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| "The Virgin and
Child with Saint Anne and Saint John the
Baptist", 1499-1500, The National Gallery, London. |
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Da
Vinci, Leonardo (Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci)
(1452-1519)
Italian painter, sculptor, architect,
engineer, and scientist, active in Florence and Milan,
born in Vinci near Florence. In 1469, at the age of 17,
Leonardo moved to Florence and became apprenticed to Andrea
Verrocchio, a leading Renaissance master of that time. In
Verrocchio's workshop he was introduced to the painting of
altarpieces, panel pictures and to the creation of large
sculptural projects in marble and bronze. In 1472 Leonardo
became a member of the painter's guild of Florence, where he
came into contact with other great artists including
Michelangelo.
In 1482 Leonardo entered the service of
the duke of Milan Lodovico Sforza for the next 18
years, and was active also as painter and
architect and assisted the Italian mathematician Luca
Pacioli in the work "Divina Proportione".
During
this period he painted "The Virgin of the Rocks"
and "The Last Supper".
In 1499 he left Milan and traveled to Venice, where he
consulted on architecture from 1495-99, and from 1502-03, he
was military engineer for Cesare Borgia. In the period
1503-06 he first of all worked in Florence, where he painted
"Mona Lisa". In 1509 his was back in Milan devoted
much of his time to military engineering, scientific studies
such as anatomy, mathematics, physics and biology. From 1514-16 he lived in Rome
under the
patronage of Pope Leo X, where he came into contact
with again Michelangelo and
Raphael.
He was housed in the Palazzo Belvedere in
the Vatican and seems to have been occupied principally with
scientific experimentation. In 1516 Leonardo traveled
to France and became architectural advisor to King Francis
I. and spent his last years at
château
du Clos Lucé near Amboise, where he died.
(Renaissance) |
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Postage stamp of Leonardo da Vinci
issued by Monaco. |
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Postage stamp of Leonardo da Vinci
issued by Cyprus in 1981. |
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Statue
of Leonardo da Vinci, Galleria degli
Uffizi, Florence. |
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"The
Virgin of the Rocks", 1483-86, Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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"The
Annunciation", c. 1472-1475, Galleria
degli Uffizi, Florence. |
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"St. John the Baptist",
1513-16, Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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Study
of arms and hands, 1474, The Royal
Collection. |
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Drawing of giant crossbow, c. 1485-1487. |
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Design
for a flying machine, c. 1488. |
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Mona
Lisa
(La Gioconda)
1503-1506, Músee du Louvre,
Paris.
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Mona Lisa
supposed to be a portrait of Lisa di Antonio Maria di Noldo Gherardini the wife of
Francesco di Bartolommeo di Zanobi del Giocondo a noble
citizen of Florence. Mona Lisa was 24 years old when
Leonardo started to work at the portrait in 1503. The famous
smile of Mona Lisa, is the result of the painting technique
"Sfumato" (an Italian word meaning "evaporate") where thin oil glazes are used to
soften the graduation from light to dark in the modeling of a shape.
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Postage stamps,
Mona Lisa, self-portrait and the Vitruvian Man. |
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Mona
Lisa's famous smile. |
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"L.H.O.O.Q."
(Elle a chaud au cul/she
has a hot ass), 1919, by
Marcel
Duchamp. |
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here
for enlargement |
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Homo Vitruvianus
1490 |
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Homo Vitruvianus
is the
Proportions of The Human Figure
created in God's Image.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
(80-20
B.C.), Roman writer, architect and engineer, the author of
"De Architectura". Vitruvius studied human
proportions,
and his treatises were later encoded in
Leonardo's "Vitruvian Man". Vitruvius concluded,
that a man
with legs and arms outstretched could be
inscribed within the perfect geometric figures of the circle
and the square alike. These two figures are usually referred
to as the
homo ad circulum et homo ad quadratum.
According to Vitruvius's theory, the centre of the human
body as inscribed within the square and circle coincided
with the navel. Vitruvius's findings were taken up again
during the Renaissance, and best known is the drawing by
Leonardo.
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Homo
Vitruvianus, Vitruvian
Man on stamps. |
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Niels Winkel, 2003, detail from the glass decoration
"Pro
Utilitate Humani Generis", Psychological Institute, Aarhus University's Nobel Park. |
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Vitruvian
Man by the Dutch multiartist Rob
ten Berge. |
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Click
here for enlargement.
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The Last Supper
(La Ultima
Cena)
1498,
The
refectory in the Church Santa Maria delle Grazie,
Milan. |
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Leonardo painted The Last Supper for his patron the
Duke Lodovico Sforza. It represented the scene of
The Last Supper from the final days of Jesus Christ
described in the four Gospels of The Bible. The
evening before Christ was betrayed by one of his
disciples (Judas the Betrayer), he gathered them
together to eat, told them that he knew what was
coming and washed their feet. During The Last Supper
Christ gave his disciples instructions on how to eat
and drink in the future, in remembrance of him. The
Feet Washing symbolized humility, that all were
equal under the eyes of the Lord.
"Easter in Images. The Last Supper According to
Leonardo" by Sandro Magister and
"If the Christ of Leonardo were to look up,
he would see the cross" by Timothy Verdon
Read the text, click
here.
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From left to
right:
Bartholomew, James/Jacob, Andrew, Judas Iscariot, who betrayed
Jesus to his enemies for 30 pieces of silver, Simon, whom Jesus called
Peter, John, Jesus, Thomas (raised his
finger), James of Zebedee, Philip, Simon the Canaanite (called Simon the
Zealot), Jude/Thaddaeus, Matthew. |
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"The
Last Supper" on Stamps. |
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Pop
Art version of The
Last Supper, Marisol Escobar, "Self-Portrait
Looking at The Last Supper", 1982–84,
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. |
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| See
a full-size image of the painting, click
here. |
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The Holy Grail |
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supposed to be the chalice, blessed by Jesus, and used by him
and his disciples at the
Last Supper. The chalice is said to have been used during the Crucifixion,
it was filled with the blood of Jesus, and afterwards, by
Joseph of Arimathea, brought to Glastonbury in England. In the legends of
King Arthur the Knights of the Round Table were sent on a quest to find
the holy
grail. |
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"The da Vinci Code" |
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Dan Brown's novel "The da Vinci Code" is fiction, a detective novel, containing
some factual
information
on history, history of art and history of architecture. Central to the
story is da Vinci's fresco "The Last Supper" - the disciple
(from the spectators
point of view) to the left of
Jesus, John, is according to Brown Mary Magdalene, who saw the empty tomb,
and was the first person who saw the Lord Jesus after his resurrection. Brown
puts forth the idea that Jesus Christ was married to Mary Magdalene, and
she gave birth to their daughter named Sarah, who married into the first
Frank dynasty (the long-haired Merovings).
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In "The Last Supper"
the space between Jesus and John forms the letter "V", a symbol
of the Holy Grail, the Sangreal (another name for the Holy Grail), Brown
manipulates the San Greal to Sang Real (royal blood) and with it there
is a connection - the holy Grail is represented symbolic, predicting the
destiny of the unborn child. The so-called "V" space is not something special, it is a compositional
effect, it creates space around the central figure, Jesus - in the dynamic
composition conversations take place, John is listening, his placing to the
left of Jesus is
more logical than symbolic. The idea about the feminine look of John can
be attributed to his beardless look (two disciples are beardless),
and long hair with centre parting was the male hairstyle at that time.
In 1945, a set of 52 religious and philosophical texts
written in the 2nd or 3rd century, were found at Nag Hammadi,
Egypt - the Gnostic Gospel of Philip is best known for a
verse that portrays Jesus kissing Mary Magdalene, (some of
the books were attacked by ants):
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"And the companion of the ... Mary
Magdalene. ... loved her more than all the
disciples, and used to kiss her often on her
... The rest of the disciples ... They said to
him "Why do you love her more than all of
us?" The Saviour answered and said to
them, "Why do I not love you like her?
When a blind man and one who sees are both
together in darkness, they are no different
from one another. When the light comes, then
he who sees will see the light, and he who is
blind will remain in darkness."
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According to Dan Brown,
Jesus kisses Mary Magdalene on the mouth, however a kiss was
a common greeting between Master and disciple - a customary
greeting in the ancient world, it has nothing to do with an erotic kiss.
In "The Da Vinci Code", the curator of the Louvre Museum,
Jacques Sauniere, has been murdered, and before he expired, he draw a circle around his body and
placed himself like "The Vitruvian Man", on the floor was
written a mysterious coded message, a secret demanding an answer. The professor
of religious symbology at Havard University Robert Langdon,
who is suspected of the murder of Sauniere, and Sauniere's
granddaughter the cryptographer
Sophie Neveu began their search for the Holy Grail chased by
the police and hunted by Opus Dei. According to Dan Brown
Leonardo Da Vinci was a Grandmaster of Priory of Sion.
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| "Outbreak of the
Vesuvius", 1820, Städelsches Kunstinstitut,
Frankfurt am Main. |
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Dahl, J.C.
(Johan Christian) (1788-1857).
Norwegian painter. He was born in Bergen, Norway and died in Dresden,
Germany. From 1811-18 he lived in Copenhagen and was educated at
The
Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, at the same time he studied Dutch
landscape paintings at the Royal Collection of Paintings. He was
influenced by
Eckersberg's
paintings and the Dutch painters impressive landscapes, however it was
in Dresden, he found his final expression - in Dresden he made
acquaintance with German Romantic Painting (Caspar
David Friedrich). Dahl was romanticist and dramatist, and the
details in his paintings were based on accurate nature studies. In 1824,
after a journey to Italy, Dahl settled down in Dresden, and he was appointed
professor at the Dresden Academy of Fine Arts. Dahl got great influence
on the Danish and Norwegian landscape painters.
(Romanticism) |
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Stugunoeset Mountain in the mountain
range of Filefjell, 1851, Baroniet
Rosendal, Norway. |
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"Lyshornet near Bergen",
1836, The National Museum of Art,
Architecture and Design, Oslo. |
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| Church of the Holy
Cross, Dalby, Sweden. Click
here for
full size image. |
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Dalby, The
Book of Dalby was a Middle Ages handwriting from the Augustinian
monastery Dalby in Denmark. This Latin Gospel book of Dalby was the first
known representative of European book culture. The stamp shows the
evangelist Mark.
The monastery archives in Dalby did not exist any longer. The Book was acquired
by the Danish Royal Library in 1785.
(Romanesque)
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"Rhinoceros", 1956,
Puerto José Banús, Marbella, Spain.
Photographer Manuel González Olaechea y
Franco.
See by Albrecht Dürer's woodcut
"Rhinoceros",
1515, click
here. |
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Dali
i Domènech,
Salvador (1904-1989). Spanish painter, sculptor,
writer and experimental filmmaker, born in Figueras,
northern Catalonia. He studied art in Madrid at Real Academia de Bellas Artes de
San Fernando, where he met the Spanish poet and dramatist Federico
García Lorca
and the Surrealist filmmaker Luis Buñuel - together with Buñuel
he created "Un Chien Andalou" (The Andalusian
Dog), 1928 and "L'Age D'Or" (The Golden Age),
1930. |
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Dali was influenced by
Chirico's
and Carrà's metaphysical style, his macabre paintings in meticulous
naturalistic style shocked the public.
His first solo exhibition was held in 1925 at Galeries Dalmau
in Barcelona.
In 1928 he moved to Paris, where he made acquaintance with
Picasso
and the surrealists. In 1930 he published
"La Femme Visible" (the Visible Woman) about
his paranoiac-critical method. I 1934 he
married Gala. In 1940 he moved to the US, where he
worked with theatre productions, wrote, illustrated books
and painted. In 1941 a retrospective
exhibition was held at Museum of Modern Art in New
York. Dali returned to Europe in 1948 and settled down in an
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fishing
village Port Lligat in Spain. In 1964 an important
retrospective exhibition of his work was shown in Tokyo,
Nagoya and Kyoto. In 1980 a major retrospective
exhibition was
held at the Musée National d’Art Moderne,
Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris,
and his work was exhibited at the Tate Gallery in London.
Dali's most famous works are "The
Persistence Of Memory" with the melting watches,
1931, Museum of Modern Art, New York and the
"The Burning Giraffe", 1936-37 in the Kunstmuseum Basel (Basel
Art Museum, Switzerland). Dali illustrated
Dante's "La Divina Comedia"
(The Divine Comedy), 1963, and the works of Surrealist writers and
poets. In 1997 the Salvador Dali house-museum in Port Lligat was
opened to the public. (Surrealism) |
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"Self-Portrait with Raphaelesque Neck",
c. 1921. Fundació
Gala-Salvador
Dalí, Figueras, Spain. |
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Salvador Dali with His Cane. |
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"Port Alguer", c. 1923,
Fundació
Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueras, Spain. |
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"The Basket of Bread", 1945,
Fundació
Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueras, Spain. |
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"Soft Self-Portrait with Fried Bacon",
1941,
Fundació
Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueras, Spain. |
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"Galatea
of the Spheres", 1952, Fundació
Gala-Salvador Dalí, Figueras, Spain. |
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"The
Persistence of Memory", 1931, Museum of
Modern Art, New York. |
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"The Temptation of St. Anthony", 1946,
Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels,
Belgium. |
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"The Endless Enigma", 1938, Museo
Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia,
Madrid, Spain. |
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"The
Great Masturbator", 1929, Museo Nacional
Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid. |
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"Notre-Dame de Paris", 1850. |
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Daumier,
Honoré
(1808-1879). French caricaturist, graphic artist, painter and
sculptor. He was born in Marseille and he died in Valmondois near Paris. In 1816 the
family moved to Paris, where Daumier lived most of his life. He had wanted to be an
artist since he was a child, however his
father, a glazier, encouraged him to find new ways - Daumier worked as
an assistant in a bookshop - however his only interest was drawing, and at the age of 14
he was allowed to attend art classes at Atelier
Suisse in Paris, where he met the future sculptor Auguste Preault
(1809-1879), his works made a profound impression on him. Daumier learned lithography techniques and began his artistic career
by executing steel engravings for music-publisher and illustrations for
advertising. During the July Revolution of 1830, he joined the republican
opposition to the "Citizen King"/"Bourgeois Monarch", King Louis Philippe
(1830-1848) and his regime. From 1830 he worked as a caricaturist for the
French magazine "La Caricature". In c.4000 lithographs he spoke ironically of
prominent people, first and foremost politicians, lawyers and particularly
the king came under fire. Daumier was imprisoned for six months in
1832 for representing King Louis-Philippe as a Gargantua* - the king was transformed to
Rabelais' Gargantua,
senators feed the king, called pear face, with baskets filled with gold
stolen from the poor - the gold is transported on a ramp into his open
mouth. In 1835 the government banned the political satire, and Daumier
began to work for the satirical magazine
Le Charivari
(published from 1832-1937), and turned to
the social satire - during
1848-Revolution/the February Revolution he
returned to political subjects. Daumier is
considered the most outstanding caricaturist
of the 19th century - the essence of his
satire is his ability to interpret stupidity
and physical absurdity and his fine sense of
limit of exaggeration.
In his lifetime Daumier was chiefly known as a caricaturist, he also
worked as a
painter and a sculptor. Though his painting were
accepted by the Paris Salon four times, he was practically unknown as a
painter until 1878, where he exhibited at Galerie Durand-Ruel in Paris. His paintings
were mainly a documentation of contemporary life containing satirical undertones.
As sculptor he specialized in portraits and figures in a spontaneous style
- except one they were all caricatures - best-known is "Ratapoil", 1950, symbolizing
human vices/the henchmen of Louis-Philippe. A corresponding political
figure in his graphic art was
"Robert Macaire"**, who personified the unscrupulous (war-)speculator and
with simplicity and lack of sentimentality
Daumier depicted the social life. Though his
art never became a financial success,
swindler. his works
were highly valued among his friends and
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admires e.g.
Delacroix,
Corot,
Forain and Baudelaire.
Degas was a collector of Daumier's works. *Gargantua - a big person (of height or size) with a greedy physical and
intellectual appetite, the figure is from the humorous satirical book
series about the giants "Gargantua og Pantagruel" by the French
renaissance writer, Franciscan monk, humanist and physician Francois
Rabelais. The book is about the adventure of the two heroes (father and
son), the are rudely, vulgar and funny in a universe filled with greediness,
stupidity, violence and grotesque jokes. The book was banned by the
catholic church and registered in Index Librorum Prohibitorum (the church
register of forbidden books).
**Robert Macaire a criminal and murder known from the French drama
"Aubry's Dog"/The Bondy-Forrest". The legend tells that the
French knight Aubry de Montdidier in 1371 was murdered in the Bondy-Forrest
by Robert de Macaire - the only witness to the murder was Aubry's dog
Dragon, who subsequently showed unusual fury at the sight of Macaire.
King Charles V/The Wice
(1364-80), decided that a duel between the dog and Macaire, who was armed
with a cudgel, should settles the case, the dog murdered Macaire, who
confessed the murder before he died, he was hanged.
(Realism)
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"Gargantua", 1831, Lithography,
Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. |
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"Crispin and Scapin", c. 1858-60. Musée
d'Orsay, Paris. |
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"The Third-Class
Carriage",
c. 1862-64. National Gallery of Canada. |
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"Chess-Players", c. 1863-1867, Musée du Petit Palais,
Paris. |
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"Mary Magdalene in the Desert", c.
1849-1850, The National Museum of
Western Art, Tokyo. |
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"Attorney Reading", Sammlung Dr. Robert
Bühler, Winterthur. |
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"Advice to a Young Artist", 1860,The National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. |
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"Don Quixote", c. 1868. |
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"The Collector of Engravings", c.
1860. Musée du Petit Palais, Paris. |
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"Ecce Homo!" c. 1849-52. Museum
Folkwang, Essen, Germany. |
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Lithograph published June 16, 1865 in
the illustrated newspaper Le Charivari
(1832-1937).
Eh! bien en regardant ce tableau de près on finit
par y découvrir des qualités, on voit que la couleur est bonne.
(Oh! Looking closely at the painting you
might discover some qualities, one find
the colors are great). |
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Madame
Récamier c. 1800, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
David has depicted Madame Récamier (Jeanne Françoise
Julie Adélaïde Bernard 1777-1849) as the Republic's heroine,
however she was an opponent of Napoleon. She lies in a
classical position on a couch turning her shoulder to the
viewer, she has adopted the Spartan furnishing, hairstyle
and dress of ancient Pompeii, she is barefooted (symbol of
the Revolution). Madame
Récamier's Salon was frequented by celebrated Frenchmen,
writers, politicians, artists and foreign visitors - her
guests came to view her beauty, she was valued for her tact
and gift for listening.
Magrittes
Madame Récamier. |
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David, Jacques Louis
(1748-1825)
French artist, he was born in Paris, and he died in Brussels. David was
Neo-Poussinist
(Nicolas Poussin),
he was influenced by
Caravaggio's light, however first and foremost the leading
neo-classical artist in France and the revolutionary regime's official painter,
perhaps best known for his huge dramatic canvasses of Napoleon
and other historical persons.
In 1766 the young David studied under the Rococo-painter Joseph-Marie Vien
(1716-1809), who had a special interest in classical antiquity that arose
in the 18th century. From 1766-74 David studied at the Royal Academy of
Painting and Sculpture in Paris. In 1774 he won, after several fruitless attempts,
the Prix de Rome for
"Antiochus
and Stratonice". From 1775-80 David lived in Rome, he followed
his teacher Vien, who had become director of the French Academy in Rome - during his stay
he became acquainted with the great creations of
Raphael
and Domenichino and with the
Roman antique monuments, which were of crucial importance to him. In 1784 David was commissioned, by King Louis XVI, to
create a large painting on his own premises, he returned to Rome to paint "The Oath of the Horatii", which in
1785 was exhibited at the Paris Salon, where it became a gigantic
success, it became the principal model for noble and heroic
historical painting.
David was playing a active role during the French revolution
1789-99, he supported Robespierre
(1758-1794), member
of the Jacobin Club and the leader of the The Reign
of Terror (1793-94) - the French physician and politician
Jean-Paul Marat (1743-1793) was chairman of the Jacobin Club - David's
painting "The
Death of
Marat", painted after the policeman's
report, shows Marat in his bathtub, he was killed
with a |
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Charlotte Corday, a young idealistic noblewoman, her
name can be seen on the note in Marat's left hand: "Du 13 juillet 1793, Marie Anne Charlotte Corday au citoyen Marat, il suffit que
je sois bien malheureuse pour avoir droit à votre bienveillance" ("the
13th July 1793, Marie Anne Charlotte Corday to citizen Marat. Because I am
very unhappy I have the Right of your attention").
The French Revolution of 1789 ended
up with Napoleon's coup d'état (and
again in 1804 a new absolute monarchy), David gave up his glorification of
the revolution, he was a great admirer of Napoleon an joined him, presumably because of an sincere enthusiasm
for him - whose appearance (according to David) was similar to that of a
Roman hero. As
court painter to Napoleon David executed the monumental history painting
(6 x 11 metres) of the spectacular coronation ceremony at Notre Dame in Paris.
When Napoleon's empire came to an end in 1814 the Bourbon Dynasty was
restored to the French throne, David went into exile in Brussels in 1815, he continued
painting, he executed e.g. the portrait of count
de
Turenne, 1816.
(Neo-Classicism) |
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1 |
Sketch
for the "Tennis Court Oath" (Le serment du
Jeu de Paume, le 20 juin 1789), 1791,
Versailles. |
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"The Oath of
the Horatii",
1784, Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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"The
Death of Marat", 1793, Musées Royaux des
Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels. |
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"Napoleon's
Coronation", 1805-1808, Musée du Louvre,
Paris. |
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"Napoleon
in his study", 1812. The National Gallery of Art,
Washington, D.C. |
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"Bonaparte
Crossing the St. Bernard Pass", 1800,
Musée
national du château de Malmaison, Rueil-Malmaison, (near Paris), France.
The Château de Malmaison, residence of Napoleon
Bonaparte and the Empress Joséphine |
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"The
Sabine Women", 1796-99, Louvre, Paris. |
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"Paris and Helen", 1788, Musée du
Louvre. Paris. |
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"Portrait of Pope Pius VII", 1805, Musée
du Louvre, Paris. |
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| "The Bellelli Family", 1858-67, Musée
d'Orsay, Paris. |
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Degas, Hilaire-Germain-Edgar
(1834-1917). French
painter, draughtsman and sculptor. He was born in Paris into a banking
family, and he died in
Paris. Degas studied at Ècole des Beaux-arts in Paris, under a former
apprentice to
Ingres, afterwards he went
to Italy to study. His great fascination with Ingres' became a determining
factor in his work, he was also influenced by
Manet and Japanese woodcuts.
Degas was one of the artists in the Impressionist group, where Manet was
the central figure, he never became
an Impressionist |
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"Self Portrait With Top Hat", 1863,
Museu Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon |
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in the
proper sense of the word - unlike the
impressionists, he preferred to work in the studio,
and the Impressionists structureless light painting
did not satisfy him, he was an observer, his whole
life he was attracted to Ingres' cool Classicism -
most of Degas' works depicted jockeys, race horses, scenes of women
bathing, theaters, cafés or music
halls - in the early 1870s the female ballet dancer |
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became his favorite
theme. His ability to maintain the distinctive
in even the passing motion was unusual - he absolutely
wanted to depict his models unpainted - at the same his art
was graceful and merciless, uniting the realistic moment
description with classical seriousness and feeling of style.
In the 1880s, when his eyesight began to fail, he began
increasingly to work in new mediums, sculpture and pastel,
that did no require intense visual acuity. In 1881 he
exhibited a sculpture, The little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer,
and as his eyesight filed thereafter, he turned increasingly
to sculpture, modelling figures and horses in wax over metal
armatures.
As
sculptor Degas executed several important statuettes of women and horses -
whether he is looked at as painter or sculptor, he is among Europe's
greatest artists. (Impressionism)
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1 |
"The Little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer" and self-portrait. |
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2 |
"Little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer",
1879-1881, The Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York. |
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3 |
Detail
"Dancer on Stage with Bouquet", Musée
d'Orsay, Paris. |
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4-8 |
Ballet dancers. |
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9 |
"Mlle La La at the Circus Fernando",
1879.The National Gallery, London. |
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10 |
"Cafe Concert Singer", 1878, The Fogg
Art Museum, Harvard University,
Cambridge, USA. |
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11 |
"Portrait of
Mary
Cassat", c. 1880-84, National
Portrait Gallery, The Smithsonian
Institution, Washington, DC. |
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12 |
"Woman with Porcelain Vase", 1872, Musée d'Orsay, Paris. |
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13 |
"Woman Ironing", c.1869, Neue Pinakothek,
Munich. |
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14 |
"Place de la Concorde", 1876, The State
Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg. |
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15 |
"The Tub", 1886, Musée d'Orsay, Paris. |
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16 |
"The
Absinthe Drinker", 1875-76, Musée d'Orsay,
Paris. |
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17 |
"At the Races", 1877-1880, Musée
d'Orsay, Paris. |
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18 |
"Dancer", c. 1900, Ny Carlsberg
Glyptotek, Copenhagen. |
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| "The
Barque of Dante", 1822, Musée du
Louvre, Paris. Delacroix's first
major painting signalling a
change of direction in his style
from
Neo-Classicism towards
Romanticism. It depicts an
episode from Dante's "Inferno".
Dante and Virgil endures a
fearful crossing of the River
Styx. On Dante's journey to
salvation, the Roman poet Virgil
is his guide to the gates of
heaven. |
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1-2 |
"Liberty
Leading the People", 1830, Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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3 |
"The Death of Sardanapalus", 1827-1828,
Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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4 |
Detail from "Jacob wrestling with the
angel", 1857-1861, mural, Saint-Sulpice,
Paris. |
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5 |
Detail "Entry of the Crusaders into
Constantinople", 1840, Musée du Louvre,
Paris. See the full painting
here. |
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6 |
"Orphan Girl at the Cemetery", 1924,
Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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7 |
George Sand and Frédéric Chopin. Sand
was a French author and feminist
Amandine Aurore Lucille Dupin. |
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8 |
"Greece on the Ruins of Missolonghi",
1826, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Bordeaux. |
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9 |
Self-portrait, c. 1839, Musée du Louvre,
Paris. |
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10 |
Delacroix's Studio, Paris. |
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| "The
Newborn", c. 1645, Musée des
Beaux-Arts, Rennes, France. |
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1 |
"The Newborn", c. 1645, Musée des
Beaux-Arts, Rennes, France. |
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2 |
"The Adoration of the Shepherds", c.
1640, Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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3 |
"The Musicians' Brawl", 1625-1630, J.
Paul Getty Museum, Malibu, USA. |
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4 |
"St. Sebastian Attended by St. Irene",
c. 1649. Musée du Louvre, Paris. |
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5 |
"St Thomas", 1605-30, Musée du Louvre,
Paris. |
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6 |
"The Dream of St Joseph", 1628-1645,
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Nantes, France. |
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7-8 |
"St Joseph the Carpenter", 1642, Musée
du Louvre, Paris. |
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9 |
"Old Man", c. 1618-1619, The Fine Arts
Museums of San Francisco, Legion of
Honor. |
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10 |
"The Fortune Teller", c. 1630s,
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New
York. |
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Delvaux,
Paul
(1897-1994).
Belgian painter born in Antheit.
From 1916-19 he studied architecture and painting
at
Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. In his
early years he was influenced by
Ensor.
In 1938 he participated in the Exposition Internationale du
Surréalisme at Galerie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. In 1944 his first
retrospective exhibition was held at Palais des Beaux-Arts in
Brussels.
In
1946 Henri Storck and Paul Éluard created a film about him.
In
1950 he was appointed professor at the École Nationale
Supérieure d'Art et d'Architecture in Brussels.
Delvaux
exhibited at the Venice Biennale, 1954. From 1965-66
he served as president and director of the Académie Royale des
Beaux-Arts of Belgium. His work has received numerous awards e.g.
the World Fair Medal in 1958 and the Rembrandt Prize in 1973. In
1977 he became an associate member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts
of France.
In his paintings he concentrated on the feeling of loneliness
- in deserted streets
in an idealized town with classical temples
and buildings, and nude
women walked in a somnambulistic trance
centered on their own beauty. In a state of barrenness and passivity
the human persons lived an unreal life.
(Surrealism)
.
.
.
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"Paul
Delvaux, ou, La passion puérile"
by Jacques Sojcher and Paul Delvaux ,
1991 |
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1 |
"The
Worried city", 1941. |
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2 |
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3 |
Detail "The
Night Train", 1957. |
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4 |
"Woman
with a Mirror". |
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5-6 |
Details
"The Man of the Street", 1940.
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7 |
"The
Public Voice", 1948, Musée d'Art
Moderne, Brussels.
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8 |
"Serenity",
1970. The Groeningemuseum
Bruges, Belgium. |
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Derain,
André (1880-1954).
French painter and sculptor. He was born in Chatou (Seine-et-Oise). In 1898 he matriculated at the Academie
Carriere in Paris, where he met Matisse. In 1905 the art dealer Ambroise Vollard
bought every painting in his studio - the same
year, together with Vlaminck,
Matisse
and other artists, he exhibited at Salon d'Automne
- the critics called these artists Les Fauves (wild beasts). Also
in 1905 Derain visited London for the first time, Vollard commissioned
him to paint some views of London, the later so-called Thames pictures.
In 1906 he painted in
L'Estaque in the South of France, where he met
Picasso, and the following
year he signed a contract with Picasso's art dealer Daniel-Henri
Kahnweiler,
and his financial freedom made it possible for him to marry the beautiful Alice,
called "La Vierge" (the Madonna) - they moved to Montmartre in Paris, where Derain continued his
friendship with Picasso. Derain was influenced by Cubism, classical art
and African art. In his so-called gothic period, 1912-14, his paintings of figures and
landscapes
showed a firmness in form and composition, and he was perceptible influenced by
Cezanné.
In the last years of his life, he became less and less experimented and created several
portraits and figure paintings in a simple classic style. Derain was in
his understanding of colours influenced by the Venetians, in his paintings
he used golden and brown nuances.
During the German occupation of France he lived mostly in Paris, his
paintings were highly valued by the Nazi's because of their artistic
integrity and the Nazi's snobbery of French art. Hitlers' foreign minister Joachim von
Ribbentrop commissioned Derain to paint a family portrait, he rejected
this offer. Derain was also a scenery designer, and he illustrated books e.g.
books of the poet Guillaume Apollinaire and works written by André Breton.
In 1954 Derain died in a car accident.
(Fauvism) |
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| "Figures
in a Meadow", 1906. |
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"Barges
on the
Seine", 1906, Musée National
d'Art Moderne,
Paris. |
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"Jardin
d'émail" (Enamel Garden), 1974,
The Kröller-Möller Museum, the Netherlands |
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1 |
"Group of
Four Trees", Manhattan Plaza,
William Street, Manhattan, New York. |
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2 |
"Manoir d'Essor", Louisiana Museum of
Modern Art, Humlebaek, Denmark. |
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3 |
The Patsy and Raymond Nasher Collection,
The National Gallery of Art, Washington. |
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4-5 |
Ceramic
wall, 1965. Executed by Erik Nyholm 1977,
Silkeborg Art Museum, Denmark. |
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Duchamp,
Marcel
(Henri-Robert-Marcel)
(1887-1968). French-American artist and chessplayer. He was born in
Blainville, and he died in
Neilly-sur-Seine, France.
In 1904 Duchamp moved to Paris, where his
brothers, the artists, Jacques Villon and Raymond Duchamp-Villon
already lived. From 1904-05 he studied painting at Académie Julian.
In 1909 he exhibited for the first time at
Salon des Indépendants and Salon d’Automne in Paris.
His earliest paintings were influenced by
Post-Impressionism - first and foremost
Cézanne.
About 1913 he gave up the traditional painting for variant
experimental forms e.g. a dynamic version of Analytic Cubism close
to Futurism, he composed motion sequences of several successive
photographic shots.
In 1912 his painting
"Nude
Descending a Staircase, No.2",
(Philadelphia Museum of Art, Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection)
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Armory Show, New York, 1913,
"Nude Descending a
Staircase, No.2", 1912, Philadelphia Museum of Art,
Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection. |
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"Neuf Moules Málic", 1914-15,
private collection. |
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was shown at Salon de la Section d’Or
in Paris, and in 1913 when shown at the Armony Show,
International Exhibition of Modern Art, New York, the
painting caused a scandal - it was a remarkable painting, an
avant-garde jumble with elements from Cubism, Futurism, the
chromophotography (colour photograph) and silent film. The
painting was sold for 300 USD to a San Francisco art dealer.
In his painting "The
Bride",
1912, (Louise and Walter Arensberg Collection), the title is
written on the canvas, there is no similarity to the human
body or references to a bride, however the title is not
unimportant, and perhaps the painting can be understand as
an analysis of at bride - the painting looks like an
advanced machine.
Duchamp's revolutionary ideas
anticipated the founding of the Dada movement in Zürich in
1916.
In 1914 he introduced his
readymades,
mass-produced objects exhibited as work of art, Duchamps put
his signature and often a provocative title on his
mass-produced objects e.g. an
urinal, a
bottle stand or a shovel.
I 1915 Duchamp went to New York, where he
came into contact with e.g. Katherine Dreier and Man Ray,
with whom he founded Société Anonyme. After playing chess in
Buenos Aires for almost a year, he returned to France in
1919 and joined the Paris Dada group. In 1919 he "improved"
a reproduction of
Leonardo da Vinci's
"Mona
Lisa"
with a mustache and pointed beard and named his work
"L.H.O.O.Q."
(Elle a chaud au cul/she has a hot
ass). In 1920 in New York he created his first motor driven
construction. The same year he invented Rrose Sélavy, his
female alter ego - the photographer Man Ray took several
pictures of Duchamp as
Rrose Sélavy
- she became a person to whom Duchamp through his life ascribes
a great deal of his works e.g. readymades, poems and puns.
In 1923 Duchamp returned to Paris and seemed to have given
up art in favour of chess, however his artistic experiments
continued. From the mid-1930s he co-operated with the
surrealists and took part in their exhibitions. In 1942 he
settled permanently in New York, and
in 1955 he became American citizen. Throughout the 1940s he
worked and exhibited together with the "Surrealist émigrés"
in New York. From 1946-66 he secretly worked on his
construction "Etant
donnés: 1. la chute d’eau 2. le gaz d’éclairage"
(Given: 1. the Waterfall, 2. the Illuminating Gas) - the
work consisted of an old wood door, bricks, velvet, leather,
twigs, glass, motor etc, he prepared this "Manual of
Instructions for the Assembly of "Etant donnés"", where the
creation process was explained and illustrated. The
spectators steps in front of the
door
activate light and a motor, through two peepholes in the door,
the spectators can look at the construction behind the door,
on a bed of twigs lies a
nude female figure
holding a gaslamp in her hand, the scene background is an
almost romantic landscape with a waterfall - the work is
regarded as Duchamp's chief work, it belongs to Philadelphia
Museum of Art, USA. (Dadaism)
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Dufy, Raoul
(1877-1853). French painter and illustrator, influenced by Impressionism,
Cubism and Fauvism. Dufy was born in Le Havre, and he
died in Forcalquier north east of Marseille in Southern France. At
Le Havre Museum, he studied, together with his school friend, the later
French Fauvist Othon Friesz, the works of
Eugène Boudin. In 1900 Dufy received a scholarship, which made it possible for
him to study at École des Beaux-Arts
in Paris, where he was apprenticed to Bonnat. In 1905
Matisse's
painting
"Luxe, Calme et Volupté", 1904,
(Musée d'Orsay,
Paris), was exhibited at Salon des Indépendants - a painting of vital
inspiration for Dufy, it radically changed his way of painting, and he
joined the circle of fauvists, whose leader and key figure was Matisse -
later Dufy developed his personal style. With a light touch he painted
female forms, the French Riviera, regattas, casinos, palms and horseraces
- charm and exquisite good taste characterized his works. Alongside his career
as painter, he worked as e.g. graphic designer, textile designer and
illustrated books, e.g.
Guillaume Apollinaire's "Bestiary: Or the Parade of Orpheus" -
illustrated with woodcuts. (Fauvism) |
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"The red
violin", 1948, Musée national d'Art Moderne, Paris. |
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| "Sailing
Ships at Deauville", 1935, Private
Collection. |
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"Self-Portrait in a Fur Coat",
1500. Alte Pinakothek, Munich
"Self-Portrait at 26", 1498,
The Prado Museum, Madrid, Spain
Albrecht Durer Logo |
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Dürer,
Albrecht
(1471-1528). German painter,
printmaker,
mathematician
and writer, who combined the
German coppersmith
Martin
Schongauer's (1450-1491) Gothic
world with the Renaissance
ideals - Dürer sought a fusion
between the Spirit of the
Renaissance and the Spirit of
the Reformation in serious,
moral and often symbolic
subjects - several of his works
showed manneristic tendencies,
he emphasized complexity
physical and spiritual motion.
Dürer came
from a Hungarian family, his
father, who was a goldsmith
named Ajtósi, emigrated to
Nuremberg in Bavaria in 1455 and
adopted the German-sounding name
Dürer. In 1467 Albrecht Dürer
the Elder married his master's
daughter Barbara Holper. Dürer
was born in Nuremberg, and he
died in Nuremberg. He began to
work in his fathers workshop at
an early age and showed great
drawing talent, and at the age
of 15 his father sent him to the
leading Nuremberger artist
Michael Wolgemut/Wohlgemuth in
whose workshop he first and
foremost learned the woodcut
technique for book
illustrations. Dürer's godfather
was the former goldsmith Anton
Koberger (1440-1513), who became
the largest printer and
publisher in Germany at the time
- his most famous publication
was the Nuremberg Chronicle or
Liber Chronicarum, 1493, which
contained woodcut illustrations,
and Dürer is supposed to have
cut some of them - the Chronicle
project began while Dürer was an
apprentice in the workshop of
Michael Wolgemut. After
finishing his apprenticeship
Dürer travelled through Germany,
Switzerland and Italy. I 1494 he
returned to Nuremberg - his
father has arranged an
appropriate marriage for him to
Agnes Frey, the daughter of the
highly respected and wealthy
coppersmith Hans Frey - their
marriage was not a particularly
happy one. From 1494-95 Dürer
visited Venice for short a
period. In 1505 he returned to
Venice for a two-year stay, he
worked together with Giorgiona
and
Tizian
on the decoration of Fondaco dei
Tedeschi, the German Exchange. |
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In 1507 he was
back in Nuremberg, and he stayed
there for the rest of his life,
apart from a journey to the
Netherlands in 1520-21. From 1512-19
Dürer was court painter to emperor
Maximilian. In Nuremberg Dürer
joined the humanist circles.
Dürer earliest
work was a self-portrait painted at
the age of 13, the first of many
self-portraits.
Dürer's woodcuts
revolutionized the practice of
illustrating books, he contributed
to the appreciation of woodcuts as
an independent art form. Dürer wrote
and illustrated book on art theories
based the Italian artist
Piero della Francesca,
who pioneered the use of perspective
in Renaissance art. In his late
period, when he was convinced about
the Reformation thoughts, he turned
towards a more ascetic style,
"The
Four Apostle",
called his will, 1526, combined the
Nordic Reformation with the Italian
Renaissance painting.
(Renaissance)
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1 |
Albrechts
Durer's house in Nuremberg. |
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2 |
"Self-Portrait at 22", 1493,
Musée du Louvre,
Paris. |
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3 |
Self-Portrait". |
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4 |
Sculpture of Dürer, Albrecht-Dürer-Platz
in
Nuremberg,
Germany. |
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5 |
"Portrait of Michael Wolgemut", 1516. |
|
6 |
"Two Musicians", 1504, Wallraf-Richartz
Museum, Cologne, Germany. |
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7 |
"Adoration
of the Kings", Galleria degli
Uffizi, Florence. |
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8 |
"Portrait of Barbara Dürer", 1490-1993,
Germanisches Nationalmuseum,
Nuremberg,
Germany. |
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9 |
"Paumgartner Altar", c. 1503, Alte
Pinakothek, Munich, Germany. |
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10 |
"Feast of the Rose Garlands", 1506,
Nationalgalerie, Prague, the Czech
Republic. |
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11 |
"St. Anne with the Virgin and Child" (=
Anne Selfthird"), 1519, Metropolitan
Museum of Art, New York |
|
12 |
"Valley near Kalchreuth" (near
Nuremberg), c. 1495, Kupferstichkabinett
(copperplate cabinet),
Berlin. |
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13 |
"The Magic Square", Melancholy I, 1514. |
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14 |
Melancholy I, 1514. |
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15 |
"Adoration
of the Lamb", 1496-98 |
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16 |
"Rhinoceros", 1515, woodcut, See Dali's
"Rhinoceros", click here. |
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17 |
"Knight", 1498, drawing, Albertina
Wien. |
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18 |
"Christ in
front of Pilate". |
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