ART 4
2-DAY 20
October |
DEATH:
1801 GAUFFIER |
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Born on 20 October 1832: Anton
Romako, Austrian painter who died on 08 March 1889. Anton Romako, who had long lived in Rome painting portraits and scenes of rural life in the Campagna, came home to Vienna, but his technique of exaggerating details met with general perplexity. — Son of the cotton manufacturer Jozef Lepper and his working-manager Elisabeth Romako, Anton Romako was a student of Carl Heinrich Rahl [13 Aug 1812 – 09 Jul 1865]. Because of the uneasiness that speaks from his paintings he's regarded as a precursor of expressionism; he had an appreciable posthumous influence on expressionist Oscar Kokoschka [01 Mar 1886 – 22 Feb 1980]. On 11 June 1862 he married Sophie Köbel, the attractive daughter of the architect Karl Köbel. Franz Liszt [22 Oct 1811 – 31 Jul 1886] was present at the marriage ceremony, but did not play the music. Romako lived in Rome for nearly twenty years and his work became very popular. After his wife left him in 1875 to join her lover, he returned to Vienna in 1876. Unfortunately he was less than successful there and things got even worse when in 1887 his two youngest daughters sadly committed suicide. Not until fifteen years after Romako's death did the world show interest in his work once more. — LINKS — Kaiserin Elisabeth (1883, 135x85cm; 1357x814pix, 101kb) with a big dog (the one on the left is the dog). — Karl Radnitsky (20x29cm) Tegetthoff at the Naval Battle of Lissa (1879, 110x82cm) _ This picture by Romako is one of the most unusual historical paintings of the 19th century. It deals with the sea battle of Lissa in 1866, where the Austrian Admiral Wilhelm von Tegetthoff conquered the Italians. Romako chose not to present the scene in the conventional manner: the dramatic action is set on the bridge of the Austrian flagship, and the crew is shown rapt with anticipation of the ramming about to take place. The effect is heightened by the flying splinters of a shell exploding left above the wheel, while the whole ship is wrapped in billowing clouds of steam and smoke. Contemporary critics found Romako's concentration on the purely psychological aspect of the participants' reactions unacceptable; and Tegetthoff's very human but deplorably unheroic deportment disturbed them too. But it was precisely Tegetthoff the man, worried about the outcome of his tactics, that Romako was interested in, and only thus could he do justice to the ingenious deed. |
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Died on 20 October 1801: Louis
Gauffier, French painter born in 1762 (1761?). Winner
of the Rome Prize, admitted to the Academy, he made his career in Rome.
He was a history, landscape, and portrait painter. — Born in Poitiers, he moved to Paris, where he became a student of Hugues Taraval and a student at the Académie Royale. In 1784 Gauffier shared the Prix de Rome with Jean-Germain Drouais and Antoine-Denis Chaudet (for sculpture), his own work being Christ and the Woman of Canaan. During his time in Rome (1785–1789) Gauffier worked hard, but his health was poor and the results variable. On his return to Paris he was accepted (agréé) by the Académie as a history painter. Soon after, he returned to Rome in order to escape the worsening situation in Revolutionary Paris, although he continued to send his Neo-classical works to the Salon. In March 1790 he married Pauline Chatillon [–July 1801], a portrait painter whom he and Drouais had taught. He died in Livorno. LINKS View of Falls at Vallombrosa (1797, 84x115cm; quarter size 170kb; or see it half-size 629kb; or full size) Frederick Augustus of Saxony (1793) — Portrait of Dr. Penrose (1798, 69x53cm; 2000x1537pix; 2368kb) _ Gauffier was one of many French artists who fled Rome in 1793 in order to escape Roman reprisals following the execution of Louis XVI in France. Arriving in Florence, Gauffier the history painter adopted a portrait genre based on the flourishing market for commemorative likenesses of aristocrats set in characteristic landscapes of the region. Thomas Penrose [1769-1851] was neither an artist (as the sketchbook he holds suggests), nor an aristocrat. However, the sitter had diplomatic ambitions and, at the time of this portrait, was serving as secretary to the English envoy to the Duke of Tuscany. With a high degree of finish, Gauffier depicts Penrose above Florence on an upper terrace of the Boboli gardens. Romulus and Remus (112x142cm). _ The scene is partly inspired by the account of Romulus' life in Plutarch's Lives of Famous Men : "She gave birth to twin brothers of exceptional size and beauty. Amulius was even more alarmed and ordered a servant to drown them. He is said to have been called Faustulus; others say that was the name of he who found them [...] Unknown to everyone, Faustulus, Amulius' shepherd, sheltered and brought up the children." |
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Born on 20 October 1620: Aelbert Cuyp
(or Aelbrecht Kiup), Dordrecht painter and draftsman who was buried on 15
November 1691. He was the only child of Jacob Gerritszoon Cuyp [1594-1652],
who was the half-brother of Benjamin Gerritszoon Cuyp [bapt. Dec 1612 –
28 Aug 1652 bur.]. — One of the most important landscape painters of 17th-century Netherlands, he combined a wide range of sources and influences, most notably in the application of lighting effects derived from Italianate painting to typical Dutch subjects. Such traditional themes as townscapes, winter scenes, cattle pieces and equestrian portraits were stylistically transformed and given new grandeur. Aelbert was virtually unknown outside his native town, and his influence in the 17th century was negligible. He became popular in the late 18th century, especially in England. LINKS River Landscape with Riders (1655) The Avenue at Meerdervoort (1651, 70x99cm) _ This view was probably commissioned for one of the Meerdervoort family who lived in the Huis te Meerdervoort which is seen on the left. The Dairy Maid (1655, 106x172cm) _ From the 1650s onward golden sunlight becomes the all-pervading element in Cuyp's paintings. It spreads warmth and beauty over the Dutch countryside, where sturdy animals most often cows take the place of human heroes. They stand or rest in complete harmony with nature, breathing the invigorating air of the never-distant sea. Herds of cows in Cuyp's paintings can be seen as allusions to the pride the Dutch took in their celebrated, profitable dairy industry. In literature and emblems of the time the cow was used as a symbol of various abstract ideas (fertility, loyalty, wealth, moderation, and as a symbol of the Netherlands). The Negro Page (1652, 143x227cm) _ After about 1642 Cuyp came under the influence of painters in Utrecht like Jan Both, who had worked for several years in Italy. His tight descriptive early style, nurtured by Jan van Goyen and Salomon van Ruysdael, now suddenly gave way to a broader, more effulgent style in which the landscape is soaked in a golden light. This style reaches its climax during the 1650s when Cuyp created an imaginary landscape based on personal recollections of the North, but transformed by an appreciation of the South, particularly the Italian campagna, derived from other painters. A distant view, bathed in mist and the warm glow of a late afternoon light, proved irresistible to early collectors. River Landscape with Horseman and Peasants, which was painted around 1655, is perhaps the finest example of Cuyp's mature style, but The Negro Page, dating in all probability from a few years earlier, is not far removed in quality. The types of the buildings, the hilly background and the lake are common to both paintings and may be a reflection of Cuyp's journey up the Rhine as far as Nijmegen and Kleve, near the German border, at the beginning of the 1650s. Cuyp was economical with his motifs and several of those in The Negro Page recur in other paintings. For example, in Huntsman halted Cuyp deploys similar horses, dogs and groom in a different composition. Dappled horses and negro pages are frequently found in other works by the artist of comparable date. The spaniel in the foreground of the present work is similarly posed in the painting of Orpheus. Some of the motifs are the subject of preparatory drawings either by Cuyp or his studio, such as the spaniel, the greyhound and the vegetation on the left. The figure on the right facing the viewer has been tentatively identified as one of Cornelis van Beveren's sons, perhaps Willem (born 1624) who was appointed Bailiff and Dyke-Reeve of the Lande van Strien in 1648. This identification is based on the fact that his mount's horse brass is in the form of a fleur-de-lys, which suggests a connection with France (a knighthood was conferred on Cornelis van Beveren by the French king, Louis XIII). Cuyp spent nearly all of his life in Dordrecht. His marriage in 1650 to Cornelia Boschman, the widow of a wealthy Regent, led to a decline in his artistic output as he devoted more time to a career in public life. His work was particularly appreciated by members of the Regent class in Dordrecht, and Cuyp deliberately cultivated the social mores in the paintings dating from the 1650s. These social distinctions are detectable in dress, the emphasis on equitation, the relationship of the figures to architecture and the prominence of servants. Peasants with Four Cows by the River Merwede (38x50cm) _ Cuyp also made paintings of the lively activity on the great rivers of the Netherlands, most often the wide Merwede that forks at Dordrecht into the North Maas and Lower Maas. It was Dordrecht's location at this juncture thast made it one of the principal cities of the country until traffic on the Maas was diverted to Rotterdam. Cuyp's river scenes are usually set late in the afternoon and are seen against a luminous, sunny sky that sparkles and glistens on the calm water. View of Dordrecht (1655, 98x138cm) _ Aelbert Cuyp lived and worked in Dordrecht which, although a small provincial town, had a flourishing local school of painting. Nicolaes Maes, Samuel van Hoogstraten (02 Aug 1627 19 October 1678) and Aert de Gelder also worked in the town. Cuyp's early landscape style is close both in its grey-green palette and sketchy technique to that of Jan van Goyen but in the early 1640s his style was transformed by his encounter with the landscape style which the Utrecht artist Jan Both had developed during his stay in Italy. Cuyp never visited Italy but he developed an idiosyncratic version of Both's style. He bathed his very Dutch landscapes in a golden Italian sunlight which sparkles on the water and warms the stones of the buildings. Having adopted and refined his version of the Italianate landscape style, Cuyp practised it for many years of a successful career, which he ended as a member of the regent class of Dordrecht and an elder of the Reformed Church, the owner of a fine town house and an extensive country estate. Because his style does not develop significantly his paintings are difficult to date but this view of his native town from the River Maas was probably painted in about 1655. The outline of the city is dominated by the profiles of the Groothooftspoort on the left and the squat tower of the Grote Kerk, a familiar landmark in Cuyp's many views of his home town, to the right. Young Herdsman with Cows (1658) _ In this painting the strong horizontal of the standing cow is echoed in the hazy distance of the rolling country and lends firmness and structure to the whole design. As in Rembrandt's mature phase, which is approximately contemporaneous, this landscape shows classical elements which strengthen the compositional power. Horizontals and verticals are coordinated with the Baroque diagonals, which are still alive and help to create a mighty spaciousness. The atmospheric quality is as important as ever in uniting the whole impression. Light breaks now with greater intensity through the clouds and the clouds themselves gain in substance and volume. The sky forms a gigantic vault above the earth. Cows in the Water (59x74cm) _ Cuyp was not only a landscape painter, although there is no doubt that his most attractive and significant works belong to this genre. His range covered conversation pieces, seascapes, portraits and group portraits, but he most frequently depicted animals and landscapes with human figures engaged in fishing, hunting or riding. The setting is generally the countryside around his native town of Dordrecht, and his pictures show us the Meuse estuary with its low coastline, boats at their moorings and cattle grazing. The pictures are characterized by an atmosphere of serenity and calm, with glistening water, soft clouds, gentle landscape, cattle whose smooth coats shine in the evening light and human figures engrossed in work, all combining in a peaceful harmony. Evening Landscape with Horsemen and Shepherds (1658) _ Cuyp also made paintings of the lively activity on the great rivers of the Netherlands, most often the wide Merwede that forks at Dordrecht into the North Maas and Lower Maas. It was Dordrecht's location at this juncture that made it one of the principal cities of the country until traffic on the Maas was diverted to Rotterdam. Cuyp's river scenes are usually set late in the afternoon and are seen against a luminous, sunny sky that sparkles and glistens on the calm water. He knew Dutch river life intimately. He travelled up the Rhine, and along the Maas, and the Waal making numerous drawings of huge sailing vessels, small craft, rafts, and also views of the land from the water. He was equally at home working on a large or a small scale, and could fill a canvas with the massive dark hull and rigging of a clumsy passage boat making way to a pier or with the decorative and elegant silhouettes of colorful figures on horseback riding into the evening sky . In grandeur of composition Cuyp often matches Ruisdael and the best of Hobbema's work. As a colorist he seems even superior by the glow and richness of his warm palette both in his land and sea pictures. The Ferry Boat (1654, 72x90cm) _ Cuyp also made paintings of the lively activity on the great rivers of the Netherlands, most often the wide Merwede that forks at Dordrecht into the North Maas and Lower Maas. It was Dordrecht's location at this juncture thast made it one of the principal cities of the country until traffic on the Maas was diverted to Rotterdam. Cuyp's river scenes are usually set late in the afternoon and are seen against a luminous, sunny sky that sparkles and glistens on the calm water. The Maas at Dordrecht (1660, 115x170cm) _ Holland’s Maas river flows through France and Belgium, where it is known as the Meuse. In Aelbert Cuyp’s radiant vista over the Maas’ ocean port at Dordrecht, crowds jam the docks, bugles and drums sound fanfares, and cannons fire salutes. Near the end of the Thirty Years’ War, Dordrecht hosted a two-week festival in honor of 30'000 soldiers. On 12 July 1646, a huge fleet of merchant and navy ships set sail to end the happy furlough and return the men home. This vast, sunny composition specifically accents one figure: the young man standing in the dinghy beside the large ship. The anchored ships at the left create a wedge-shaped mass that points toward him, as do some rigging lines. His head lies directly before the horizon, and his stark black outfit is silhouetted dramatically against the palest area of the picture, the morning mist over the far shore. Because he wears a sash with Dordrecht’s city colors of red and white, he may be the festival’s master of ceremonies and is probably the patron who commissioned Cuyp to document this historic event. River Landscape (1658, 123x241cm) _ This large canvas, arguably the greatest of all Cuyp's landscapes, was probably painted in the late 1650s, and represents the culmination of his career as a landscape painter. Following his marriage to a wealthy widow in 1658, Cuyp seems to have abandoned painting. Cuyp's patrons, with those of his father, the portrait painter, Jacob Gerritsz. Cuyp, appear to have been members of the regent families of Dordrecht and this landscape, with its remarkable effects of sunlight and the extraordinary delicacy in the treatment of details, was presumably intended to hang in the house of a member of this group which Cuyp joined by marriage. In a print of 1764, made shortly after the painting arrived in England, it is identified as a view of the River Maas at Dordrecht. In fact, it is an imaginary landscape, with mountains on a scale which cannot be found in The Netherlands. Cuyp may, however, have referred to drawings of actual views he made in his sketchbooks, particularly those made on a visit to Nijmegen and Cleves in 1651-2. The painting was purchased in the United Provinces by Captain William Baillie in about 1760. He acted as an agent for John, Earl of Bute, in the formation of the art collection which hung at Luton Hoo, Bedfordshire. According to Benjamin West, it was this picture which began the rage for landscapes by Cuyp among British collectors. On 18 May 1818, Joseph Farington wrote in his diary: 'I went to the British Institution and there met Mr. West and I went round the exhibition with him examining all the pictures. While looking at Lord Bute's picture by Cuyp, he said that picture was brought to England by the late Captn. Baillie, and was the first picture by that master known in England. Having been seen pictures by Cuyp were eagerly sought for and many were introduced and sold to advantage'. River-bank with Cows (1650) Cuyp's earliest dated landscapes of 1639 are astonishingly eclectic, but by 1641 he was painting panoramic views of the Dutch countryside in the monochromatic mode of van Goyen. The young Cuyp, however, favoured a distinct yellow tonality as against van Goyen greyish and brown hues. More important for Cuyp's subsequent development was the impact of Dutch landscapists who brought an Italianate style from Rome back to Holland; Cuyp himself never travelled to the south. Since very few of Cuyp's landscapes are dated, and none is dated after 1645, it is difficult to say precisely when the characteristic golden light, reminiscent of the Campagna the artist never saw, replaces the earlier paler one, and when mountain ranges, herds of cattle, and figures conspicuously set off against a sky begin to play an important role in his compositions. But by 1645 distinct traces of the style of Cornelis Poelenburgh, a member of the first generation of Italianate painters, and Jan Both, the leading artist of the following generation of Italianate landscapists, are evident. Jan Both became Cuyp's principal source of inspiration. The River-bank with Cows shows how rapidly he assimilated Both's motifs and sun-drenched light. From this time onward golden sunlight becomes the all-pervading element in Cuyp's paintings. It spreads warmth and beauty over the Dutch countryside, where sturdy animals most often cows take the place of human heroes. |