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ART “4” “2”-DAY  24 October
DEATHS: 1926 RUSSELL — 1901 HART — 1898 PUVIS DE CHAVANNES
BIRTHS: 1607 LIEVENS — 1868 CONDER — 1820 FROMENTIN 1843 SIEMIRADZKI
^ Born on 24 October 1607: Jan Lievens Lievenszoon van Oude, Dutch painter, draftsman, and printmaker, who died on 08 (04?) June 1674.
— His work has often suffered by comparison with that of Rembrandt, with whom he was closely associated from 1625 to 1631. Yet Lievens’s early work is equal to that of Rembrandt, although in later years he turned more towards a somewhat facile rendering of the international Baroque style favored by his noble patrons, thus never fully realizing his early promise. Nonetheless, he became a renowned portrait painter and draughtsman, and his drawings include some of the finest examples of 17th-century Dutch portraiture in the medium.
— Lievens was a painter of portraits and religious, allegorical and genre subjects. He was a friend and contemporary of Rembrandt and a student of Pieter Lastman in Amsterdam. Then he shared a studio with Rembrandt in Leiden in the later 1620s: many works of this period show one influencing the other. Lievens went to England, probably in 1632 after Rembrandt moved to Amsterdam, but he was in Antwerp by 1635, where he was influenced by the courtly style of Van Dyck. He returned to Holland in 1639 and became a successful painter of portraits and allegories. Raising of Lazarus (1631) is a good example of his works.
— Jürgen Ovens was a student of Lievens.
LINKS
Constantijn Huygens (1627) — Rembrandt van Rijn (1630) — Poet Jan Vos
Samson and Delilah (1630) — Vanitas Still Life (1625)
A Girl (1633, 62x 48cm) _ A characteristic early painting of the artist from his Leiden period. It is certainly not a portrait, probably it is a fragment of a larger composition, perhaps Mary from an Annunciation.
Petrus Egidius de Morrion (1637, 84x59cm) _ The painting was made in Antwerp and it clearly shows the influence of Flemish painters.
A Man (63x48cm; 1/3 size — ZOOM to 2/3 size)
^ Died on 24 October 1926: Charles Marion Russell, US painter and sculptor specialized in the US West, born on 19 March 1864.
— In 1880 he left his upper-class home in Saint-Louis for Montana Territory. He worked briefly on a sheep ranch, spent two years as a hunter’s and trapper’s assistant and then became a cowboy. During his considerable spare daytime hours he painted, sketched and modelled small animal figures in clay (e.g. Antelope, 1915). Although he painted a few exceptional oils and watercolors prior to 1900, the vast majority of his best work was done in the last two decades of his life. Typically the subject-matter centers around cowboy life (e.g. Wagon Boss, 1909) and the Plains Indians, for whom he had great respect. The luminous Piegans (1918), with its depiction of the Plains Indians, is a reminder of the vastness of the US West. Russell’s sense of humor and empathy for his subject-matter radiates from his paintings as pleasingly as do the clear colors of the high country. His bronze sculptures (e.g. Buffalo Hunt, 1905) depict the same dramatic and tension-packed themes as his paintings.

— Near the turn of the century, the Indian Wars were ending and the transition to reservation life was in progress throughout the Plains region. As the West of Russell's youth yielded to encroaching civilization, his artistic vision evolved away from stern realism toward a more poetic and romantic style. The image of a single mounted warrior was a format Russell employed frequently and it clearly manifested his nostalgic sentiments. Throughout his artistic career, he did paintings depicting a single mounted Indian, from every tribe with which he came in contact. Russell's thorough knowledge of Amerindian culture led him to execute more than thirty individual paintings of Amerindians from some fifteen distinct tribes. These included the Arapaho, Assiniboin, Blackfoot, Blood, Cheyenne, Cree, Crow, Flathead, Kutenai, Nez Perce, Pawnee, Piegan, and Sioux.
      A comparison of Russell's single figure studies, before and after the turn of the century, reveals a steady increase in his technical expertise. By 1905, his handling of human and equine form had reached its peak, mostly because of his exposure to the New York art world in late 1903-1904. The simple horse and rider compositions over the next ten years reveal Russell's flourishing sophistication as a draftsman and colorist. These new skills would also be apparent in the carefully worked, multi-figured paintings of the next decade.
      While critics may not have taken Russell's art too seriously at one time, they found the artist fascinating. He received attention from New York's professional illustrators who, charmed by his frank manner and droll humor, welcomed him into their ranks. Russell stoutly insisted upon his right to be himself. He dressed as he pleased — in cowboy boots and Stetson, with a woven sash to hold up his pants and he believed, keep his stomach small. His talk which was guarded and laconic when around strangers, flowed among friends, who regarded him as a master storyteller and delighted in his dry wit just as readers of his illustrated letters still do.
      1887-1899 were formative years for Russell and his most experimental period in subject matter; he borrowed Remington subjects, compositions and figures as he worked out his own approach and defined his own turf. The Indian fighting army was Remington's, but Russell claimed the open range cowboy, the old-time Plains Indian and western wildlife. They were his West.
      He elaborated setting in his paintings. Montana was home to him and he cherished the landmarks that identified specific locales — the Judith Basin, the Great Falls area, Glacier Park. One critic for The St. Louis Star said "Mr. Russell paints the landscape with as much fidelity as he does his figures…he gives a graphic description of the country which creates the rugged, boisterous, fun loving, life-loving, jolly men of the plains…" Those who champion Russell continue to refer to his authenticity rather than his artistry. Russell offered the "speaking details dear to any lover of western life."
      He worked hard to satisfy the demand for authenticity but recognized, as he wrote a friend about his Indian paintings, that he had "always studied the wild man from his picture side."
      Russell disclaimed any interest in "teckneque", mocked highfalutin artsy talk, and doubted that there was anymore to Impressionism than a desire to hide "bum drawin." But his own painting in the 1920's exhibits a bolder use of color and a painterly looseness that indicates an evolution (similar to Remington's evolution) away from the linear and the literal toward an appreciation of light and the way we feel what we see.
      The core of his work is a sustained elegy in which time stands still. His images of the "onley real American", proud Indian men and women riding across the land they owned, of cowboys in their careless youth free never to grow old, and wild animals, buttes and rivers, and the rolling plains, will be there for generations to come. Through his art Russell speaks to us in the present voice, and what he says constitutes his claim to greatness.

—      According to family lore, Charlie Russell displayed an aptitude for art from a young age, reportedly drawing pictures and modeling in wax when he was a small child. At 16 years old, Russell's parents sent him to Montana under the care of a sheepherder. The independent young man struck out on his own soon after, finding work as a cowboy in the booming Montana ranching industry. During long, often tedious days watching over cattle on the open range, Russell sketched the scenes around him. In the winter, when many cowboys were unemployed, Russell lived in various frontier towns and painted pictures to pay for his food and lodging.
      Friends said Russell also began carrying modeling clay with him during this time, making small sculptures during his spare moments. Russell likely would have continued as an itinerant cowboy and amateur artist for the rest of his life had he not met a young woman named Mary (Nancy?) Cooper. On 09 September 1896, the couple married, and Russell's new wife began to guide him toward a serious career in art. Russell found there was a growing market, especially among wealthy East Coast residents, for images of the disappearing US frontier.
      By 1920, he was making frequent trips to New York to paint western pictures for an increasing number of supportive patrons. Russell rarely painted or sculpted from models or from life, relying on memory to recreate scenes from the life he had experienced. He had no real art training and little interest in the formal aesthetics of art.
     Though critics often ignored or derided his work, the public loved it. Initially, Russell's paintings and sculptures documented his early life as a cowboy, but later in his career, he also began to depict scenes from the lives of American Indians and historical figures. Many of his later paintings express Russell's melancholy attachment to the unspoiled West and his dislike of the "progress" that had plowed under the Great Plains and fenced in the open range. Russell spent his final years in Great Falls, Montana, where he continued to paint until his death.
— Like Frederic Remington, Charles M. Russell was born to moderate wealth. Born in Saint-Louis, Missouri, Charley Russel[ spent his early boyhood in the Oak Hill suburb, in a half-century-old estate strongly reminiscent of a colonial Virginia plantation. The Russell family operated the most extensive coal mines in the region. Later, Russell's father became the president of the Parker-Russell Mining and Manufacturing Company, which built a large plant to convert fire clay into tile and brick, gas works, and rolling mills. It was the largest company of its kind in the US. Charley's family tried hard to educate him and resisted his urge to go west, but he did not like school and had heard too many tales from men who had been clear up to Fort Benton, and his longing was not to be resisted. Through all his years of drifting, Russell never lost his air of being to the manner born, no matter how disreputable his outward appearance might be.
     Russell first came to Montana in early March 1880 with a dream of becoming a real cowboy. He was so captivated with the West he chose to stay and fulfill his childhood fantasy. During those first years in Montana, Russell received great encouragement from Jake Hoover, a mountain man who befriended him and took him under his wing. Hoover often shared his cabin with the young Charlie, sometimes providing food and shelter for months at a time. This friendship allowed Russell to experience the ways of the frontier life he would later portray so vividly in his paintings.
      In 1882 Charlie landed a job as a wrangler on a cattle drive. He wrangled for eleven years, and while he was not known for being a good roper or rider, Russell established a local reputation as the affable (some said bone lazy) cowboy who loved to draw and knew how to tell a great story. As a self-taught artist, his sketches were crude but reflected an observant eye, a feel for animal and human anatomy, a sense of humor and a flair for portraying action — all hallmarks of Russell's mature art.
      Throughout his years on the range, he witnessed the changing of the West. He saw the bitter winter of 1886-1887 end the cattleman's dominion on the northern plains. The days of free grass and unfenced range were ending and, for Russell, the cowboy life was over by 1893.
      Prior to Russell's marriage to Nancy Cooper, in 1896, only a few of his works had been reproduced nationally. Although he was unsure of his ability to earn a living with his art, Nancy Russell recognized her husband's talent and promise, and provided the business sense and drive that eventually made her unambitious husband one of America's most popular artists.
      Success did not come easily for the Russells. Montana offered few opportunities for art sales, which eventually led them to New York where contact was established with other artists interested in Western themes. At the very time Frederic Remington was getting out of illustration to concentrate on painting, Russell secured illustrating assignments and began to gain exposure through exhibitions and press coverage.
      His emergence in the big time art world came in 1911 with a one man show at a New York gallery, followed three years later by an exhibition in London. Charles Russell felt deeply the passing of the West, the most evident theme of his art. This sense of loss touched him with an emotional immediacy. He was haunted by youthful fantasies, memories of what once was and by the evidence of change that surrounded him as an everyday reality. His work reflected the public demand for authenticity, but also the soul of a romantic.
— More biographical information:
Great Falls (MT) Chamber of Commerce / Charles M. Russell, Legacy / Frye Art Museum
Photo of Russell

LINKS

Self (on horseback, 1906)
The Signal Fire (1897, 81x111cm; 1463x2000pix, 1917kb)
The Death Song of Lone Wolf (1901, 58x90cm; 1296x2000pix, 1761kb)
Spearing a Buffalo (47x77cm, 1213x2000pix, 1849kb)
Buffalo Hunt (1897, 47x72cm; 1298x2000pix, 1616kb)
Antelope (1894, 51x84cm; 1212x2000pix, 1571kb)
Indian Rider (56x46cm) — The Challenge (56x81cm)
Return of the Horse Thieves (1900)
Red Man on the Plains (1901; 538x1000pix, 75kb) — Meat's not Meat (1915)
— Illustrations from Indian Old Man Stories (1920):_ [Amerindian up in tree attacks eagle's nest] (800x559pix, 101kb) _ [Riverscape with Heron] (800x537pix, 113kb) _ [Return of the Squaw] (800x559pix, 94kb)
A Quiet Day in Utica (1907, 61x92cm; 441x673pix; 216kb gif)
Man Killer (1911; 423x306pix, 17kb) — War Council on the Plains (314x450pix, 24kb)
^ Born on 24 October 1868: Charles Edwin Conder, English painter, active in Australia and France, who died on 09 February 1909.
— He was sent to Australia in 1884 to learn surveying under his uncle W. J. Conder. After about two years in survey camps, he attended evening classes at the Royal Art Society, Sydney; in 1887 he worked as a lithographic draughtsman for The Illustrated Sydney News. Tom Roberts, then in Sydney on a visit from Melbourne, was among the open-air landscape painters that he knew at this time. He taught Conder some of the principles of Impressionism, such as truth to the momentary effect of light and to colour values, and the rejection of the academic ideal of high finish. The most important painting of Conder’s Sydney years, The Departure of the ‘SS Orient’ from Circular Quay, 1888 (1888), already showed a distinct personal style, combining humour with nostalgia and selective observation with decorative finesse of handling and design. In December 1888 Conder joined Roberts and Arthur Streeton in Melbourne. During the following summers they painted together at the outer suburbs of Mentone, Box Hill and Eaglemont. Conder lived in a room in Melbourne fitted out in the Aesthetic style and used his studio as a form of self-expression. His friends in Melbourne included the English novelist Mrs Mannington Caffyn, who included a written portrait of Conder in her Australian novel A Yellow Aster (1894). In 1889 Conder joined Roberts, Streeton, Frederick McCubbin and others at the Buxton Galleries, Melbourne, in a show of small cedar panels, predominantly cigar-box lids, known as the ‘9 by 5 Impression Exhibition’ after the size of the panels.
LINKS
Le Moulin Rouge
The Artist and the Editor (1906) — L'Alcade dans l'Embarras
A Pastoral FantasyThe Sea-wallA Dream in Araby
A Spanish courtyardL'entrée en scèneThe Green Room
La Mi~CarêmeSchaunard's studio
Swanage Bay (1901, 46x61cm) _ Although born in London, Conder grew up and first went to art school in Australia. He moved to Paris in 1890. While living there in the 1890s he often stayed in Normandy, where he painted
^ Died on 24 October 1901: James McDougal Hart, Scottish-born US painter born on 10 May 1828.
— Born in Kilmarnock, Scotland, Hart emigrated with his family to Albany, New York, in 1831. He was apprenticed as a sign painter for a coach-maker. By the late 1840s, Hart was producing easel paintings. In 1849, he exhibited at the American Art-Union. In 1851, he traveled to Dusseldorf for academic training. There, he studied under Johann Wilhelm Schirmer [1807-1863], remaining abroad for about a year. Hart was back in Albany in 1852 where he had a studio and taught art for the next five years. He exhibited at the National Academy of Design for the first time in 1853 and continued to show there almost annually for the rest of his life. In 1857, Hart moved to New York City permanently. Hart became successful as a painter of landscapes with cattle in the style of the Hudson River School. Popular during his lifetime, his compositions were reproduced as engravings for art journals and gift books, and as chromolithographs by Louis Prang.
— With his family, including his brother William Hart, James moved from Kilmarnock, Scotland to Albany NY in 1830. There he was apprenticed to a sign painter and developed an interest in art. In 1851 he went to Dusseldorf, Germany to study and remained for three years. He returned to Albany and opened a studio. In 1857 he moved to New York City. later moving to Brooklyn. After the 1870s, he and his brother William opened studios in Keene Valley, NY, in the heart of the Adirondacks. James and his brother William painted in a language intelligible for the artistically illiterate. His children, Robert, Mary, and Letitia Bonnet Hart were artists, as was his wife, Marie Thereas Gorsuch, his brother William Hart [1823-1894], and his sister, Julia Hart Beers Kempson. His last known address was in Brooklyn NY. An auction of his paintings was held at the Fifth Avenue Art Gallery in 1902, and 146 of his paintings were sold for a total of $20'287.

LINKS
An afternoon concert (1850, 99x136cm) — Returning from harvest (1870, 51x87cm)
Presidential Range and Starr King Mountain from Lunenburg VT (11 Sep 1867, 37x61cm)
The Adirondacks
Adirondack Scenery (1861; 250x350pix, 29kb) _ James Hart's large, impressive landscapes {the online image would be large and impressive only as a postage stamp} painted during the 1860s are noted for their meticulous attention to detail, soft gentle colors, and light-filled skies. These idyllic scenes of nature (note the three frolicking bears {best appreciated through a microscope}) glorified the conception of the US wilderness and were eagerly sought by collectors.
Pasture in Early Evening (1880) _ During his lifetime, James McDougal Hart became well known for his restful scenes of countryside with grazing cattle. Pasture in Early Evening is one such composition. Hart could have been describing the Boston College acquisition when he stated in an interview, "I strive to reproduce in my landscapes the feeling produced by the original scenes themselves...In this painting... I aimed at the lazy listless influence of an Indian summer day. If the painting were perfect, you would feel precisely as you feel when contemplating such a scene in nature."
^ Born on 24 October 1820: Eugène~Samuel~Auguste Fromentin (Dupeux?), French Romantic writer and painter specialized in Orientalism. He died on 27 August 1876.
— The wide skies and sweeping plains of his native Charente region left him with a love of natural beauty for which he later found affinities in Algeria and the Netherlands. From his youth he showed academic intelligence, literary talent and artistic aptitude. In 1839 he was sent to Paris to study law, but he became increasingly interested in drawing. Although his father, a skilled amateur artist who had studied with Jean-Victor Bertin, never became reconciled to his son’s desire to pursue painting as a career, Fromentin was sent to study with the Neo-classical landscape painter Jean-Charles-Joseph Rémond [1795–1875]; however, he preferred the more naturalistic Nicolas-Louis Cabat. Fromentin developed slowly as an artist and began to show real promise as a landscape draftsman only in the early to mid-1840s. He published his first important piece of criticism on the Salon of 1845.
Photo of Fromentin
LINKS
Arabes
(1871; main detail 877x1157pix, 80kb — ZOOM TO FULL PICTURE 1500x2024pix, 210kb)
Orientaux
(68x76cm; main detail 871x1170pix, 100kb — ZOOM TO FULL PICTURE 1616x2000pix, 318kb)
La Chasse au Faucon en Algérie aka The Quarry (1862, 162x118cm; 876x737pix, 62kb — ZOOM to 2799x1965pix; 484kb)
Voleurs de Nuit aka Sahara Algerien (1865, 132x204cm)
Abreuvage des Chevaux (1873, 40x31cm)
Chevaux s'Abreuvant dans une Rivière (1872, 41x31cm)
Étang dans une Oasis - Sahara (1866, 112x143cm; 687x1000pix, 353kb)
Cavaliers Arabes (36x45cm) — Arabes en Chasse (41x26cm)
Centaures et Centauresses s'Exerçant au Tir de l'Arc (201x137cm)
Dans le Nil (27x38cm) — Deux Arabes sur une Terrace (27x20cm)
Campement Arabe dans les Montagnes de l'Atlas (1872, 33x41cm)
Le Simoun (55x65cm) — Dans le Désert (1868; 490x800pix, 97kb)

^ Born on 24 October 1898: Pierre Cécile Puvis de Chavannes, French Symbolist painter born on 14 December 1824.
— Puvis de Chavannes decorated many public buildings in France (for example, the Panthéon, the Sorbonne, and the Hôtel de Ville, all in Paris) and also Boston Public Library. His paintings were done on canvas and then affixed to the walls (marouflage), but their pale colors imitated the effect of fresco. He had only modest success early in his career (when a private income enabled him to work for little payment), but he went on to achieve an enormous reputation, and he was universally respected even by artists of very different aims and outlook from his own. Gauguin, Seurat, and Toulouse-Lautrec were among his professed admirers. His reputation has since declined, his idealized depictions of antiquity or allegorical representations of abstract themes now often seeming rather anaemic. He remains important, however, because of his influence on younger artists. His simplified forms, respect for the flatness of the picture surface, rhythmic line, and use of non-naturalistic color to evoke the mood of the painting appealed to both the Post-Impressionists and the Symbolists.
— The greatest French decorative painter. His international influence was even greater than that of Moreau. He had to abandon his studies at the Polytechnique because of illness and travelled in Italy during his convalescence, where he discovered the frescoes of the Quattrocento and decided to become a painter. Ary Scheffer, Couture, Delacroix (for 4 days) and above all Théodore Chassériau were his teachers at the Beaux-Arts. In 1850, exhibited a pietŕ at the Salon. In 1861 his career as a painter of murals for public buildings began with the Musée d'Amiens. He decorated many buildings, including the Panthéon, the Hôtels de Ville of Paris and Poitiers, the Sorbonne, various French museums, and the Boston Public Library. A very French mind - to the extent that his work attracted that other very French painter, Matisse - he brought to his art a sense of grandeur and an organisational logic that were precisely the gifts required for vast mural decorations. His decorative compositions attempt to reach monumentality not through depth but through superficiality, linearity of construction, the "majesty" of the organisation and also by a certain philosophical pretention. The mobility of the man is clear; the influence of his work quite outstripped its intrinsic qualities, but he was, whether we like it or not, one of the masters of the Symbolist age, an age which made of Beauty and the Pure Idea a veritable religion.
Puvis de Chavannes by Étienne Carjat (photograph, 11x8cm) — Photo of Puvis
Pierre Puvis de Chavannes by Lily Lewis Rood (color lithograph, 49x35cm, a modernist non-portrait)
LINKS
Death and the MaidenThe Dream
The Poor Fisherman
The Meditation (1867, 106x53cm)
Mary Magdalene at St. Baume (1869, 54x37cm)
Saint Genoveva as a child in prayer (1876, 136x76cm; 700x384pix framed)
Young Girls at the Seaside (1879, 61x47cm) — The Birds
Mad Woman at the Edge of the Sea (1857; 700x680pix; 108kb) — Hope (1872)
Kneeling nude woman, viewed from back (lithograph, 18x16cm)
Ancient Vision (1889, 105x133cm; 552x700pix) _ The term Vision which the artist chose as the title of this picture is symptomatic of a state of mind that rejected the modern world and escaped into dreams and visions of a vanished world characterised by a total communion between man and nature, where everything was tranquil and beautiful. (cf. Sir Edward Burne-Jones' dreams of an Arthurian arcadia)
Concordia (1861, 60x81cm) _ Puvis de Chavannes’ development was hardly determined by the brief and fleeting instruction received from Henri Scheffer, Delacroix and Thomas Couture. He has as little in common with the older Courbet and the Naturalists as with the younger Pissarro and the Impressionists, even though he admires their uncompromising battle for their ideals. Eugčne Boudin was an exact comtemporary, and the two artists have nothing in common. Puvis de Chavannes’ work is like a bridge over the painting of his age, ist piers being his friendship with Chassériau and his admiration by Seurat and Gauguin. The influence of Ingres via Chassériau is what scores his first success, in the Salon of 1861 with War and Peace, after nine years of rejection. Peace is purchased by the State and ends up in the Museum of Amiens, inspiring the later murals in the staircase. Concordia is the first sketch for Peace: the warriors have laid aside their weapons, they repose in the Elysian landscape beneath flowering laurels, refreshed by fruits and milk. The radiant white in the garb of the female figure in the background triumphs over the red of the warriors’ cloaks against the deep green landscape. In Peace the garbed female figure is replaced by a nude figure, on which all the light converges. Théophile Gautier, Chassériau’s friend, enthusiastically greeted Chavannes’ advent with this picture in the Salon of 1861. That is probably also why Concordia bears a dedication to Madame Gautier.
The Prodigal Son (1879, 130x96cm; 650x466pix). _. War and Peace launched Chavannes on his career as a mural painter, taking him from Amiens via Marseilles to the great Paris works in the Sorbonne, in the Hôtel de Ville and in the Panthéon – to name only these. Among these highly demanding projects, aiming at "animer les murailles", the easel paintings seem like brief pauses for rest. Chavannes never set up his easel in the open like the Impressionists, but, being an avid walker, stored up visual impressions in his memory. Questioned regarding The Prodigal Son, he said laughing that he really only wanted to paint swine, studies of which he had made in the country in 1878. He said nothing of the repentant self-communion of the poor sinner, so modestly expressed with the crossed hands of the figure driven to the limits of life — and of the picture, for, as a person, Chavannes eschewed rhetoric, and as a painter, extravagant gestures. And yet the elegiac tone is there, indeed being echoed in the same way in the Poor Fisherman, painted two years later. The abandonment of the human figure is matched by the silver-grey of dying nature, redolent of Corot, whom Chavannes so admired, and which does not deny the muralist with its rhythmically sweeping composition. [compare The Prodigal Son Feeding Swine by MurilloThe Prodigal Son in Misery by Mary Ann WillsonThe Prodigal Son by Dürer]

^ Born on 24 October 1843: Henryk Hector Siemiradzki, Polish Academic painter whose birth date is sometimes incorrectly given as 15 Sep or 10 Oct. He died on 23 August (perhaps Julian, which would be 05 Sep Gregorian) 1902.
— He studied drawing in Kharkiv under Dmitry Bezperchei [1825–1913], a student of Karl Bryullov. In 1864 he completed his studies in Natural Sciences at the University of Kharkiv and from then until 1870 studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Saint-Petersburg. While he was to adhere for the rest of his life to the academic classicism taught there, Siemiradzki also worked in a lighter vein: while still a student he sent genre paintings to Warsaw for exhibition at the Association of Fine Arts and during this period he also received lucrative commissions from patrons in St Petersburg for portraits, religious scenes and copies after Old Masters.
— He studied at the Petersburg Academy, and also at Munich under Piloty, going afterward to Rome, where he permanently settled. Some of his fresco work is to be seen in the Church of Our Savior in Moscow. His monumentalTorches Vivantes de Néron, shown at the Paris Exhibition of 1878, achieved a great success, and, despite an offer of 120'000 francs for the picture, Siemiradzki patriotically preferred to donate it to the Crakow, where it became the core of the first national gallery in the Cracow Cloth Halls. Other works of his are Une Caverne de Pirates, Danse des Glaives, Vendeur d'Amulettes. He died in Rome.
— Henryk Siemiradzki, active mainly in Rome, where he enjoyed the international renown of an author of effective, academic scenes from the life of ancient Greece and Rome, including the martyrdom of the first Christians, a fashionable theme, full of cruelty and opulence.
— Studia odbywal (1864-1870) w Akademii w Petersburgu, a nastepnie w 1870-1871 w Monachium u K.Piloty'ego. W 1871 wyjechal do Wloch. Do Polski jezdzil tylko na wakacje. Malowal glównie obrazy o tematyce antycznej (m.in. kompozycje z zycia pierwszych chrzescijan), sceny sielankowe, a takze obrazy religijne, historyczne i krajobrazy. Namalowal kurtyny do teatrów w Krakowie i Lwowie.
— Henryk Hector Siemiradzki was the son of Hippolit Siemiradzki, a Polish military officer in the service of the Russian Tzar. His childhood and youth were spent in Kharkov, in the Russian Empire (now in the Ukraine). Henryk received his first art lessons from the Ukrainian painter Dmitry Besperchy, a student of Karl Brulloff. Later Siemiradzki called him his only teacher. In 1860, under pressure from his family, he entered the Kharkov University. After graduating with a BA in science, he immediately left for St. Petersburg, where he got permission to visit lectures in the Academy of Arts; the Academy at that point did not accept students older than twenty. Very soon, however, the professors paid attention to the talented young man and he was admitted as a student, despite the age limits. At the Academy, Siemiradzki impressed his classmates with his knowledge of science and ancient history. His teachers remarked that he was an excellent colorist and draftsman. In 1870, Siemiradzki got a Major Gold medal for Alexander the Great’s Trust in Doctor Hippolitus and a pension to study abroad for 6 years.
      First Siemiradzki went to Munich, at that time the second, after Paris, artistic center of Europe. He was confident enough to work independently, however he visited the studios of other masters, and especially often that of Carl Piloti, the famous historical painter. In Munich, Siemiradzki painted his first big work Roman Orgy in the Time of the Caesars (1872). The picture was bought by the St. Petersburg Academy, and the money helped the artist move to Italy. In Rome, where everything lives and breathes with art, he remained for the rest of his life, visiting Russia only from time to time.
      Siemiradzki's second big work,Christ and Sinner. The First Meeting of Christ and Mary Magdalene (1872), brought him success and European fame. This painting presents the main peculiarities of his art: the effective composition in which the landscape plays the greatest role, helping unite the figures of people. In Christ in the House of Martha and Mary (1886) the landscape is of major importance, and his best biblical painting Christ and the Samaritan Woman. (1890) is a beautiful sunlit landscape in which the figures of Christ and the Samaritan play a minor role. In 1876, Siemiradzki painted the big (385x704cm) Leading Light of Christianity. Nero’s Torches., a subject from Suetonius’ The Twelve Caesars.  In the picture Emperor Nero and his courtiers watch how his servants set fire to Christian martyrs, bound with oakum and soaked with pitch.
      In the 1870s, Siemiradzki, although a Catholic, got an important commission from the Holy Synod for murals in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. About 40 leading Russian artists worked there, among them Vasily Surikov, Feodor Bruni, Peotr Basin, Ivan Kramskoy, Vasily Vereshchagin and many others. Siemiradzki longed for work of such importance and was enthusiastic about it. He painted a cycle of murals devoted to the life of Alexander Nevsky, and some episodes from the life of Christ. In 1931, the Communists blew up the Cathedral. All murals by outstanding artists, including Siemiradzki, were lost forever. We can get a vague idea of them from some remaining sketches. In the 1890s Siemiradzki worked for the theater, he designed stage curtains for the Krakow and Lvov theaters, decorated the house of the Philharmonic Society in Warsaw.
      Though Siemiradzki received his education in Russia, his art is international. He is one of the best representatives of late European Neoclassicism.
— Malarz, przyrodnik, podroznik. W setna rocznice smierci. Ur. 24.10.1843 w Charkowie, syn Hipolita, plk. dragonów i Michaliny z Prószynskich. Mial brata i siostre. Ziemianska rodzina Siemiradzkich wywodzila sie z Jaroszyc w Nowogródzkiem. W domu pielegnowano polskosc przy nienaruszaniu lojalnosci wobec wladz carskich. Po skonczeniu gimnazjum studiowal na uniwersytecie charkowskim nauki przyrodnicze ukonczone w 1864. Na ASP w Petersburgu dostal sie z klopotami z powodu przekroczenia granicy wieku. W trakcie studiów uzyskal wiele znaczacych nagród udokumentowanych srebrnymi i zlotymi medalami w konkursach.
      W 1870 ukonczyl studia, których zwienczeniem byl wielkich rozmiarów obraz Aleksander Macedonski i jego lekarz Filip. W sierpniu 1871 przybyl do Krakowa. Byl w Monachium, ale do Akademii nie wstapil. Tu spotykal sie z Brandtem, Chelmonskim, Witkiewiczem, a w 1872 w Dreznie z Kraszewskim. W 1873 poznal i poslubil kuzynke Marie Prószynska. Mieszkal w tym czasie na stale w Rzymie. Jego willa byla nieprzerwanie odwiedzana przez rodaków, w tym przez osobistosci, jak: kard. A. Dunajewskiego, H. Sienkiewicza, I.J. Paderewskiego. W jego malarstwie dominowala tematyka antyczna. Wymienmy nazwy kilku jego plócien: Orgia rzymska (1872), Chrystus i jawnogrzesznica, Pochodnie Nerona (obraz ten przekazal dla przyszlego Muzeum Narodowego w Krakowie), Za przykladem bogów, Dirce chrzescijanska i wiele innych. Wiele jego plócien zakupil dwór carski. Prócz obrazów artysta malowal plafony i kotary dla teatrów w Krakowie i Lwowie. Byl malarzem uznanym dlatego jego dziela byly chetnie pokazywane na wystawach w Petersburgu, Wiedniu, Rzymie, Monachium, Berlinie, Paryzu, Londynie. Warszawie, Poznaniu i Lwowie.
      W 1901 stwierdzono u artysty nowotwór, który pozbawil go mowy. Przewidujac bliska smierc, w czerwcu 1902 pragnal by przewieziono go do Strzalkowa. 23.08.1902 zakonczyl zycie. Pochowany najpierw na cmentarzu Powazkowskim w Warszawie.
      W 1905 prochy przewieziono na Skalke w Krakowie. Pozostawil zone, synów Boleslawa, Kazimierza i Leona oraz córke Wande. O wizycie Henryka Siemiradzkiego w Czestochowie i jego pamiatkach w Strzalkowie k. Radomska. Pobyt malarza na Jasnej Górze jest utrwalony wpisem jego reka do ksiegi pamiatkowej 30.09.1899, Sygn. 405, s.350 na 3 lata przed smiercia. Poniewaz czesto w niektórych zródlach piszacych o majatku Siemiradzkiego, Strzalków umiejscowiony jest k. Czestochowy (np. WEP-PWN). Nasz rekonesans wyjasnil, ze miejscowosc ta lezy ok. 10 km od Radomska i zapewne w najblizszym czasie zostanie wchlonieta przez to miasto. Na te okolicznosc przyblizmy Czytelnikom w kilku zdaniach stan dzisiejszy tego miejsca, w którym malarz przebywal nader rzadko. Dawny murowany parterowy dworek, który w miedzyczasie zmienial wlascicieli, byl w latach 1925 i 1960 przerabiany. Zostal poszerzony i podwyzszony przez co zmienil calkowicie zewnetrzny wyglad architektoniczny. Po II wojnie swiatowej majatek zostal rozparcelowany. W dworku po reformie rolnej powstala Szkola Gosp. Wiejskiego.
      W latach 1950 - 1959 miescila sie administracja PGR i nastepne szkoly zmieniajace nazwy, ale zawsze o profilu rolniczym. Obecnie istniejaca szkola nosi nazwe Zespolu Szkól Agrobiznesu. Wokól zachowal sie zabytkowy park. W niewielkiej odleglosci od szkoly usytuowany jest piekny kosciólek pw. Nawiedzenia NMP, wewnatrz którego, na jednej ze scian przymocowana jest pamiatkowa tablica z jasnego marmuru wzbogacona herbem i dekoracyjnymi elementami (koluminkami) z nastepujacym trzynastowierszowym tekstem w czarnej barwie: "Henryk Siemiradzki artysta malarz czlonek wielu akademii kawaler orderów ur. 24 pazdziernika 1843, zm. 23 sierpnia 1902 r. w Strzalkowie w glebokim smutku pograzeni zona i dzieci. Kamien ten na wieczna pamiatke polozyli proszac o westchnienie do Boga za spokój duszy nieodzalowanego meza i ojca". Godny podkreslenia jest fakt, ze szkola, kosciól, park i cale otoczenie jest utrzymane z widoczna dbaloscia i troska. Dziekujemy dyr. szkoly Panu Janowi Mielczarskiemu i ks. proboszczowi Maciejowi Klakowskiemu za przekazane informacje dot. H. Siemiradzkiego i jego pamiatek w Strzalkowie.
Photo of Siemiradzki
LINKS
Christ and the Samaritan Woman (1890) _ detail
Phryne at the Festival of Poseidon in Eleusin (1889) _ main detail _ close detail
Rest (1896) _ detail
By a Spring (1898) _ detail
Following the Example of the Gods (1879; 374x600pix, 64kb) — Vendeur d'Amulettes (1875)
At the Spring (1876) — Szkic do Obrazu Zebrak (27x38cm)
U Zródla (76x110cm) — Roman Idyll (1885) — Christian Dirce (1897)
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Died on a 24 October:


^ 1895 Jacob Isaac Meyer van Haan, Dutch painter born on 14 April 1852 into a well-to-do manufacturer’s family, from whom he inherited a great interest in painting. His earliest known paintings, in the style of David Teniers and Rembrandt, are somewhat anecdotal in nature and reflect his Jewish background. One of these works, Uriel Acosta (1888), caused such displeasure in orthodox Jewish circles that Meyer de Haan left for Paris in October 1888 with a monthly allowance from his family. There he stayed with the art dealer Theo van Gogh [1857 – 25 Jan 1891] for some months. In May 1889 he traveled to Brittany, where in Pont-Aven he became friendly with Paul Gauguin [07 Jun 1848 – 08 May 1903]. During the winter of 1889–1890 Gauguin and Meyer de Haan lived, at the latter’s expense, in Marie Henry’s inn in Le Pouldu, where Meyer de Haan rented a studio for the two of them and decorated the dining-room with murals; for example Breton Women Stretching Hemp (1889). The withdrawal of his family allowance and a sudden illness seem to have prevented Meyer de Haan from following Gauguin to Tahiti in early 1891. He probably returned to the Netherlands in 1891 where he continued to suffer from the ill-health that precipitated his early death.

1888 François Etienne Musin, Belgian artist born on 04 October 1820.

1843 Antoine Berjon, Lyon French painter, mostly of flowers, born on 17 May 1754. — Portrait of a Gentleman (pen-wash-and-white on blue paper 25x19cm; 400x305pix, 35kb) _ auctioned at Christie's on 04 Jul 2000 to New York dealer Mark Brady for £40'000. — Nature morte avec coquillages (515x414pix, 54kb) — Fleurs dans une corbeille d'osier et fruits (77x60cm; 450x351pix, 35kb)

^ 1684 Gerrit van Battem, Rotterdam draftsman, etcher, and painter, born in 1636. — {He was a Rotterdam artist, NOT a rotten dam artist.] — {Ça ne serait pas la date du baptême de Battem?} — He is usually judged by his many signed — and often highly colored — gouache drawings of landscape views and genre scenes. However, several gouache drawings of religious subjects, for example The Crucifixion, have been suggested as early works. Between 1648 and 1654 he was very likely a student in Rotterdam of Abraham Furnerius, a relative (on his mother’s side). In 1668 van Battem was in Utrecht, where he married Margaretha Scheffer, sister of the local painter Anton Scheffer. The same year he was commissioned by Philips Koninck, the brother-in-law of Abraham Furnerius [–1654], to arrange for the auction of the prints, drawings and art books belonging to the estate of Abraham’s father, Dr. Johannes Furnerius [–1668], a Rotterdam surgeon and collector. Van Battem must have seen the colorful landscapes of Herman Saftleven II while in Utrecht, where he lived until 1669, when he returned to Rotterdam. In 1678 he was paid by the municipal authorities of Rotterdam to restore a painting in the stock exchange.

1664 (1667?) (buried) Gabriel Metsu (or Metzu), Dutch painter born in January 1629. He was the son of Jacques Metsue [1588–1629], a Flemish painter in Leiden. Gerrit Dou and Jan Steen were some of the teachers of Metsu. Gabriel Metsu was one of the leading figures in the founding of the Leiden Guild of Saint Luke of which he became a member in 1648. According to guild records, Metsu was absent from Leiden from about 1650 to about 1652; probably some of this time was spent in Utrecht. In 1657 he settled permanently in Amsterdam. The following year he married Isabella de Wolff, a native of Enkhuizen who was a descendant on her mother’s side of the Haarlem de Grebber family of painters. There is a Portrait of the Artist and his Wife (1661), which was clearly inspired by Rembrandt’s Self-portrait with Saskia (1635). The Rotterdam painter Michiel van Musscher became one of Metsu’s students in 1665.

^
Born on a 24 October:


1924 Chu Teh Chun, Chinese painter active in France. — Untitled (1998, 130x130cm; 350x355pix, 34kb)

1858 Bertalan Karlovszky, Hungarian artist who died in 1939.

1854 Gunnar-Fredrik Berndtson, Swedish-Finnish French painter and illustrator who died on 09 April 1895. He studied under Adolf von Becker [1831–1909] at the drawing school of the Finnish Art Association in 1869 and in the drawing class of Helsinki University from 1872 to 1875, also studying privately with E. J. Löfgren (1825–84) and Bernhard Reinhold (1824-1892). In 1876 Berndtson was awarded a scholarship to Paris, and he spent most of his time there studying at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts under Jean-Léon Gérôme [11 May 1824 – 10 Jan 1904], whose influence can be seen in such works as Berndtson’s Game of Chess (1878). Berndtson was also much influenced by the detailed genre and costume paintings of Ernest Meissonier [21 Feb 1815 – 31 Jan 1891], as seen for example in Art Lovers in the Louvre (1879), shown at the Salon of 1879, which reveals his technical skill and accuracy in the treatment of costume and interiors. The Bride’s Song (1881), which depicts a wedding breakfast, is one of his first attempts at handling light in a way learnt from the Impressionists.

1843 Margaretha (Margi) Roosenboom Vogel, Dutch artist who died on 26 December 1896.


MODELS
The young artist tried to concentrate on his work, but the attraction he felt for his model finally became irresistible. He threw down his palette, took her in his arms and kissed her. She pushed him away. "Maybe your other models let you kiss them," she said. "I've never tried to kiss a model before," he swore. "Really?" she said, softening, "How many models have there been?" "Four," he replied, "A jug, two apples, and a vase."

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