^
Died on 24 December 1824: John Downman,
English portrait
painter born in 1750.
— Born in Ruabon, North Wales. He studied under Benjamin
West in London and entered the Royal Academy, London Schools in 1769.
He visited Rome with Wright of Derby in 1773-1775, apparently intent on
becoming a history painter, but by 1777 he was painting portraits in Cambridge
and by 1780 he had evolved his most characteristic portrait manner, the
half-length oval in black chalk and stump with light washes of color. He
exhibited portraits and a number of fancy subjects at the Royal Academy,
London 1769-1819, and was elected Associate Royal Academician, London 1795.
He practiced in the west country 1806-1808 and is recorded at Chester in
1818-1819. He died at Wrexham.
— Downman became a student of Benjamin West in 1768 and entered the
Royal Academy Schools, London, the following year. In 1770 and 1772 he exhibited
portraits at the Royal Academy and showed his first subject picture in 1773.
He left for a period of study in Italy and was in Rome with Joseph Wright
of Derby from 1773 to 1774. When he next exhibited at the Royal Academy
(1777) he was living in Cambridge, but from 1778 to 1804 his considerable
annual contribution to the Academy exhibitions was sent from various London
addresses. His very popular small portraits were often shown in groups of
six or nine. His occasional subject pictures were based on themes from mythology,
Classical history, poetry and the theatre. They included a scene from As
You Like It painted for John Boydell’s Shakespeare Gallery. Downman
became ARA in 1795 and traveled widely in later life, marrying in Exeter
in 1806 and sending works to the Royal Academy (1805–1812 and 1816–1819)
from all over the country.
— Downman studied at the Royal Academy Schools and under Benjamin
West. He first exhibited at the Free Society in 1768. In 1771 he set off
to Rome with Joseph Wright of Derby [1734-1797]. During this time he departed
from portraiture and, mastering watercolors, produced beautiful soft landscape
and architectural studies. On his return he continued with the oval portraits
in watercolors for which he is best known. Throughout his career he also
worked on a small scale in oils where his enamel-like finish of a miniaturist
reveals his debt to his "beloved master" West. The popularity of his style
of painting in watercolors was advanced by many of his popular subjects,
actresses, etc. becoming prints and Peltro William Tomkins perfected a special
technique of printing the delicate complexions in color. The artist himself
was innovative, frequently working on very thin paper, coloring the complexion
from the reverse side of the sheet. He became an A.R.A. in 1795, having
exhibited at the Academy from 1789 to 1819.
— LINKS
— Shakespeare
- As You Like It - Act 1, Scene 2, (50x63cm) [illustrating
the play As
You Like It]
— The
3rd Marquess of Hertford as a Boy (1781, 22x17cm) [hair and dress of
a girl, it seems to me]
^
Born on 24 December 1596: Leonaert Bramer,
Dutch artist who died on 10 February 1674.
— Dutch genre and history painter, active mainly in his native Delft.
He traveled widely in Italy and France, 1614-28, and drew on a variety of
influences for his most characteristic paintings - small nocturnal scenes
with vivid effects of light. Works such as the Scene of Sorcery have
earned him the reputation an interesting independent who cannot easily be
pigeonholed. Bramer was also one of the few Dutch artists to paint frescoes
in Holland, but none of his work in the medium survived. He evidently knew
well the greatest of his Delft contemporaries, Vermeer,
for he came to the latter's defence when his future mother-in-law was trying
to prevent him from marrying her daughter. In fact, it is likely that Bramer,
rather than Carel
Fabritius, was Vermeer's teacher.
— LINKS
— The
Adoration of the Magi (1630) _ Bramer is best remembered today for his
small nocturnal scenes illuminated by phosphorescent colors and streaks
of light. His contemporaries considered him an outstanding wall painter
and, he was one of the artists commissioned by Frederik Hendrik to help
decorate his hunting lodge at Honselaarsdijk, and he also received several
other important commissions. Bramer was one of the few seventeenth-century
Dutch artists who painted frescoes in Holland; none have survived the Dutch
climate. Bramer's name has been invoked in connection with Rembrandt's early
phase. The question of whether Bramer's early night scenes influenced Rembrandt,
or if Rembrandt inspired Bramer's late works, is best answered negatively.
The resemblance between their works is superficial. It is safe to say both
artists arrived at their results independently.
^
Died on 24 December 1904: Gustav Bauernfeind,
Austrian (or German?) artist specialized in orientalism, born on 04 September
1848.
— Bauernfeind originally studied architecture before turning to art.
One of the few Jewish artists of his time, he settled in Jerusalem in 1898
and died there six years later. He had great talent at depicting ordinary
life and produced beautiful paintings that are considered among the most
historically accurate images we have today of the Middle East in the nineteenth
century.
— LINKS
— Lament
of the Faithful at the Wailing Wall, Jerusalem (1890) The Wailing Wall
is the one surviving wall of the great temple of Solomon which the Babylonians
destroyed when they overran Israel and sacked Jerusalem. In this painting
you can see it has been rebuilt but not restored to its original condition.
Certain stones seem out of place and probably were in different locations
in the original structure. This represents the archetypal vision which has
been shattered and then imperfectly rebuilt; and is a metaphor for the human
condition. For centuries Christian artists had painted scenes from the Bible.
Now Jewish artists were painting scenes from Jewish religious life.
— Market
at Jaffa Market in Jaffa, now a part of Tel Aviv, was painted by Gustav
Bauernfeind in 1887. Bauernfeind was extremely brave to paint in cities
like Jaffa and Damascus. Jaffa was frequently under quarantine for plague
and westerners could be attacked in the streets of Damascus by religious
zealots. Bauernfeind would show up in these cities in western dress with
bulky photographic equipment and somehow survive and get his work done.
— Jaffa, Recruiting of Turkish Soldiers in Palestine (1888,
148x281cm) This is the largest and most impressive painting of Bauernfeind
(available online only as this
tiny reproduction!). The harbor is the setting for a riveting spectacle
that Bauernfeind witnessed of men being conscripted into the Ottoman army,
while their wives and children ran after them into the surf. What is especially
noteworthy about this image, and what sets it apart from many other Orientalist
works, is its engagement of both the traditional, or "timeless," motifs
of Orientalism--the picturesque costumes and architecture--and the contemporary
Ottoman world of steam-powered warships, uniformed soldiers and conscription.
— Washing
Day (1880, 75x62cm)
^
Born on 24 December 1919: Pierre Soulages,
French abstract painter.
— Pierre Soulages was born in Rodez, France. As a child, he was attracted
by Romanesque art, carved menhirs, grottos and vast isolated plateaus. He
is a self-taught painter. Though he had been accepted at the École des Beaux-Arts,
he declined to enrol, inspired by the discovery of Cézanne and Picasso in
1938. He settled in Paris in 1946 and devoted himself entirely to painting.
His first solo exhibition was held in 1949. By the 1950s, he had been propelled
onto the international scene, and his works are in the collections of all
the great museums. The first retrospective exhibition took place in 1960,
in Hanover, Germany. His works have been exhibited without interruption
from 1948 to 1995, in the United States, France, Japan (where he won the
Grand Prize at the 1957 Tokyo Biennial Exhibition), Germany, Korea and China.
In 1974-1975, a retrospective was shown in Africa, France, Spain, Portugal,
Venezuela and several cities in Brazil. Working on a government commission
from 1987 to 1994, Soulages made 104 models for stained glass windows for
the Romanesque abbey church in Conques, France.
— Three thousand canvases and drawings make up the artist's output.
Soulages chose to use the deepest black to express his fascination with
light. While black is the color he uses almost exclusively, line is his
principal means of expression, and has been from the beginning. His work,
at once ascetic, balanced and powerful, eschews all reference to nature
and anecdote. "This rejection of the descriptive," noted Jean-Louis Andral,
curator of the exhibition, "is not some sort of opportunistic or circumstantial
decision, but an imperative response to the need for painterly intensity
that has guided him from the outset." Soulages's compositions are dominated
by rectangular shapes constructed on an elaborate play of horizontals and
verticals. At first, he painted mainly on paper with walnut stain, solvents
and oil. But soon the tipped artist's brush was replaced by the flat brush,
palette knife and spatula so he could work the medium of paint to create
more effective contrasts of flat color and streaks. The resulting textural
relief becomes a focus for reflection: it reacts to the reception of light,
entraps and alters it, while light in turn transforms the pictorial space.
Soulages' work can be divided into four periods:
the fluid gestures of the early works from 1947, the broken constructions
of the 1950s, the monumental architecture of the 1960s, and the explorations
since 1979, where black unleashes its light and color. — Born on December
24, 1919 in Rodez, in southwest France, Soulages started painting very early,
moved by his fascination for the contrast created by black shapes on a white
page. In 1938, he briefly attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris but,
disappointed by its academic rigidity, he soon dropped out and decided to
work on his own. During World War II, he was a farm laborer and could not
devote himself to painting until 1946 when he moved to Paris. Soulages'
first exhibition, in 1947, during the Salon des Surindépendants, received
immediate notice from critics and painters as different as Francis Picabia
and Hans Hartung. His large dark pieces stood out against the polychromatic
works of other painters. In 1948, he participated in the exhibition, Französische
Abstrakte Malerei that travelled throughout Germany and won him great respect
among German painters. In 1949, he had his first solo exhibition in Paris,
and in 1952 he joined the Galerie Louis Carré, which carried the works of
other important French artists including Fernand
Léger, Raoul
Dufy, and Jacques
Villon.
But Soulages' consecration came from the
United States where the response of professionals and collectors was the
most favorable. James Johnson Sweeney, curator of the Museum of Modern Art
in New York, visited his studio as early as 1948, purchasing a painting
on behalf of the Museum in 1952. Soulages first exhibited in New York, at
the Betty Parsons Gallery in 1949, and at the Sidney Janis Gallery in 1950,
and he participated in the landmark Younger European Painters exhibition
presented at the Solomon Guggenheim Museum in 1953. Thereafter his reputation
in the United States was solidified and many of the major US museums showed
his work. From 1954 to 1968, he had solo exhibitions almost every year in
New York, first at the Sam Kootz Gallery (until 1966) and then at the Knoedler
Gallery. During his many travels to the United States, Soulages established
lasting friendships with great US painters, notably Mark
Rothko. In 1964, he received the Carnegie Award and in 1966 the Museum
of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas organized the first retrospective exhibition
of his work. In France, Soulages switched to the Galerie de France in Paris,
in 1956, where his work has been exhibited regularly since. In 1967, the
Musée National d'Art Moderne de Paris organized a retrospective exhibition,
initiating a series of such exhibitions in a number of museums worldwide.
Soulages work is represented in museum collections throughout the world,
with 146 pieces, 45 of which are part of diverse collections in the United
States. The international art world recognized Soulages' career of accomplishment,
awarding him the Prix National de Peinture in France in 1987 and the Proemium
Imperiale for Painting in Japan in 1992.
Pierre Soulages' abstract style corresponds
to the European and US postwar movement, but it does not relate to any “school”;
indeed, its singularity is striking. His canvases have no illustrative titles,
not even that of “composition” – they are designated by the uniform
term “painting,” followed by the dimensions of the canvas and
the date of their completion. Soulages thus indicates that his paintings
are objects presented to the viewer's gaze, objects inviting the viewer
to construct or deconstruct his or her own meaning. But these objects are
neither images nor languages: they represent nothing exterior to themselves
and have no significance assigned by the painter. Rather, they aim to provoke
by allowing the viewer a share of their emotions in the encounter. Frequently,
before 1979, Pierre Soulages based his painting on the contrast between
regions of black neighboring other dark colors and white or other light
colors. His painting is characterized by the strength of its assertions,
modeled by wide black touches and by the power that emerges from the rhythm
of black on white. From 1979 on, his black tones invade the surface of the
whole canvas, which is generally of large dimensions and often assembled
in polyptichs. The entire composition escapes, however, a simple monochromatic
effect as the black paint is worked in streaks and in flat tints in order
to reflect the light. It offers the viewer a luminous and colorful image
which is continually renewed.
— LINKS
— Composition
IV (1957; 56x40cm; half size _ ZOOM
to full size)
— Green
and Black (60x43cm; 1/3 size _ ZOOM
to 2/3 size)
— Abstract
Composition in Black and Yellow (64x49cm; 1/3 size _ ZOOM
to 2/3 size) —Peinture 200 x 265 cm, 20 Mai 1959[the copyright people don't
want you to see the picture by Soulages here. You would immediately know
that it is junk similar to what you could produce yourself by making a big
ink blot. So here is a reproduction of something very much like it
and just as worthless: Peinture 200x265cm, 24 Décembre 2003, by Canu >]
_ Soulages is considered by some to be the greatest French painter of his
generation {that does not say much for the others!}. Nevertheless, he received
his most favorable response in the United States. This painting, in which
streaks of black rise in a burst to meet the diagonal at a right angle,
is one of his last pieces done in this explosive style, as well as one of
his most successful. Twentieth of May 1959, like other works of the
late 1950s, combines an immobility of shapes with a striking dynamism and
clearly belongs to this second style particularly used since 1956. It is
a piece characterized by its rhythm and the dynamic beat of its shapes in
space. Wide streaks of black rise in a burst to meet the diagonal at a right
angle. The play of light in Twentieth of May 1959, which is one of
the last pieces of this style and one of the most successful, foreshadows
Soulages' achievements since 1979. It can be compared to Eighteenth of
April 1959. It also bears similarities with Twenty Second of May
1959, a piece painted in a static style of the same period. {This drivel
does not represent the opinions of Art~4~2day}.
^
Died on 24 December 1868: Abraham
Cooper, British painter specialized in horses, born on 08 September
1787. — He was not related to Thomas
Sidney Cooper [26 Sep 1803 – 07 Feb 1902], whom he encouraged
to become an artist. — Relative? of George
Cooper, Washington
Bogart Cooper [1802-1889], William
Cooper, Richard
Cooper Jr. [1740-1814]?
— Abraham Cooper was born in London, the son of a tobacconist and
innkeeper. At the age of thirteen he became an employee at Astleys amphitheatre,
and was afterwards groom in the service of Sir Henry Meux. When. he was
twenty-two, wishing to possess a portrait of a favorite horse under his
care, he bought a manual of painting, learned something of the use of oil-colors,
and painted the picture on a canvas hung against the stable wall. His master
bought it and encouraged him to continue in his efforts. He accordingly
began to copy prints of horses, and was introduced to Benjamin Marshall,
the animal painter, who took him into his studio, and seems to have introduced
him to The Sporting Magazine, an illustrated periodical to which
he was himself a contributor. In. 1814 he exhibited his Tam
O'Shanter (296x452pix, 108kb gif) and in 1816 he won a prize for
his Battle of Ligny. In 1817 he exhibited his Battle of Marston
Moor (a 1644 battle of the English Civil War) and was made associate
of the Academy, and in. 1820 he was elected Academician. Cooper, although
ill educated, was a clever and conscientious artist; his coloring was somewhat
flat and dead, but he was a master of equine portraiture and anatomy, and
had some antiquarian knowledge. He had a special fondness for Cavalier and
Roundhead pictures.
— LINKS
—
Mr. Stillwell with his Favorite Hunter (a horse, of course) (71x92cm)
— Draught
Horses (1828) —
The Day Family (1838) — Battle
Piece (36x41cm)
— 7
works at the Tate
^
Born on 24 December 1837: Hans
von Marées, German painter, draftsman, and sculptor, who
died on 05 July 1887.
— He was a leading representative of the later 19th-century return
to Renaissance models, especially the use of figure painting in large-scale
decorative schemes. Von Marées was born to a prosperous family in Dessau,
Germany. As a young man he went to Berlin to study art at the Akademie and
later in the studio of Carl Steffeck, who specialized in equestrian and
hunting scenes. Von Marées's early work consisted mainly of equestrian and
military subjects. Even after leaving Steffeck's studio and moving to Munich,
he continued to choose similar themes for his paintings. He spent much of
his later career in Italy. He is best known for a set of large frescoes
that he painted in the Stazione Zoologica in Naples. In these and other
works he depicted male nudes, often in tranquil bucolic settings or in scenes
from classical mythology. His work includes homoerotic drawings and paintings
such as Cheiron und Achilles (1883) and Entführung des Ganymed
(1887).
Von Marées also developed an interest in portraiture.
His early self-portraits, the first of fifteen that he would eventually
paint, show the influence of Rembrandt. The influence of Venetian painting,
with its use of rich colors, can be seen in a number of works that von Marées
produced in 1863. He designed decorative panels with mythological themes
for the St. Petersburg home of Baron Alexander Lyudwigovich Stieglitz and
also painted a woodland scene, Rast der Diana. Von Marées would
return to mythological subjects throughout his career.
In 1864 von Marées left Germany for Italy,
where he would remain for most of his life. Commissioned by Adolph Friedrich
Graf von Schack to paint copies of works of the Old Masters, von Marées
copied several paintings, but these were, as Christian Lenz states, "not
so much painstaking reproductions of the originals as evidence of an independent
exploration of the subjects." Not satisfied with the copies, Schack ended
von Marées's commission in 1868.
While working in Italy, von Marées met and
became a very close friend of Adolf Hildebrand, a young German sculptor
and architect. When Hildebrand went back to Berlin, von Marées followed.
He rented a studio that he shared with Hildebrand, who had become his student
and protégé.
In 1873 both men returned to Italy when von
Marées received a commission to paint the decorations for the Stazione Zoologica
in Naples. The two artists collaborated on the project, Hildebrand contributing
trompe l'oeil architectural elements for the five large frescoes by von
Marées.
Two of the frescoes, Aufbruch der Fisher
and Das Boot, depict Neapolitan boatmen. In the first, six burly
men, three of them nude, the others wearing only shorts, are launching a
boat. The second shows five men energetically rowing a boat that transports
a bored-looking woman who is paying them no attention.
Another pair of frescoes, Orangenhain;
Die Frauen and Orangenhain; Die Männer, depict figures in
an orange grove. In the former, two women in contemporary dress are sitting
on a bench conversing. The most prominent figure in the second is a nude
young man plucking an orange from a tree.
The other figures in the male scene are an
elderly man (clothed) digging with a shovel, and two boys, one clothed and
seated, the other nude and lying on the ground. Von Marées would repeat
the theme of nude young men in idyllic groves in several subsequent paintings
including Drei Jünglinge unter Orangenbaümen (1880). The final
fresco, Pergola, shows friends sitting at an outdoor table and
drinking wine. Von Marées placed himself and Hildebrand in the scene. The
two sit side by side, their heads close together.
When the fresco project was completed, von
Marées and Hildebrand moved to Florence, where they remained for two years.
Their romantic friendship ended when Hildebrand fell in love with and married
Irene Koppel, a member of the German expatriate community in Rome who had
sat for a portrait by von Marées.
Von Marées depicted the end of his intimate
friendship with Hildebrand in a drawing, Die Frau zwischen die beiden
Männer (1875). In it, von Marées, clad in a loin-cloth, stands to the
left, his gaze direct and his arm extended to the nude Hildebrand. The younger
man returns only an oblique regard and makes a tentative gesture toward
grasping von Marées's open and outstretched hand. A serene Koppel, dressed
in a classical robe, looks fixedly at Hildebrand as she places a laurel
wreath on his head.
Hildebrand and Koppel returned to their native
Germany, but von Marées remained in Italy and went back to teaching. Beginning
in the mid-1870s he worked with sculptors Artur Volkmann, Peter Bruckmann,
and Louis Tuaillon. Von Marées often made sketches for the sculptures that
they produced, the subjects of which were generally from classical mythology.
Von Marées himself intended to sculpt a marble nude of Nestor and made a
series of preparatory sketches but did not complete the project.
Von Marées died in Rome. At the time of his
death, his work--apart from the frescoes--was not widely known to the public.
Some years later, Hildebrand designed a museum built in Munich in von Marées's
memory. Recently, there has been a renewed interest in the artist and his
work, as witnessed by exhibitions in Munich and other cities and by an increase
in scholarship and criticism.
^
1826 Auguste-Xavier Leprince, French painter
and lithographer born on 28 August 1799. He was the son and student of the painter
and lithographer Anne-Pierre Leprince and the elder brother of the painters
Robert-Léopold Leprince [1800–1847) and Gustave Leprince [1810–1837]. Leprince
received a medal at his first Salon of 1819 for one of six entries, five of
which were landscapes of 17th-century Dutch inspiration, which came possibly
via the work of Jean-Louis Demarne. Leprince quickly learnt to vary the contents
of his paintings: at the Salon of 1822 his entries included three Paris street
scenes, three portraits and two scenes on board a frigate. His numerous Paris
street scenes usually depicted some well-known contemporary event, as in La
Restoration de la Barrière du Trône, which is one of a series. The
Embarkation of the Animals at the Port of Honfleur (1823) shows the successful
application of Leprince’s interest in R. P. Bonington, not only in its composition
and content but also in its direct observation. The painting was purchased by
Louis XVIII at the highly competitive Salon of 1824. Also reminiscent of Bonington
is the small-scale contemporary history painting, The Ordination (1825),
again one of a series. In the last year of his short life Leprince showed himself
to be a sensitive watercolor painter and lithographer, publishing a set of 12
lithographs entitled Inconveniences of a Journey by Stage-coach.
1804 Moses Haughton, British artist born in 1734.
1799 Tiberius Dominikus Wocher, Swiss artist born in 1728.
^
1784 (17 Sep?) Giuseppe Bottani, Italian painter
born in 1717. He studied first in Florence under Antonio Puglieschi and Vincenzo
Meucci [1694–1766]. In 1735 he settled in Rome where, as a student of Agostino
Masucci, he deepened his knowledge of the Antique and of the pictorial tradition
of the 16th and 17th centuries. His paintings, executed in the classical Baroque
style epitomized by Reni and Maratti, are characterized by their erudite composition,
precise drawing and enamel-like colors. The large altarpiece of Saint Paola
Leaving for the Holy Land (1745) reflects his study of the proto-Neo-classical
style prevalent in Rome. He painted various religious works, mostly intended
for churches in Pontremoli (Massa Carrara), from where his family derived. Among
them are The Madonna with Saints (1756) and The Assumption of the
Virgin, the Saint Francis Xavier in Ecstasy (1757) and The
Ascension (1764). The painting of The Fair at Maccarese (1755)
is typical of his landscape and genre scenes. In 1769 Bottani was appointed
Director of the Accademia di Belle Arti in Mantua, where his activity provoked
a classical trend in painting. During these years he painted a series of altarpieces
for local churches, the designs for six high reliefs for a room in the Accademia
and some paintings on secular themes. In his last period he painted Saint
Vincent Ferrer Preaching and The Holy Family with Saints Joseph, Zeno
and Stephen (1779), in both of which he demonstrates an extreme delicacy
of painting.
^
1680 (burial) Jan van Kessel, Dutch painter and draftsman
baptized as an infant on 22 Sep 1641. — He has no known relationship with
the Flemish artists Hieronymus van Kessel II [06 Oct 1578 – >1635],
Jan
van Kessel II [bap. 05 April 1626 – 18 Oct 1679], Jan
van Kessel III [23 Nov 1654 – 1708]. — Today's Jan van Kessel
was a follower, and probably a student, of Jacob van Ruisdael and covered the
same range of subjects painted by Ruisdael, with the exception of marine paintings.
However, van Kessel is best known for his townscapes and panoramic views, as
exemplified by The Sluice and the New City Ramparts of Amsterdam in Winter
and The Bleaching Grounds near Haarlem. He imitated the water-mills
and village scenes of his friend Meindert Hobbema, as well as the waterfalls
of Allaert van Everdingen, the wooded landscapes of Jan Wijnants and the winter
scenes of Jan van de Cappelle. Many of van Kessel’s 120 surviving pictures,
including The Avenue and The Ford in the Woods, were once
attributed to van Ruisdael and these other masters (often with an authentic
signature covered by the better-known name). Van Kessel is also frequently confused
with other minor artists in van Ruisdael’s circle, especially Jan Vermeer van
Haarlem the younger, Isaac Koene [1639–1713], Jacob Salomonszoon van Ruysdael
[1630–1681] and Anthonie van Borssom. As a draftsman, van Kessel emulated van
Ruisdael’s mature style, working almost exclusively in black chalk and grey
wash. The best of his 70 drawings are townscapes, although his studies of trees
and depictions of farmsteads are noteworthy. A number of correlations exist
between his sketches and paintings.
1670 (burial) Jan Mijtens, The Hague Dutch artist born in 1614. —
Nephew of Daniel
Mijtens the Elder [1590-1647] and Isaac Mijtens [1602 – 22 Aug 1666],
he was the son of their elder brother David, a saddle-maker in The Hague. Jan
may have learnt to paint from his uncle Isaac Mijtens. After 1634 he may have
been trained by his uncle Daniel, who had by then returned to The Hague; Jan
married Daniel’s daughter Anna in 1642. In 1639 had been admitted to The
Hague’s guild of painters, of which he became a governor in 1656. In the
latter year he helped to found the painters’ society De Pictura; from
1667-1668 he was a governor of this society and from 1669-1670 its dean. He
was the father of Daniel Mijtens II [07 Aug 1644 – 23 Sep 1688 bur]. Martin
Mijtens I [01 Jun 1648 – 06 Aug 1736 bur] was a son of Isaac Mijtens and
the father of Martin van Meytens II [24 Jun 1695 – 23 Mar 1770].
1541 Damián Forment, Spanish sculptor and painter born in 1480.
Fortement influencé par les artistes italiens, il contribua à la diffusion de
l'art renaissant dans les territoires de la couronne d'Aragon. Son œuvre sculptée
marque la transition entre le gothique et la Renaissance (retable de l'autel
du monastère de Poblet; maître-autel de la cathédrale de Huesca, 1520). Son
œuvre picturale est moins importante (retable de Sigena, vers 1520). —
Retable of the High Altar (1530 sculpture): photo
of detail.
Born on a 24 December:
^
1903 Joseph Cornell, US assemblage artist who
died on 29 December 1972. Cornell was born in Nyack, New York. From 1917 to
1921, he attended Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts. He was an avid collector
of memorabilia and, while working as a woolen-goods salesman in New York until
1931, developed his interests in ballet, literature, and opera. He lived with
his mother and brother, Robert, at their home in the Flushing section of Queens.
In the early 1930s, Cornell met Surrealist writers and artists at the Julien
Levy Gallery, New York, and saw Max
Ernst’s collage-novel La Femme 100 têtes. Cornell’s early constructions
of found objects were first shown in the group exhibition Surréalisme at Levy’s
gallery in 1932. From 1934 to 1940, Cornell supported himself by working as
a textile designer at the Traphagen studio in New York. During these years,
he became familiar with Marcel
Duchamp’s readymades and Kurt
Schwitters’s box constructions. Cornell was included in the 1936 exhibition
Fantastic Art, Dada, Surrealism at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Always
interested in film and cinematic techniques, he made a number of movies, including
the collage film Rose Hobart (1936) and wrote two film scenarios. One
of these, Monsieur Phot (1933), was published in 1936 in Levy’s book
Surrealism. Cornell’s first two solo exhibitions took place at the Julien Levy
Gallery in 1932 and 1939, and they included an array of objects, a number of
them in shadow boxes. During the 1940s and 1950s, he made Aviary, Hotel, Observatory,
and Medici boxes, among other series, as well as boxes devoted to stage and
screen personalities. In the early 1960s, Cornell stopped making new boxes and
began to reconstruct old ones and to work intensively in collage. Cornell died
at his home in Flushing. — LINKS
— Untitled
(How To Make a Rainbow) (1972 screenprint 37x28cm; half-size _ ZOOM
to full size) — Untitled
(Hotel du Nord) (1972 screenprint, 38x29cm; 2/3 size)
^
1876 Josep María Sert i Badía, Barcelona
Catalan artist who died in December 1945. — En 1900 se estableció en París,
viajando todos los años por Italia, estudiando la composición, dibujo y colorido
que caracterizan su producción. Entre sus pinturas destacan la decoración de
la catedral de Vich, que haría de nuevo después de la Guerra, la de la Exposición
Universal de París (1900), el Gran Salón del Palacio de Justicia de Barcelona
(1909), el Palacio de la Sociedad de Naciones en Ginebra. De gran imaginación
al estilo de Rubens, mezcla la Biblia y la zoología fantástica, el majismo goyesco
y los títeres. También pintó las decoraciones para el Waldorf Astoria y Rockfeller
Center en Nueva York. "No hago un cuadro para una sala, sino que convierto una
sala en un cuadro".
— Su padre fue un notable artista que trazó excelentes cartones para la
fabricación de tapices, y en él encontró Sert el primer preceptor artístico
y la ayuda inicial para desarrollar su decidida vocación. De niño asistió Sert
a la escuela de los padres Jesuitas de Barcelona, completando posteriormente
su educación en su domicilio, bajo la dirección de un preceptor. Tras ello dedicóse
a la pintura, destacando ya inicialmente su inclinación por la obra mural, especialmente
las pinturas a fresco de la escuela italiana. En sus primeros tiempos produjo
bastantes obras, la mayor parte de las cuales no exponía ni salían de su estudio.
No obstante que esta actitud parecía semejar los iniciales ensayos que pretendían
fijar un estilo o adoptar un firme camino, ya poseía su producción la perfección
y personalidad de un pintor logrado. En 1900 dio a luz pública sus lienzos murales
"El Cortejo de la Abundancia". Después, le encargó el obispo Torras y Bages
la decoración de la catedral deVich, y empezó a realizar unos cuidadísimos bocetos,
cuyos primeros frutos expuso en París en 1908 con un éxito unánime de la alta
crítica de la capital francesa. La principal tarea que desarrolló Sert en su
vida artística fue Ia decoración mural, y fue, en este aspecto, una de las primeras
figuras mundiales de su tiempo. Entre sus más importantes realizaciones figuran
las efectuadas en el hotel Waldorf Astoria, los paneles del Rockefeller Center
y el salón de Ia Hispanic Society, todo ello en Nueva York; el Palacio de Justicia
en Barcelona, el de San Telmo en San Sebastián; varios salones en el Palacio
de la Sociedad de Naciones, en Ginebra, y otros palacios y moradas particulares
de destacadas personalidades nacionales y extranjeras. En enero de 1930 fue
nombrado académico de honor de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando.
Su más celebre obra la constituye el conjunto de las citadas pinturas para la
catedral de Vich, destruidas durante la guerra civil española y rehechas después
por Sert una vez finalizada ésta.
Sert era hijo de un acaudalado artista que había
hecho su fortuna pintando tapices. Estudió en la Lonja y en la academia de Pedro
Borrell, en Barcelona, y en 1899 viajó a París para completar su formación pictórica:
estudió composición, dibujo y colorido . En 1900 decoró el pabellón del Art
Nouveau en la exposición universal de Bing, y, más tarde, emprendió la magna
obra de decorar la catedral de Vich, trabajó que no concluyó hasta 1929.
Especializado en la pintura mural, Sert realizó
numerosas decoraciones en mansiones europeas y norteamericanas: el palacio de
los marqueses de Salamanca (Madrid), la residencia de Francisco Cambó (Barcelona),
el comedor del hotel Waldorf Astoria (Nueva York), la escalinata de honor y
el salón de las Crónicas del ayuntamiento de Barcelona, las dependencias del
Rockefeller Center (Nueva York), la mansión de Juan March (Mallorca). De gran
imaginación, al estilo de Rubens,
mezcló la Biblia y la zoología fantástica, el majismo goyesco [ejemplos de Goya:
Maja Vestida
(1801) — La
Maja y los Enmascarados (1777)] y los títeres.
— El 02 octubre 1936 se inauguró en Ginebra, en el nuevo palacio
de la Sociedad de Naciones, la gran sala de los consejos, pintada por Josep
Maria Sert i Badía.
— Josep Maria Sert i Badia va desenvolupar, durant la primera meitat del
segle XX, una obra pictòrica per la qual se'l va considerar el millor pintor
muralista dels anys trenta. La dimensió internacional del pintor queda patent
en el fet que les seves teles es troben tant a Europa com a Amèrica, des del
Rockefeller Center de Nova York a l'edifici de la Societat de les Nacions de
Ginebra.
Vinculat al modernisme català, Sert va viure
a Paris on va tenir contacte amb els corrents més avançats del moment. La relació
amb Catalunya la va mantenir a través de les seves germanes i, sobretot, pel
lligam que va establir amb la ciutat de Vic, on va decorar la Catedral per encàrrec
del seu amic i protector Torras i Bages. Les diferents realitzacions d'aquesta
obra van ocupar etapes decisives de la seva vida artística i, per això, no és
gens agossarat dir que Sert es va fer com a pintor al voltant del projecte decoratiu
de Vic.
A l'actualitat, Vic ofereix la visita a tres
conjunts importants: peces de les dues primeres decoracions de la Catedral a
la Capella Fonda; les pintures procedents de l'hotel Waldorf Astoria de Nova
York a l'edifici del Sucre i a la impressionant decoració de la Catedral. Tot
plegat, la visió més completa i àmplia que es pot veure en tot el món d'aquest
pintor.
1859 Eliseo Meiffren y Roig, Barcelona Catalan artist who died in 1940.
— El Marne
(414x550pix, 50kb)
^
1810 Wilhelm Nicolai Marstrand,
Copenhagen Danish painter and illustrator whose strand of earthly life ended
on 25 Mars 1873. He was a student of C. W. Eckersberg at the Kunstakademi in
Copenhagen (1825–1833). His art reflects his constant observation of the
world around him, in particular middle-class society, and the narrative element
dominated his pictures of crowds in the city streets. Throughout his life he
sought inspiration from literature and the theatre. In his early genre painting
Moving Day Scene (1831.) it was the popular novelty of vaudeville that
interested him. The October Festival (1839) reveals how Marstrand’s
five-year stay (1836–1841) in Italy opened his eyes to the classical ideal
of beauty. It was, however, an ideal that found little response in contemporary
Denmark, and he turned towards a more anecdotal and humorous approach. In Scene
of Country Life (1843), painted as a set subject for the Kunstakademi, Marstrand
took as his theme a scene from Erasmus Montanus, a play by the 18th-century
Danish poet and playwright Ludvig Holberg. Thereafter Holberg’s comedies
provided an inexhaustible source that satisfied Marstrand’s need to pursue
his investigations of human character. Family life similarly interested him
throughout his career, as in his Scene of Daily Life (1857). Such group
portraits as The Waagepetersen Family (1836) show an equal concern to
depict the quiet details of Danish domestic life. Marstrand continued to travel
abroad in search of inspiration. His stay in Venice in 1853–1854 was particularly
important; his studies there of the great Venetian painters improved his understanding
of the handling of colour, as seen clearly in the many historical and religious
paintings of his last years. Of particular interest is his mural decoration
of Christian IV’s chapel in Roskilde Cathedral (1864–1866) with scenes
from the life of the Danish monarch. Marstrand’s paintings have a certain
facetiousness which often obscures a much deeper philosophical content. For
this reason, it is his drawings that arouse more admiration; they capture the
spirit of his time with sharp satire. — The students of Marstrand included
Michael Ancher, Carl Bloch, P. S. Krøyer, Kristian Zahrtmann.
1689 Frans van Mieris II, Leiden Dutch painter and writer who died on
22 October 1763 — nephew of Jan
van Mieris [1660-1690], son of Willem
van Mieris [03 Jun 1662 – 27 Jan 1747], grandson of Frans
van Mieris the Elder [16 Apr 1635 – 12 Mar 1681] — The oeuvre
of Frans van Mieris II comprises portraits, several small history paintings,
and many genre scenes (e.g. The Grocer’s Shop Seen through an Arched Window,
1715), which stylistically and thematically are similar to his father’s work.
His most important picture, The Three Generations (1742), shows himself
standing alongside his father, Willem, and holding in one hand a portrait of
his famous grandfather, Frans, while pointing with the other to Houbraken’s
De groote schouburgh, which lies open at an engraved portrait of the
latter. In this way he demonstrated, with obvious pride, that he was from a
distinguished family of painters, who for three generations had occupied a central
position among Leiden artists. In addition to being a painter, he was well known
for his historical and numismatic writings.
—
Peinture 200 x 265 cm, 20 Mai 1959 [the copyright people don't
want you to see the picture by Soulages here. You would immediately know
that it is junk similar to what you could produce yourself by making a big
ink blot. So here is a reproduction of something very much like it
and just as worthless: Peinture 200x265cm, 24 Décembre 2003, by Canu >]
_ Soulages is considered by some to be the greatest French painter of his
generation {that does not say much for the others!}. Nevertheless, he received
his most favorable response in the United States. This painting, in which
streaks of black rise in a burst to meet the diagonal at a right angle,
is one of his last pieces done in this explosive style, as well as one of
his most successful. Twentieth of May 1959, like other works of the
late 1950s, combines an immobility of shapes with a striking dynamism and
clearly belongs to this second style particularly used since 1956. It is
a piece characterized by its rhythm and the dynamic beat of its shapes in
space. Wide streaks of black rise in a burst to meet the diagonal at a right
angle. The play of light in Twentieth of May 1959, which is one of
the last pieces of this style and one of the most successful, foreshadows
Soulages' achievements since 1979. It can be compared to Eighteenth of
April 1959. It also bears similarities with Twenty Second of May
1959, a piece painted in a static style of the same period. {This drivel
does not represent the opinions of Art~4~2day}.
