly skillful composition. In the centre the childlike Mary is enthroned with her child. In the background, behind the ruined arcades of a classical building, is a simple hut that provides the ox and ass with a stable and the holy family with shelter. The kings’ large retinues are lined up right to the ruin, and only behind the Madonna is there a circle of empty space. In other words the composition is influenced by the form of the panel.
On the left is a lovely group of four soldiers with helmets and lances, looking in various directions. The soldiers have four horses that are also looking in different directions. Their pendant on the right, further back, is a group of four other soldiers in magnificent contemporary armor. The horses in front of the ruin are also very successful, and in them Ghirlandaio showed that he was also capable of depicting animals with strong foreshortening and from various angles. The contrast between the magnificent gray stallion and the darker gray ass is surely intentional. Above these animals the observer’s gaze wanders through the open arched architecture of the classical ruin out into the far distance. There, painted in an atmospheric paleness, is a city surrounded by water and reminiscent of Venice.
The composition of this Adoration contains allusions to the unique panel created in 1481 by Leonardo da Vinci, now in the Galleria degli Uffizi. Though Leonardo never completed this work, it had an enormous influence on the artists of his age. Ghirlandaio adopted the pyramidal composition of the main figures, with Mary at the top. The circular empty space behind Mary in the tondo might also have been inspired by Leonardo’s picture.
A replica of this tondo, in smaller dimensions and entirely the work of Domenico’s shop, is to be found in the Galleria Palatina at Palazzo Pitti in Florence.
Domenico Ghirlandaio Adoration of the Magi for the Spedale degli Innocenti Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Adoration of the Magi for the Spedale degli Innocenti by Domenico Ghirlandaio
1488
Tempera on wood, 285 x 240 cm
Spedale degli Innocenti, Florence
Vasari writes about the painting: “In the church of the Innocenti he painted in tempera a much-admired picture of the Magi, containing some fine heads and varied physiognomies of people both young and old, notably a head of the Virgin, displaying all the modesty, beauty and grace which art can impart to the Mother of God”.
There are so many saints in this Adoration that it is not easy to make out the three Magi. On the left, Saint John the Baptist is kneeling and pointing to the Madonna. The orphans of the Spedale are represented by two of the innocent boys who were killed during the Slaughter of the Innocents in Bethlehem, kneeling in the foreground. There are gaping bloody wounds to their faces, arms and necks.
In this Adoration of the Magi, Ghirlandaio’s carefully thought out use of colour is particularly impressive: Ghirlandaio distributes the glowing colours evenly. Mary in the centre is wearing a blue cloak over a red dress. The oldest king kneeling in front of her is wearing a variation of these colours combined with yellow. To the left of Mary, the youngest king holding the valuable goblet in his hand – he almost looks like Saint John the Evangelist – is also dressed in blue, yellow and red. The figure standing on the right edge of the picture wearing an expensive hat repeats this combination of colours, though now the blue and yellow are reversed. In the second figure from the right, wearing the blue hat, the Madonna’s colours of red and blue are visible again, and they are repeated in clothes of the bearded man wearing a turban on the left edge of the picture. Between the Madonna and the man with the blue hat on the right, the artist creates a yellow highlight, though with a weaker blue accent, in the figure of Joseph. This row of figures alone produces a rhythm of colour from left to right: red and blue; yellow, blue and red; red and blue; yellow and blue; red and blue; yellow, blue and red.
The work represents one of Ghirlandaio’s most important “easel” works. Here too the assistants were at work. Indeed, in the scene of the Slaughter of the Innocents in the background, Berenson recognized the hand of Bartolomeo di Giovanni, the author of the stories from the predella.
Giorgione Madonna Enthroned with the Child between St. Francis and St. Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Madonna Enthroned with the Child between St. Francis and St. by Giorgione
c. 1505
Oil on panel, 200 x 152 cm
Duomo, Castelfranco Veneto
The altar-piece, called the Castelfranco Madonna, was in all probability commissioned by the Condottiere Tuzio Costanzo in memory of his son Matteo, who died in 1504: the Costanzo coat of arms can be seen on the base of the Virgin’s throne. It can almost certainly be dated to 1505. Although it is not signed, the authorship is made indisputable by Giorgione’s individual technique in laying on delicately shaded coats of paint without any underlying scaffolding from a drawing. The traditional scheme of composition is lightened by the novel use of such elements as the throne and the landscape, which takes up a good portion of the background.
This smallish altarpiece echoes the artistic approach developed by Giovanni Bellini, who was probably one of Giorgione’s teachers. Giorgione softens both the atmosphere surrounding the figures and that in the space before the viewer. This atmospheric veil has a palpable analogy with the methods of Leonardo da Vinci, who was known to have been in Venice in 1500 and it is possible that Giorgione had seen some works by the Florentine genius. Yet the figural proportions and the lacy landscape speak to a fully personal Giorgionesque idiom.
Domenico Ghirlandaio Angel Appearing to Zacharias Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Angel Appearing to Zacharias by Domenico Ghirlandaio
1486-90
Fresco
Cappella Tornabuoni, Santa Maria Novella, Florence
The first scene of the stories of St John the Baptist, the Angel Appearing to Zacharias is represented at the bottom on the right wall.
Vasari wrote: “Domenico introduced a goodly number of Florentine citizens, who were then members of the Government, and especially all the members of the Tornabuoni family”.
In this fresco Ghirlandaio portrayed a considerable number of contemporary political figures and members of the donor families – such as Giuliano, Gian Francesco and Giovanni Battista Tornabuoni on the right, together with Giovanni Tornaquinci. Those portrayed are not taking part in the biblical events; rather, it seems important to them to be seen in this context. The artist arranges them in groups of three, four and five figures on various ground levels, so that they do not overlap too much. As a result, the front groups are standing at the edges of the picture in rather absurd holes – an artistic device that Ghirlandaio employed with considerably more skill in the Sassetti Chapel by making the figures climb a flight of steps. It is likely that the artist had to accede to the wishes of his client and incorporate all these figures, relatives and friends, into the scene. In the process he once again showed himself to be a superb portrait painter with the talent to create character studies with a psychological profundity.
Giorgione Old Woman Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Old Woman by Giorgione
c. 1508
Oil on canvas, 68 x 59 cm
Gallerie dell’Accademia, Venice
The presentation of reality by means of a luminous medium which decants the subtlest gradations of colour with extraordinary fidelity and assembles them with immediacy into images of lyrical purity is a feature also of the extremely rare portraits by Giorgione, amongst them this painting of the Old Woman. As with other pictures attributed with certainty to Giorgione hidden meanings have been searched for in the painting though the writing on the scroll – ‘col tempo’ (with time) – would seem to suggest that its subject is the fading of beauty over the years. Despite the damage suffered by the painting, it is still possible to admire the freedom of touch, the mellow transparency of the medium with which the half figure of the woman is realized and the extraordinary realism with which her lost beauty is explored. The description of the shriveled flesh, the aged eyelids, the toothless mouth, retains nothing at all of the Nordic prototypes and uses colour alone to create an objectively naturalistic image with consummate skill.
Giorgione Adoration of the Magi Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Giorgione Judith Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Giorgione Madonna with the Child, St Anthony of Padua and St Roch Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Madonna with the Child, St Anthony of Padua and St Roch by Giorgione
Oil on canvas, 92 x 133 cm
Museo del Prado, Madrid
The attribution to Giorgione is doubtful, it is also attributed to Titian
Anthony van Dyck Blessed Joseph Hermann Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Blessed Joseph Hermann by Anthony van Dyck
1629
Oil on canvas, 160 x 128 cm
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
Joseph Hermann lived in Cologne in the 13th century. He was a monk to whom the Virgin Mary appeared several times in his visions.
Anthony van Dyck Charles I King of England at the Hunt Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Charles I King of England at the Hunt by Anthony van Dyck
c. 1635
Oil on canvas, 266 x 207 cm
Musee du Louvre, Paris
This painting, commissioned by the King, is one of the masterpieces of the artist.
Anthony van Dyck Christ on the Cross Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Anthony van Dyck Cornelis van der Geest Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Cornelis van der Geest by Anthony van Dyck
before 1620
Oil on wood, 37,5 x 32,5 cm
National Gallery, London
An early work by Van Dyck, pupil of Rubens that time. Cornelis van der Geest was a merchant and art collector in Antwerp, and the friend of Rubens
Anthony van Dyck Crowning with Thorns Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 9, 2009
Crowning with Thorns by Anthony van Dyck
1618-20
Oil on canvas, 223 x 196 cm
Museo del Prado, Madrid
The contrast between the serenity of Christ and the villainy of his captors is vigorously conveyed in this early work by Van Dyck. The composition, as so often, is based on a prototype by Titian, of whom Van Dyck was a passionate admirer. But the influence of Rubens is also crucial, and the presentation is typically baroque: the viewer is forced into the role of a close but helpless witness of the violence enacted. The effect is reinforced by Van Dyck’s textures – for instance the exposed and brilliant chest of Christ against the gleaming precision of the axe above or the fluid musculature of the tormentor beside it.
William Powell Frith And Charles Dickens
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 8, 2009
William Powell Frith was the English painter. His parents were in domestic employment before taking a hotel in Harrogate in 1826. They encouraged him to become an artist, despite his own desire to be an auctioneer. While at school in Dover, Frith sketched caricatures and copies of Dutch genre scenes (Dover Mus.) that betray his disposition to narratives. His taste did not accord with the academic training he received at Henry Sass’s Academy in London (1835-7) and at the Royal Academy Schools (1837). Frith began his career as a portrait painter, using members of his family as models. He first exhibited at the British Institution in 1838, and during the 1840s he established himself with his entertaining historical and literary subjects in the popular tradition of C. R. Leslie, William Mulready and Sir David Wilkie. He was a member of THE CLIQUE, which included Richard Dadd, Augustus Egg, Henry O’Neil and John Phillip. His friendship with Charles Dickens began with commissions for paintings of Dolly Varden (London, V&A) and Kate Nickleby (untraced) in 1842.
Frans II Francken An Antique Dealer s Gallery Painting
Posted by wendyturner217 in November 8, 2009
An Antique Dealer s Gallery by Frans II Francken
1615-20
Oil on wood
Galleria Borghese, Rome
The Antique Dealer’s Gallery by Frans Francken the Younger captures the atmosphere of such places at the beginning of the 17th century and shows a large display of paintings hanging in two rows.
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