1.
Saint Dominic
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Saint Dominic, also known as Dominic of Osma and Dominic of Caleruega, often called Dominic de Guzmán and Domingo Félix de Guzmán, was a Castilian priest and founder of the Dominican Order. Dominic is the saint of astronomers. Dominic was born in Caleruega, halfway between Osma and Aranda de Duero in Old Castile, Spain and he was named after Saint Dominic of Silos, who is said to be the patron saint of hopeful mothers. The Benedictine abbey of Santo Domingo de Silos lies a few north of Caleruega. In the earliest narrative source, by Jordan of Saxony, Dominics parents are named Felix Guzman and Juanna of Aza. This story drew resonance from the fact that his order became known, after his name, as the Dominican order, Dominicanus in Latin which a play on words interpreted as Domini canis, Dog of the Lord. Jordan adds that Dominic was brought up by his parents and an uncle who was an archbishop. The failure to name his parents is not unusual, since Jordan wrote a history of the Orders early years, a later source, still of the 13th century, also gives their names as Juana and Felix. Nearly a century after Dominics birth, a local author asserted that Dominics father was vir venerabilis et dives in populo suo. The travel narrative of Pero Tafur, written circa 1439, states that Dominics father belonged to the family de Guzmán, Dominics mother, Jane of Aza, was beatified by Pope Leo XII in 1828. Dominic was educated in the schools of Palencia where he devoted six years to the arts, in 1191, when Spain was desolated by famine, young Dominic gave away his money and sold his clothes, furniture and even precious manuscripts to feed the hungry. Dominic reportedly told his fellow students, Would you have me study off these dead skins. In 1194, around age twenty-five, Dominic joined the Canons Regular in the canonry in the Cathedral of Osma, following the rule of Saint Augustine. In 1203 or 1204 he accompanied Diego de Acebo, the Bishop of Osma, on a mission for Alfonso VIII, King of Castile. The envoys traveled to Denmark via Aragon and the south of France, the marriage negotiations ended successfully, but the princess died before leaving for Castile. However, even Dominic managed only a few converts among the Cathari, in 1215, Dominic established himself, with six followers, in a house given by Peter Seila, a rich resident of Toulouse. He subjected himself and his companions to the rules of prayer and penance. In the same year, the year of the Fourth Lateran Council, Dominic and Foulques went to Rome to secure the approval of the Pope, Innocent III
2.
Spain
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By population, Spain is the sixth largest in Europe and the fifth in the European Union. Spains capital and largest city is Madrid, other urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Bilbao. Modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 35,000 years ago, in the Middle Ages, the area was conquered by Germanic tribes and later by the Moors. Spain is a democracy organised in the form of a government under a constitutional monarchy. It is a power and a major developed country with the worlds fourteenth largest economy by nominal GDP. Jesús Luis Cunchillos argues that the root of the span is the Phoenician word spy. Therefore, i-spn-ya would mean the land where metals are forged, two 15th-century Spanish Jewish scholars, Don Isaac Abravanel and Solomon ibn Verga, gave an explanation now considered folkloric. Both men wrote in two different published works that the first Jews to reach Spain were brought by ship by Phiros who was confederate with the king of Babylon when he laid siege to Jerusalem. This man was a Grecian by birth, but who had given a kingdom in Spain. He became related by marriage to Espan, the nephew of king Heracles, Heracles later renounced his throne in preference for his native Greece, leaving his kingdom to his nephew, Espan, from whom the country of España took its name. Based upon their testimonies, this eponym would have already been in use in Spain by c.350 BCE, Iberia enters written records as a land populated largely by the Iberians, Basques and Celts. Early on its coastal areas were settled by Phoenicians who founded Western Europe´s most ancient cities Cadiz, Phoenician influence expanded as much of the Peninsula was eventually incorporated into the Carthaginian Empire, becoming a major theater of the Punic Wars against the expanding Roman Empire. After an arduous conquest, the peninsula came fully under Roman Rule, during the early Middle Ages it came under Germanic rule but later, much of it was conquered by Moorish invaders from North Africa. In a process took centuries, the small Christian kingdoms in the north gradually regained control of the peninsula. The last Moorish kingdom fell in the same year Columbus reached the Americas, a global empire began which saw Spain become the strongest kingdom in Europe, the leading world power for a century and a half, and the largest overseas empire for three centuries. Continued wars and other problems led to a diminished status. The Napoleonic invasions of Spain led to chaos, triggering independence movements that tore apart most of the empire, eventually democracy was peacefully restored in the form of a parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Spain joined the European Union, experiencing a renaissance and steady economic growth
3.
Baroque painting
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Baroque painting is the painting associated with the Baroque cultural movement. Baroque art was meant to evoke emotion and passion instead of the rationality that had been prized during the Renaissance. Among the greatest painters of the Baroque period are Velázquez, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Rubens, Poussin, Caravaggio is an heir of the humanist painting of the High Renaissance. Baroque painting often dramatizes scenes using light effects, this can be seen in works by Rembrandt, Vermeer, Le Nain. The Flemish painter Anthony van Dyck developed a graceful but imposing portrait style that was very influential, technical standards were very high, and Dutch Golden Age painting established a new repertoire of subjects that was very influential until the arrival of Modernism. The term Baroque was initially used with a meaning, to underline the excesses of its emphasis. Others derive it from the mnemonic term Baroco denoting, in logical Scholastica, in particular, the term was used to describe its eccentric redundancy and noisy abundance of details, which sharply contrasted the clear and sober rationality of the Renaissance. He did not make the distinctions between Mannerism and Baroque that modern writers do, and he ignored the later phase, the academic Baroque that lasted into the 18th century. Writers in French and English did not begin to treat Baroque as a respectable study until Wölfflins influence had made German scholarship pre-eminent. Led by Italy, Mediterranean countries, slowly followed by most of the Holy Roman Empire in Germany and Central Europe, while the Baroque nature of Rembrandts art is clear, the label is less use for Vermeer and many other Dutch artists. In France a dignified and graceful classicism gave a distinctive flavour to Baroque painting, likeness and Presence, A History of the Image before the Era of Art. Mark Getlein, Living With Art, 8th edition, the Story of Art, Phaidon,1995. ISBN 0-7148-3355-X Christine Buci-Glucksmann, Baroque Reason, The Aesthetics of Modernity, the Age of Baroque Heinrich Wölfflin,1964. Renaissance and Baroque The classic study
4.
Painting
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Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface. The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, Painting is a mode of creative expression, and the forms are numerous. Drawing, gesture, composition, narration, or abstraction, among other aesthetic modes, may serve to manifest the expressive, Paintings can be naturalistic and representational, photographic, abstract, narrative, symbolistic, emotive, or political in nature. A portion of the history of painting in both Eastern and Western art is dominated by motifs and ideas. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action, the term painting is also used outside of art as a common trade among craftsmen and builders. What enables painting is the perception and representation of intensity, every point in space has different intensity, which can be represented in painting by black and white and all the gray shades between. In practice, painters can articulate shapes by juxtaposing surfaces of different intensity, thus, the basic means of painting are distinct from ideological means, such as geometrical figures, various points of view and organization, and symbols. In technical drawing, thickness of line is ideal, demarcating ideal outlines of an object within a perceptual frame different from the one used by painters. Color and tone are the essence of painting as pitch and rhythm are the essence of music, color is highly subjective, but has observable psychological effects, although these can differ from one culture to the next. Black is associated with mourning in the West, but in the East, some painters, theoreticians, writers and scientists, including Goethe, Kandinsky, and Newton, have written their own color theory. Moreover, the use of language is only an abstraction for a color equivalent, the word red, for example, can cover a wide range of variations from the pure red of the visible spectrum of light. There is not a register of different colors in the way that there is agreement on different notes in music. For a painter, color is not simply divided into basic, painters deal practically with pigments, so blue for a painter can be any of the blues, phthalocyanine blue, Prussian blue, indigo, cobalt, ultramarine, and so on. Psychological and symbolical meanings of color are not, strictly speaking, colors only add to the potential, derived context of meanings, and because of this, the perception of a painting is highly subjective. The analogy with music is quite clear—sound in music is analogous to light in painting, shades to dynamics and these elements do not necessarily form a melody of themselves, rather, they can add different contexts to it. Modern artists have extended the practice of painting considerably to include, as one example, collage, some modern painters incorporate different materials such as sand, cement, straw or wood for their texture. Examples of this are the works of Jean Dubuffet and Anselm Kiefer, there is a growing community of artists who use computers to paint color onto a digital canvas using programs such as Adobe Photoshop, Corel Painter, and many others. These images can be printed onto traditional canvas if required, rhythm is important in painting as it is in music
5.
El Escorial
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It is one of the Spanish royal sites and functions as a monastery, basilica, royal palace, pantheon, library, museum, university and hospital. It is situated 2.06 km up the valley from the town of El Escorial, El Escorial was, at once, a monastery and a Spanish royal palace. Originally a property of the Hieronymite monks, it is now a monastery of the Order of Saint Augustine and it is also a boarding school. Philip engaged the Spanish architect, Juan Bautista de Toledo, to be his collaborator in the design of El Escorial, Philip appointed him architect-royal in 1559, and together they designed El Escorial as a monument to Spains role as a center of the Christian world. On 2 November 1984, UNESCO declared The Royal Seat of San Lorenzo of El Escorial a World Heritage Site and it is a popular tourist attraction, often visited by day-trippers from Madrid – more than 500,000 visitors come to El Escorial every year. El Escorial is situated at the foot of Mt. Abantos in the Sierra de Guadarrama, Quentin in Picardy against Henry II, king of France. He also intended the complex to serve as a necropolis for the interment of the remains of his parents, Charles I and Isabella of Portugal, himself, in addition, Philip envisioned El Escorial as a center for studies in aid of the Counter-Reformation cause. The buildings cornerstone was laid on 23 April 1563, the design and construction were overseen by Juan Bautista de Toledo, who did not live to see the completion of the project. With Toledos death in 1567, direction passed to his apprentice, Juan de Herrera, under whom the building was completed in 1584, to this day, la obra de El Escorial is a proverbial expression for a thing that takes a long time to finish. Since then, El Escorial has been the site for most of the Spanish kings of the last five centuries. Two Bourbon kings, Philip V and Ferdinand VI, as well as King Amadeus, are not buried in the monastery, the floor plan of the building is in the form of a gridiron. The traditional belief is that design was chosen in honor of St. Lawrence. St. Lawrence’s feast day is 10 August, the date as the 1557 Battle of St. Quentin. In fact, however, the origin of the layout is quite controversial. The grill-like shape, which did not fully emerge until Herrera eliminated from the conception the six interior towers of the facade, was, by no means. In fact, palaces of this design were commonplace in the Byzantine. Statues of David and Solomon on either side of the entrance to the basilica of El Escorial lend further weight to the theory that this is the origin of the design. A more personal connection can be drawn between the David-warrior figure, representing Charles V, and his son, the stolid and solomonically prudent Philip II
6.
Sculpture
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Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. It is one of the plastic arts, a wide variety of materials may be worked by removal such as carving, assembled by welding or modelling, or molded, or cast. However, most ancient sculpture was painted, and this has been lost. Those cultures whose sculptures have survived in quantities include the cultures of the ancient Mediterranean, India and China, the Western tradition of sculpture began in ancient Greece, and Greece is widely seen as producing great masterpieces in the classical period. During the Middle Ages, Gothic sculpture represented the agonies and passions of the Christian faith, the revival of classical models in the Renaissance produced famous sculptures such as Michelangelos David. Relief is often classified by the degree of projection from the wall into low or bas-relief, high relief, sunk-relief is a technique restricted to ancient Egypt. Relief sculpture may also decorate steles, upright slabs, usually of stone, techniques such as casting, stamping and moulding use an intermediate matrix containing the design to produce the work, many of these allow the production of several copies. The term sculpture is used mainly to describe large works. The very large or colossal statue has had an enduring appeal since antiquity, another grand form of portrait sculpture is the equestrian statue of a rider on horse, which has become rare in recent decades. The smallest forms of life-size portrait sculpture are the head, showing just that, or the bust, small forms of sculpture include the figurine, normally a statue that is no more than 18 inches tall, and for reliefs the plaquette, medal or coin. Sculpture is an important form of public art, a collection of sculpture in a garden setting can be called a sculpture garden. One of the most common purposes of sculpture is in form of association with religion. Cult images are common in cultures, though they are often not the colossal statues of deities which characterized ancient Greek art. The actual cult images in the innermost sanctuaries of Egyptian temples, of which none have survived, were rather small. The same is true in Hinduism, where the very simple. Some undoubtedly advanced cultures, such as the Indus Valley civilization, appear to have had no monumental sculpture at all, though producing very sophisticated figurines, the Mississippian culture seems to have been progressing towards its use, with small stone figures, when it collapsed. Other cultures, such as ancient Egypt and the Easter Island culture, from the 20th century the relatively restricted range of subjects found in large sculpture expanded greatly, with abstract subjects and the use or representation of any type of subject now common. Today much sculpture is made for intermittent display in galleries and museums, small sculpted fittings for furniture and other objects go well back into antiquity, as in the Nimrud ivories, Begram ivories and finds from the tomb of Tutankhamun
7.
Court painter
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A court painter was an artist who painted for the members of a royal or noble family, sometimes on a fixed salary and on an exclusive basis where the artist was not supposed to undertake other work. Especially in the late Middle Ages, they were given the office of valet de chambre. Usually they were given a salary and formal title, and often a pension for life, in England the role of Serjeant Painter was set up for this, leaving the Kings painter free to paint mostly portraits. See category of Italian art collectors for lists that included non-aristocratic patrons, some artists, like Jan van Eyck or Diego Velázquez, were used in other capacities at court, as diplomats, functionaries, or administrators. In Islamic cultures, especially between the 14th and 17th centuries, similar arrangements operated for miniaturists and artists in other media. In the Persian miniature, the shah and other rulers typically maintained a workshop or atelier, of calligraphers, miniaturists, binders and other crafts. The name by which Riza Abbasi is usually includes the honorific title Abbasi. Abd as-Samad, a Persian painter who moved to the Mughal Empire, was given a number of significant administrative jobs, the court remained the focus of patronage of painting in the sub-Mughal princely courts of India, whether Muslim or Hindu. At many periods rulers owned or controlled royal workshops or factories making high-quality tapestries, porcelain or pottery, silks and this was especially the case in China and in the Byzantine Empire. Le Brun dominated, and largely created, the style found throughout Louis XIVs palaces, by the 20th century court painters was an obsolete position. Commonly more artists were granted permission by royalty who would sit for official portraits whether for private of patron purposes, Artists of the Tudor Court 21st Century Court Artists Michael Levey, Painting at Court, Weidenfeld and Nicholson, London,1971
8.
Charles II of Spain
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Charles II of Spain was the last Habsburg ruler of Spain. His realm included Southern Netherlands, Italian territories, several cities in north Africa and Spains overseas empire, known as the Bewitched, he is noted for his extensive physical, intellectual, and emotional disabilities and his consequent ineffectual rule. He died in 1700, childless and heirless, with all potential Habsburg successors having predeceased him, in his will, Charles named as his successor the almost 17-year-old Philip, Duke of Anjou, grandson of Charles half-sister Maria Theresa of Spain, the first wife of Louis XIV. Charles was born in the Spanish capital, Madrid, the son of Philip IV of Spain and his second wife, Mariana of Austria. As the only surviving heir of his fathers two marriages, Charles was named Prince of Asturias, the title given to the person first in line to the Spanish throne. The Spanish branch of the Habsburg royal family was noted for extreme consanguinity, well aware that they owed their power to fortunate marriages, they married between themselves to protect their gains. Philip and Mariana were actually uncle and niece, therefore, Charles was not only their son, Charles was physically and mentally disabled and infertile, possibly due to this massive inbreeding. Due to the deaths of his brothers, he was the last member of the male Spanish Habsburg line. Charles did not learn to speak until the age of four nor to walk until eight and his jaw was so badly deformed that he could barely speak or chew. Fearing the frail child would be overtaxed, his caretakers did not force Charles to attend school, the indolence of the young Charles was indulged to such an extent that at times he was not expected to be clean. The only vigorous activity in which Charles is known to have participated was shooting and he occasionally indulged in the sport in the preserves of El Escorial. The years of Charless reign were difficult for Spain, the economy was stagnant, there was hunger in the land, and the power of the monarchy over the various Spanish provinces was extremely weak. Spain’s finances were perpetually in crisis, Charles unfitness for rule meant he was often ignored, and power during his reign became the subject of court intrigues and foreign influence, particularly French and Austrian. Charles was three years old when his father, Philip IV, died on 17 September 1665, the Council of Castile appointed Philips second wife and Charles mother, Mariana of Austria, regent for the minor king. Charles inherited the Portuguese Restoration War and soon after his accession Spain was plunged into the War of Devolution with France in Spanish Netherlands, as regent, Mariana managed the countrys affairs through a series of favourites, whose merits usually amounted to no more than meeting her fancy. From then on he was the de facto prime minister or valido of Spain, the sheer size of the kingdom at that time made this kind of government increasingly damaging to the realms affairs. The treaty ceded the North African enclave of Ceuta to Spain, but marked the loss of Portugal, to end the War of Devolution, Nithard signed the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. However, the members of the Councils and in particular Charles illegitimate half-brother, in February 1669, a military revolt in Aragon and Catalonia led by Juan José, who then proceeded to march toward Madrid, brought about Nithards dismissal
9.
Madrid
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Madrid is the capital city of the Kingdom of Spain and the largest municipality in both the Community of Madrid and Spain as a whole. The city has a population of almost 3.2 million with an area population of approximately 6.5 million. It is the third-largest city in the European Union after London and Berlin, the municipality itself covers an area of 604.3 km2. Madrid lies on the River Manzanares in the centre of both the country and the Community of Madrid, this community is bordered by the communities of Castile and León. As the capital city of Spain, seat of government, and residence of the Spanish monarch, Madrid is also the political, economic, the current mayor is Manuela Carmena from Ahora Madrid. Madrid is home to two football clubs, Real Madrid and Atlético de Madrid. Madrid is the 17th most liveable city in the according to Monocle magazine. Madrid organises fairs such as FITUR, ARCO, SIMO TCI, while Madrid possesses modern infrastructure, it has preserved the look and feel of many of its historic neighbourhoods and streets. Cibeles Palace and Fountain have become one of the monument symbols of the city, the first documented reference of the city originates in Andalusan times as the Arabic مجريط Majrīṭ, which was retained in Medieval Spanish as Magerit. A wider number of theories have been formulated on possible earlier origins, according to legend, Madrid was founded by Ocno Bianor and was named Metragirta or Mantua Carpetana. The most ancient recorded name of the city Magerit comes from the name of a built on the Manzanares River in the 9th century AD. Nevertheless, it is speculated that the origin of the current name of the city comes from the 2nd century BC. The Roman Empire established a settlement on the banks of the Manzanares river, the name of this first village was Matrice. In the 8th century, the Islamic conquest of the Iberian Peninsula saw the changed to Mayrit, from the Arabic term ميرا Mayra. The modern Madrid evolved from the Mozarabic Matrit, which is still in the Madrilenian gentilic, after the disintegration of the Caliphate of Córdoba, Madrid was integrated in the Taifa of Toledo. With the surrender of Toledo to Alfonso VI of León and Castile, the city was conquered by Christians in 1085, Christians replaced Muslims in the occupation of the centre of the city, while Muslims and Jews settled in the suburbs. The city was thriving and was given the title of Villa, since 1188, Madrid won the right to be a city with representation in the courts of Castile. In 1202, King Alfonso VIII of Castile gave Madrid its first charter to regulate the municipal council, which was expanded in 1222 by Ferdinand III of Castile
10.
Sacristy
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A sacristy is a room for keeping vestments and other church furnishings, sacred vessels, and parish records. In some countries, it is known as the vestry, the sacristy is usually located inside the church, but in some cases it is an annex or separate building. In most older churches, a sacristy is near a side altar, in newer churches the sacristy is often in another location, such as near the entrances to the church. Some churches have more than one sacristy, each of which will have a specific function, often additional sacristies are used for maintaining the church and its items – such as candles and other materials. The sacristy is also where the priest and attendants vest and prepare before the service and they will return there at the end of the service to remove their vestments and put away any of the vessels used during the service. The hangings and altar linens are stored there as well, the Parish registers may be kept in the sacristy and are administered by the parish clerk. The piscina is used to wash linens used during the celebration of the Mass, the cruets, chalice, ciborium, paten, altar linens and sometimes the Holy Oils are kept inside the sacristy. Sacristies are usually off limits to the general public, the word sacristy derives from the Latin sacristia, sometimes spelled sacrastia, which is in turn derived from sacrista, from sacra. A person in charge of the sacristy and its contents is called a sacrist or a sacristan, the latter name was formerly given to the sexton of a parish church, where he would have cared for these things, the fabric of the building and the grounds. In Eastern Christianity, the functions of the sacristy are fulfilled by the Diaconicon and the Prothesis, two rooms or areas adjacent to the Holy Table
11.
Museo de Arte de Ponce
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Museo de Arte de Ponce is an art museum located on Avenida Las Americas in Ponce, Puerto Rico. It houses a collection of European art, as well as work by Puerto Rican artists, the museum contains one of the most important Pre-Raphaelite collections in the Western Hemisphere, holding some 4,500 pieces of art distributed among fourteen galleries. Museo de Arte de Ponce is considered one of the finest art museums in Puerto Rico, the largest art museum in the Caribbean, it has also been called one of the best in the Americas. It was the first museum in Puerto Rico accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and it was founded in 1959 by industrialist and philanthropist Luis A. Ferré at a location in the Ponce Historic Zone. The museum moved to its current building location on Avenida Las Americas in 1965, in 2010, the museum increased its size significantly after a $30M expansion. With the advice of two experts – Julius S. Ferré would state in a Forbes interview that the scholars and critics all called it kitsch, everyone thought I was crazy to buy them. On January 3,1959, Ferré opened the museum at a house at 70 Cristina Street in Ponce at what is today the Centro Cultural de Ponce, some of these original paintings continue to be on display today. As time passed and the gained popularity, additional works of art were added to the collections. In 1962, the Samuel H. Kress Foundation donated 15 paintings to the museum, by 1989, the museums collection had grown to 500 pieces, with a then estimated value of $50 million, equivalent to $96.6 million in present-day terms. On April 23,1964 the first stone was placed and the construction of the museum began and it was finished in 1965 and officially opened on December 28,1965. One of the features of the museum is its hexagonal galleries. The museum contained a total of 14 galleries, two gardens, and an amphitheater, and its entrance with bifurcated ladders. The museum was closed from 2008 to 2010 while undergoing renovations, re-opening in time for the celebration of its 50th anniversary on November 13,2010, after a $30 million in improvements. In the meantime, the museum exhibitions in San Juans Plaza Las Américas. The construction work was both a renovation of the structure and an expansion, increasing the size of the museum by more than 40%. The $20-turn-$30 million renovation included a new building to house a historic archive. After the expansion the total footage of the museum came to 77,745 square feet. The expansion intended to provided facilities for educational purposes and an art history library as well as to room for a museum shop
12.
Ponce, Puerto Rico
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Ponce is both a city and a municipality in the southern part of Puerto Rico. The city is the seat of the municipal government, Ponce, Puerto Ricos most populated city outside the San Juan metropolitan area, is named for Juan Ponce de León y Loayza, the great-grandson of Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León. Ponce is often referred to as La Perla del Sur, La Ciudad Señorial, the city serves as the governmental seat of the autonomous municipality as well as the regional hub for various Government of Puerto Rico entities, such as the Judiciary of Puerto Rico. It is also the center for various other commonwealth and federal government agencies. The municipality has a total of 31 barrios, including 19 outside the urban area and 12 in the urban area of the city. Ponce is a city of both the Ponce Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Ponce-Yauco-Coamo Combined Statistical Area. The municipality of Ponce is the second largest in Puerto Rico by land area, the region of what is now Ponce belonged to the Taíno Guaynia region, which stretched along the southern coast of Puerto Rico. Agüeybaná, a cacique who led the region, was among those that greeted Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León when he came to the island in 1508. Archeological findings have identified four sites within the municipality of Ponce with archeological significance, Canas, Tibes, Caracoles, during the first years of the colonization, Spanish families started settling around the Jacaguas River, in the south of the island. For security reasons, these moved to the banks of the Rio Portugués. Starting around 1646 the whole area from the Rio Portugués to the Bay of Guayanilla was called Ponce, in 1670, a small chapel was raised in the middle of the small settlement and dedicated in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Among its earliest settlers were Juan Ponce de León y Loayza, on September 17,1692, the King of Spain Carlos II issued a Cédula Real converting the chapel into a parish, and in so doing officially recognizing the small settlement as a hamlet. It is believed that Juan Ponce de León y Loayza, Juan Ponce de Leóns great-grandson, was instrumental in obtaining the permit to formalize the founding of the hamlet. Captains Enrique Salazar and Miguel del Toro where also instrumental, the city is named after Juan Ponce de León y Loayza, the great-grandson of Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León. In the early 18th century Don Antonio Abad Rodriguez Berrios built a chapel under the name of San Antonio Abad. The area would receive the name of San Antón, a historically important part of modern Ponce. In 1712 the village was chartered as El Poblado de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Ponce, in the early 19th century, Ponce continued to be one of dozens of hamlets that dotted the Island. Its inhabitants survived by subsistence agriculture, cattle raising, and maritime contraband with foreigners, however, in the 1820s, three events took place that dramatically changed the size of the town forever
13.
Francisco Rizi
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Francisco Rizi was a Spanish painter born at Madrid. He was the son of Antonio Rizi, a native of Bologna, Rizi was first trained by Vincencio Carducho. He became painter to Philip IV in 1656, and held the office under Charles II, a few years prior, he was appointed painter to the Cathedral of Toledo. Among his works are, The decoration with Pedro Nuñez of the theatre in the Real Alcázar of Madrid, religious scenes in the Chapel of Antonio. Scenery for the theatre of the Parque del Buen Retiro, sketch for the retable of the Host of Gorkum in the Sacristy of El Escorial. Auto de Fé en la plaza Mayor de Madrid, Antonio Palomino, An account of the lives and works of the most eminent Spanish painters, sculptors and architects,1724, first English translation,1739, p.112 Bryan, Michael. Walter Armstrong & Robert Edmund Graves, ed, dictionary of Painters and Engravers, Biographical and Critical. York St. #4, Covent Garden, London, Original from Fogg Library, Digitized May 18,2007, George Bell, Rizi at Art Renewal Center Biography at Web Gallery of Art
14.
Museo del Prado
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The Prado Museum is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. Founded as a museum of paintings and sculpture in 1819, it contains important collections of other types of works. El Prado is one of the most visited sites in the world, and it is considered one of the greatest art museums in the world. The collection currently comprises around 8,200 drawings,7,600 paintings,4,800 prints, and 1,000 sculptures, in addition to a large number of other works of art and historic documents. As of 2012, the museum displayed about 1,300 works in the buildings, while around 3,100 works were on temporary loan to various museums. The museum received 2.8 million visitors in 2012 and it is one of the largest museums in Spain. The best-known work on display at the museum is Las Meninas by Velázquez, Velázquez and his keen eye and sensibility were also responsible for bringing much of the museums fine collection of Italian masters to Spain, now the largest outside of Italy. The museum is planning a 16% extension in the nearby Salón de Reinos and their efforts and determination led to the Royal Collection being enriched by some of the masterpieces now to be seen in the Prado. In addition to works from the Spanish royal collection, other holdings increased and enriched the Museum with further masterpieces, such as the two Majas by Goya. Among the now closed museums whose collections have been added to that of the Prado were the Museo del la Trinidad in 1872, in addition, numerous legacies, donations and purchases have been of crucial importance for the growth of the collection. Upon the deposition of Isabella II in 1868, the museum was nationalized and acquired the new name of Museo del Prado, the building housed the royal collection of arts, and it rapidly proved too small. The first enlargement to the museum took place in 1918, particularly important donations include Barón Emile dErlangers gift of Goyas Black Paintings in 1881. Between 1873 and 1900, the Prado helped decorate city halls, new universities, during the Second Spanish Republic from 1931 to 1936, the focus was on building up provincial museums. The art had to be returned across French territory in night trains to the museum upon the commencement of World War II, during the early years of the dictatorship of Francisco Franco, many paintings were sent to embassies. The main building was enlarged with short pavilions in the rear between 1900 and 1960, in 1993, an extension proposed by the Prados director at the time, Felipe Garin, was quickly abandoned after a wave of criticism. In the late 1990s, a $14 million roof work forced the Velázquez masterpiece Las Meninas to change galleries twice, in 1998, the Prado annex in the nearby Casón del Buen Retiro closed for a $10 million two-year overhaul that included three new underground levels. In 2007, the finally executed Rafael Moneos project to expand its exposition room to 16,000 square meters. A glass-roofed and wedge-shaped foyer now contains the shops and cafeteria
15.
Titian
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Tiziano Vecelli or Tiziano Vecellio, known in English as Titian /ˈtɪʃən/, was an Italian painter, the most important member of the 16th-century Venetian school. He was born in Pieve di Cadore, near Belluno, during his lifetime he was often called da Cadore, taken from the place of his birth. His painting methods, particularly in the application and use of color, would exercise a profound influence not only on painters of the Italian Renaissance, during the course of his long life, Titians artistic manner changed drastically, but he retained a lifelong interest in color. Although his mature works may not contain the vivid, luminous tints of his pieces, their loose brushwork. The exact date of Titians birth is uncertain, when he was an old man he claimed in a letter to Philip II, King of Spain, to have been born in 1474, but this seems most unlikely. Other writers contemporary to his old age give figures that would equate to birthdates between 1473 and after 1482 and he was the son of Gregorio Vecelli and his wife Lucia. His father was superintendent of the castle of Pieve di Cadore, Gregorio was also a distinguished councilor and soldier. Many relatives, including Titians grandfather, were notaries, and the family of four were well-established in the area, at the age of about ten to twelve he and his brother Francesco were sent to an uncle in Venice to find an apprenticeship with a painter. At that time the Bellinis, especially Giovanni, were the artists in the city. There Titian found a group of men about his own age, among them Giovanni Palma da Serinalta, Lorenzo Lotto, Sebastiano Luciani. Francesco Vecellio, his brother, later became a painter of some note in Venice. A fresco of Hercules on the Morosini Palace is said to have one of Titians earliest works. Others were the Bellini-esque so-called Gypsy Madonna in Vienna, and the Visitation of Mary and Elizabeth, now in the Accademia, a Man with a Quilted Sleeve is an early portrait, painted around 1509 and described by Giorgio Vasari in 1568. Scholars long believed it depicted Ludovico Ariosto, but now think it is of Gerolamo Barbarigo, Rembrandt borrowed the composition for his self-portraits. Titian joined Giorgione as an assistant, but many contemporary critics found his work more impressive—for example in exterior frescoes that they did for the Fondaco dei Tedeschi. Their relationship evidently contained a significant element of rivalry, distinguishing between their work at this period remains a subject of scholarly controversy. A substantial number of attributions have moved from Giorgione to Titian in the 20th century, one of the earliest known Titian works, Christ Carrying the Cross in the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, depicting the Ecce Homo scene, was long regarded as by Giorgione. In 1507–1508 Giorgione was commissioned by the state to create frescoes on the re-erected Fondaco dei Tedeschi, Titian and Morto da Feltre worked along with him, and some fragments of paintings remain, probably by Giorgione
16.
Peter Paul Rubens
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Sir Peter Paul Rubens was a Flemish/Netherlandish draughtsman and painter. He is widely considered as the most notable artist of Flemish Baroque art school, the catalogue of his works by Michael Jaffé lists 1,403 pieces, excluding numerous copies made in his workshop. His commissioned works were mostly history paintings, which included religious and mythological subjects and he painted portraits, especially of friends, and self-portraits, and in later life painted several landscapes. Rubens designed tapestries and prints, as well as his own house and he also oversaw the ephemeral decorations of the royal entry into Antwerp by the Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand in 1635. His drawings are mostly extremely forceful but not overly detailed and he also made great use of oil sketches as preparatory studies. For altarpieces he painted on slate to reduce reflection problems. Rubens was born in the city of Siegen to Jan Rubens and he was named in honour of Saint-Peter and Paul, because he was born on their solemnety. His father, a Calvinist, and mother fled Antwerp for Cologne in 1568, after increased religious turmoil and persecution of Protestants during the rule of the Spanish Netherlands by the Duke of Alba. Jan Rubens became the adviser of Anna of Saxony, the second wife of William I of Orange. Following Jan Rubens imprisonment for the affair, Peter Paul Rubens was born in 1577, the family returned to Cologne the next year. In 1589, two years after his fathers death, Rubens moved with his mother Maria Pypelincks to Antwerp, religion figured prominently in much of his work and Rubens later became one of the leading voices of the Catholic Counter-Reformation style of painting. In Antwerp, Rubens received a Renaissance humanist education, studying Latin, by fourteen he began his artistic apprenticeship with Tobias Verhaeght. Subsequently, he studied under two of the leading painters of the time, the late Mannerist artists Adam van Noort. Much of his earliest training involved copying earlier works, such as woodcuts by Hans Holbein the Younger. Rubens completed his education in 1598, at time he entered the Guild of St. Luke as an independent master. In 1600 Rubens travelled to Italy and he stopped first in Venice, where he saw paintings by Titian, Veronese, and Tintoretto, before settling in Mantua at the court of Duke Vincenzo I Gonzaga. The colouring and compositions of Veronese and Tintoretto had an effect on Rubenss painting. With financial support from the Duke, Rubens travelled to Rome by way of Florence in 1601, there, he studied classical Greek and Roman art and copied works of the Italian masters
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Anthony van Dyck
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Sir Anthony van Dyck was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England, after enjoying great success in Italy and Flanders. He also painted biblical and mythological subjects, displayed outstanding facility as a draughtsman, the Van Dyke beard is named after him. Antoon van Dyck was born to parents in Antwerp. By the age of fifteen he was already an accomplished artist, as his Self-portrait, 1613–14. He was admitted to the Antwerp painters Guild of Saint Luke as a master by February 1618. His influence on the young artist was immense, Rubens referred to the nineteen-year-old van Dyck as the best of my pupils. At the same time the dominance of Rubens in the small and declining city of Antwerp probably explains why, despite his periodic returns to the city, van Dyck spent most of his career abroad. In 1620, at the instigation of George Villiers, Marquess of Buckingham, van Dyck went to England for the first time where he worked for King James I of England, receiving £100. After about four months he returned to Flanders, but moved on in late 1621 to Italy and he was already presenting himself as a figure of consequence, annoying the rather bohemian Northern artists colony in Rome, says Giovan Pietro Bellori, by appearing with the pomp of Zeuxis. He was mostly based in Genoa, although he travelled extensively to other cities. In 1627, he went back to Antwerp where he remained for five years, a life-size group portrait of twenty-four City Councillors of Brussels he painted for the council-chamber was destroyed in 1695. He was evidently very charming to his patrons, and, like Rubens, well able to mix in aristocratic and court circles, by 1630 he was described as the court painter of the Habsburg Governor of Flanders, the Archduchess Isabella. In this period he produced many religious works, including large altarpieces. King Charles I was the most passionate and generous collector of art among the British monarchs, and saw art as a way of promoting his elevated view of the monarchy. In 1628, he bought the collection that the Gonzagas of Mantua were forced to dispose of. In 1626, he was able to persuade Orazio Gentileschi to settle in England, later to be joined by his daughter Artemisia and some of his sons. Rubens was a target, who eventually came on a diplomatic mission, which included painting, in 1630. He was very well-treated during his visit, during which he was knighted
18.
Triumphal arch
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A triumphal arch is a monumental structure in the shape of an archway with one or more arched passageways, often designed to span a road. The main structure is decorated with carvings, sculpted reliefs. More elaborate triumphal arches may have multiple archways, Triumphal arches are one of the most influential and distinctive types of architecture associated with ancient Rome. The survival of great Roman triumphal arches such as the Arch of Titus inspired many states and rulers, up to the present day. Triumphal arch is also the given to the arch above the entrance to the chancel of a medieval church where a rood can be placed. The origins of the Roman triumphal arch are unclear, Triumphal arch look similar to Mesopotamian Arch entrances like the Ishtar Gate but there is no evidence to support that the Romans got their influence from there. The development of the arch is often associated with ancient Roman architecture. To fully understand this development however it is important to understand the importance of basic arches in Roman civilization, the Romans had learned how to construct effective arches from the Etruscans, who lived in central Italy. This knowledge had a impact on the architecture of Roman civilization. As a result, the Romans used arches for things such as aqueducts, amphitheaters, bridges and they had effectively used the arch in various aspects of their civilization and city structure. Since the Romans had effectively perfected this architectural structure, one could conclude that the arch symbolized perfection, monumental gateways had already been in use for hundreds of years by civilizations such as the Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians and Myceneans. There were precursors to the arch within the Roman world, in Italy. Surviving examples of Etruscan arches can still be seen at Perugia, the two key elements of the triumphal arch – a round-topped arch and a square entablature – had long been in use as separate architectural elements in ancient Greece. Entablatures were a part of the structural fabric of such buildings. The great innovation of the Romans was to combine a round arch, the first recorded Roman triumphal arches were set up in the time of the Roman Republic. Generals who were granted a triumph were termed triumphators and would erect fornices or honorific arches bearing statues to commemorate their victories, a number of fornices were built in Rome during the Republican era. Lucius Steritinus erected two in 196 BC to commemorate his victories in Hispania, another fornix was built on the Capitoline Hill by Scipio Africanus in 190 BC, and Quintus Fabius Maximus Allobrogicus constructed one in the Roman Forum in 121 BC. None of them today and little is known about their appearance
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Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Zaragoza
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The Archdiocese of Saragossa is a Roman Catholic ecclesiastical territory located in north-eastern Spain, in the province of Zaragoza, part of the autonomous community of Aragón. The archdiocese heads the ecclesiastical province of Saragossa, having authority over the suffragan dioceses of Barbastro-Monzón, Huesca, Tarazona. The diocese was created in Roman times, Pope John XXII elevated it to an archdiocese in 1318. In 1912 the diocese was bounded on the north by Navarre and Huesca, on the east by Huesca, Lerida, the episcopal city of Saragossa is situated on the river Ebro. The cathedral is dedicated to the Saviour, as it had been before the Moorish invasion and it shares its rank with the Church of Nuestra Señora del Pilar, half of the chapter residing at each of the two churches, while the dean resides six months at each alternately. The building of the cathedral was begun by Pedro Tarrjao in the fourteenth century, in 1412 Antipope Benedict XIII caused a magnificent baldachinum to be erected, but one of its pillars fell down, and it was reduced to its present condition. The great chancel and choir were built by order of Archbishop Dalmau de Mury Cervellón, in the chapel of Saint Dominguito del Val are preserved the relics of that saint, a boy of seven who was allegedly crucified by the Jews in 1250. The façade of the cathedral is Renaissance, and beside it rises the tower, more modern than the body of the church, the Church of Nuestra Señora del Pilar is believed to have originated in a chapel built by the Apostle James. Bishop Pedro de Librana found it almost in ruins and appealed to the charity of all the faithful to rebuild it. At the close of the century four bishops again stirred up the zeal of the faithful to repair the building. In 1681 work was commenced on the new church, the first stone being laid by Archbishop Diego de Castrillo,25 July 1685 and this grandiose edifice,140 metres in length, covers the capella angelica, where the celebrated image of the Blessed Virgin is venerated. Saragossa possesses many very noteworthy churches, among them is that of St. Engratia, built on the spot where the victims of Dacian were martyred. It was destroyed in the Spanish War of Independence, only the crypt and the doorway being left, it was rebuilt in the late 19th or early 20th century, the University of Saragossa obtained from Charles I in 1542, the privileges accorded to others in Spain. Its importance was afterwards promoted by Pedro Cerbuna, Bishop of Tarazona, a separate building has been erected for the faculties of medicine and sciences. The archiepiscopal palace is an edifice erected by Archbishop Agustín de Lezo y Palomeque. Before the Roman period the site of Saragossa appears to have been occupied by Salduba, in 24 BC Emperor Octavius Augustus, then in his seventh consulate, founded the colony of Caesar Augusta, giving it the Italian franchise and making it the capital of a juridical conventus. Geographer Pomponius Mela called it the most illustrious of the cities of Hispania Tarraconensis. Pope Urban VIII ordered the old lesson in the Breviary dealing with this point to be restored
20.
Luca Giordano
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Luca Giordano was an Italian late Baroque painter and printmaker in etching. Fluent and decorative, he worked successfully in Naples and Rome, Florence and Venice, born in Naples, Giordano was the son of the painter Antonio Giordano. In around 1650 he was apprenticed to Ribera on the recommendation of the viceroy of Naples, like Ribera, he painted many half-length figures of philosophers, either imaginary portraits of specific figures, or generic types. He acquired the nickname Luca fa presto, which translates into Luca paints quickly, following a period studying in Rome, Parma and Venice, Giordano developed an elaborate Baroque style fusing Venetian and Roman Influences. His mature work combines the ornamental pomp of Paul Veronese with the complex schemes. He is also noted for his lively and showy use of colour, in 1682–1683 Giordano painted various fresco series in Florence, including one in the dome of Corsini Chapel of the Chiesa del Carmine. In the large block occupied by the former Medici palace, he painted the ceiling of the Biblioteca Riccardiana, the vast frescoes of the latter are contained in the 1670s gallery addition, overlooking the gardens. The planning was overseen by Alessandro Segni and commissioned by Francesco Riccardi and they include the prototypic hagiographic celebration of the Medici family in the center, surrounded by a series of interlocking narratives, allegorical figures and mythological episodes. In 1692 Giordano went to Spain at the invitation of Charles II and he stayed there for ten years, returning to Naples in 1702, following Charles death. While in Spain, he painted decorative schemes at the Buen Retiro Palace, El Escorial, the sacristry of Toledo Cathedral. He also painted pictures for the court, private patrons. His pupils, Aniello Rossi and Matteo Pacelli, assisted him in Spain, Giordano was popular at the Spanish court, and the king granted him the title of a caballero. After his return to Naples early in 1702, Giordano continued to paint prolifically, executed in a lighter, less rhetorical style, these late works, prefiguring Rococo, proved influential throughout the eighteenth century, and were admired by Fragonard. He spent large sums in acts of munificence, and was particularly liberal to poorer artists, one of his maxims was that the good painter is the one whom the public like, and that the public are attracted more by colour than by design. Giordano had a facility, which often lead to an impression of superficiality of his works. He left many works in Rome, and far more in Naples and this church contains the artists own tomb. Other notable examples are the Judgment of Paris in the Berlin Museum, in later years, he painted influential frescoes for the Cappella Corsini, the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi and other works. Giordano died in Naples in 1705 and his best pupil in painting was Paolo de Matteis
21.
Zaragoza
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Zaragoza, also called Saragossa in English, is the capital city of the Zaragoza province and of the autonomous community of Aragon, Spain. It lies by the Ebro river and its tributaries, the Huerva, on 1 September 2010 the population of the city of Zaragoza was 701,090, within its administrative limits on a land area of 1,062.64 square kilometres, ranking fifth in Spain. It is the 32nd most populous municipality in the European Union, the population of the metropolitan area was estimated in 2006 at 783,763 inhabitants. The municipality is home to more than 50 percent of the Aragonese population, the city lies at an elevation of 199 metres above sea level. Zaragoza hosted Expo 2008 in the summer of 2008, a fair on water. It was also a candidate for the European Capital of Culture in 2012, the city is famous for its folklore, local gastronomy, and landmarks such as the Basílica del Pilar, La Seo Cathedral and the Aljafería Palace. Together with La Seo and the Aljafería, several other buildings part of the Mudéjar Architecture of Aragon which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Fiestas del Pilar are among the most celebrated festivals in Spain, the city was called by the ancient Romans Caesaraugusta, from which the present name derives. The Iberian town that predated the Roman city was called Salduie, see also, Caesar Augusta The Sedetani, a tribe of ancient Iberians, populated a village called Salduie. Later on, Augustus founded a city called Caesaraugusta at the location to settle army veterans from the Cantabrian wars. The foundation date of Caesaraugusta has not been set with exact precision, the city did not suffer any decline during the last centuries of the Roman empire and was captured peacefully by the Goths in the fifth century AD. From 1018 to 1118, Zaragoza was one of the taifa kingdoms, during the first three decades of this period, 1018–1038, the city was ruled by the Banu Tujibi. After the death of El Cid his kingdom was overrun by the Almoravids, who, by 1100, had managed to cross the Ebro into Barbastro, the Banu Hud stubbornly resisted the Almoravids and ruled until they were eventually defeated by them in May 1110. On 18 December 1118, the Aragonese led by Alfonso I conquered the city from the Almoravids, after Alfonsos death without heirs in 1134, Zaragoza was swiftly occupied by Alfonso VII of León and Castile. The wedding never happened, as Petronila ended up marrying Ramon Berenguer IV, the marriage union was the origin of the Crown of Aragón. While the reality of the existence of Saint Dominguito del Val is questioned, despite a decline in the outlying rural economy, Zaragoza has continued to grow. The General Military Academy, a training center of the Spanish Army, was re-established on September 27,1940 by Minister of the Army José Enrique Varela Iglesias. During the second half of the 20th century, Zaragozas population boomed as a number of factories opened in the region, in 1979, the Hotel Corona de Aragón fire killed at least 80
22.
Salamanca
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Salamanca is a city in northwestern Spain that is the capital of the Province of Salamanca in the community of Castile and León. The city lies on several hills by the Tormes River and its Old City was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1988. It is one of the most important university cities in Spain, Salamanca attracts thousands of international students, generating a diverse environment. It is situated approximately 200 kilometres west of the Spanish capital Madrid and 80 km east of the Portuguese border, with its 30,000 students, the university is, together with tourism, a primary source of income in Salamanca. In the 3rd century BC, Hannibal laid siege to the city, with the fall of the Carthaginians to the Romans, the city of Helmantica, as it was known, began to take more importance as a commercial hub in the Roman Hispania due to its favorable location. Salamanca lay on a Roman road, known as the Vía de la Plata and its Roman bridge dates from the 1st century, and was a part of this road. With the fall of the Roman Empire, the Alans established in Lusitania, later the city was conquered by the Visigoths and included in their territory. The city was already an episcopal see, and signatures of bishops of Salamanca are found in the Councils of Toledo, Salamanca surrendered to the Moors, led by Musa bin Nusair, in the year 712 AD. For years, this area between the south of Duero River and the north of Tormes River, became the battlefield between the Christian kingdoms and the Muslim Al-Andalus rulers. The constant fighting of the Kingdom of León first, and the Kingdom of Castile and León later against the Caliphate depopulated Salamanca, after the battle of Simancas the Christians resettled this area. After the capture of Toledo by Alfonso VI of León and Castile in 1085, raymond of Burgundy, instructed by his father-in-law Alfonso VI of León, led a group of settlers of various origins in 1102. Soon it became one of the most significant and prestigious academic centres in Europe, during the 16th century, the city reached its height of splendour. During that period, the University of Salamanca hosted the most important intellectuals of the time, in 1551, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V ordered an inquiry to find out if the science of Andreas Vesalius, physician and anatomist, was in line with Catholic doctrine. Vesalius came to Salamanca that same year to appear before the board and was acquitted, Salamanca suffered the general downturns of the Kingdom of Castile during the 17th century, but in the 18th century it experienced a rebirth. In this period, the new baroque Cathedral and main square were finished, the battle which raged that day is famous as a defining moment in military history, many thousands of men were slaughtered by cannon fire in the space of only a few short hours. During the devastating Spanish Civil War the city went over to the Nationalist side and was used as the de facto capital. The Nationalists soon moved most of the departments to Burgos. Like much of fervently Catholic and largely rural Leon and Old Castile regions, Salamanca was a supporter of the Nationalist side
23.
Mariana of Austria
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Mariana of Austria was Queen consort of Spain as the second spouse of King Philip IV, who was also her maternal uncle. At the death of her husband in 1665, Queen Mariana became regent for her son Charles II, the last Spanish Habsburg, born as Maria Anna on 24 December 1634 in Wiener Neustadt, Austria, she was the granddaughter of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II. Her parents were Ferdinand III and Maria Anna of Spain, the sister of Maria Annas future husband, King Philip IV of Spain. Her father, who would become emperor in 1637, was as yet only King of Hungary and Bohemia and her grandfather Emperor Ferdinand II died when she was 3 and her father became Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III. Maria Anna, was the second of six children, three of which died in early childhood and her oldest brother, Ferdinand IV of Hungary died young. Only Maria Anna and her brother, the future Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I. Maria Anna was destined from her years to continue the policy of intermarriage between the two branches of the Habsburg family, the Austrian and the Spanish. In 1646 Maria Anna, then eleven years old, was engaged to her Spanish Habsburg first cousin Balthasar Charles, Prince of Asturias, however, he died only three months later age 16. With Balthasar Charless death, Philip IV was left without a male heir, Philip was a widower, as his beautiful and beloved French wife, Elisabeth of France, had just died a few years prior. The forty-four-year-old Philip decided to marry his fourteen-year-old niece himself, after a marriage by proxy, they were wedded on 7 October 1649 in Navalcarnero, near Madrid, and spent their wedding night at El Escorial. From then on, she went by her name in Spanish, Mariana and Philips marriage was not a happy one due to both Philips infidelities and the age difference between them. Mariana had nothing to do with governance while her husband reigned, instead she buried herself in religion to an extent that was excessive even for her time and place. Mariana and Philips marriage produced five children, however, only two lived into adulthood. Their first child was Margaret Theresa, who was born on 12 July 1651, just as her mother did, she went on to marry her own maternal uncle Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor. In 1655, Mariana then had another daughter, Maria Ambrosia de la Concepción, during this time, there were those at court who wanted Philip to officially name his eldest daughter, Maria Theresa, as his heir, as she was already heir presumptive according to Spanish tradition. Mariana began feeling the pressure to have a son, eventually, her first son, Philip Prospero, was born on 28 November 1657, who was joyously received. She then gave birth to the Infante Ferdinand Thomas in 1658, sadly, her son Philip Prospero died in 1661. But that same year, Mariana gave birth to her last child, Charles was born physically and mentally disabled
24.
Teodoro Ardemans
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Teodoro de Ardemans or Ardmans was a Spanish architect and painter. Ardemans was born in Madrid to a German father and he was a disciple of the painter Claudio Coello, although he mainly practiced architecture, the municipality of Toledo named him master of the Cathedral of Toledo. In 1702, King Philip V of Spain named him to succeed José del Olmo as the master for Royal works and he worked on the extensive renovations of the Palace of Aranjuez, including completing the facade to a design of Francisco Herrera. He also helped in the decoration of the Palace of la Granja de San Ildefonso, noticias de los arquitectos y arquitectura de España desde su restauración. Eugenio Llaguno y Amirola y Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez, Madrid 1829, digital version Aterido Fernández, Ángel, Teodoro Ardemans, pintor, Anuario del Departamento de Historia y Teoría del Arte, vol
25.
Museum of Fine Arts (Budapest)
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The Museum of Fine Arts is a museum in Heroes Square, Budapest, Hungary, facing the Palace of Art. It was built by the plans of Albert Schickedanz and Fülöp Herzog in an eclectic-neoclassical style, the museums collection is made up of international art, including all periods of European art, and comprises more than 100,000 pieces. The collection is made up of older additions such as those from Buda Castle, the Museums collection is made up of six departments, Egyptian, Antique, Old sculpture gallery, Old master paintings gallery, Modern collection, Graphics collection. The institution celebrated its centenary in 2006, on February 16,2015, the museum closed to the public for renovation. It is expected to reopen in March 2018, after three years of work, in the meantime, a selection of works are housed in the Hungarian National Gallery. The gallery holds the second largest collection of Egyptian art in central Europe and it comprises a number of collections bought together by Hungarian Egyptologist, Eduard Mahler, in the 1930s. Subsequent digs in Egypt have expanded the collection, some of the most interesting pieces are the painted mummy sarcophagi. The core of the collection was made up of pieces acquired from Paul Arndt, the exhibition mainly includes works from Ancient Greece and Rome. Most significant is the 3rd century marble statue called the Budapest dancer, the Cyprean and Mycenaean collection is also notable, also the ceramics and bronzes. The 3000 paintings in the offer an almost uninterrupted survey of the development of European painting from the 13th to the late 18th centuries. The core of the collection is constituted by the 700 paintings acquired from the Esterhazy estate, the collection is split up into Italian, German, Netherlandish, Flemish, French, English and Spanish art. The collections main section is devoted to pieces from the Middle Ages to the 17th century and it was based on the Italian collection of Karoly Pulszky and Istvan Ferenczys bronze collections. From the latter one of the most treasured works, the small equestrian by Leonardo da Vinci. A number of painted wooden sculptures feature in the German and Austrian section, the collection shows selected rotating exhibitions of its collection of 10,000 drawings and 100,000 prints originating mainly from the Esterhazy, Istvan Delhaes and Pal Majovsky acquisitions. All periods of European graphic art are represented, important pieces include two studies by Leonardo da Vinci for the Battle of Anghiari,15 drawings by Rembrandt,200 pieces by Goya, and French aquatints. The museums collection of 19th- and 20th-century art is less significant than those found in other departments, the bulk of the painting is from the Biedermeier period and French art. From the latter are representatives of the Romantic period, the Barbizon school, there is a large collection of sculptures by Auguste Rodin and Constantin Meunier. Hungarian artist, Victor Vasarely, donated a significant collection of his works to the gallery and these have found a permanent home outside the walls of the gallery at the Zichy mansion in Obuda
26.
Royal Palace of Madrid
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The Royal Palace of Madrid is the official residence of the Spanish Royal Family at the city of Madrid, but it is only used for state ceremonies. King Felipe VI and the Royal Family do not reside in the palace, the palace is owned by the Spanish State and administered by the Patrimonio Nacional, a public agency of the Ministry of the Presidency. The palace is located on Calle de Bailén in the part of downtown Madrid, east of the Manzanares River. Several rooms in the palace are open to the public except during state functions. An admission fee of €11 is required, after Madrid fell to Alfonso VI of Castile in 1083, the edifice was only rarely used by the kings of Castile. In 1329, King Alfonso XI of Castile convened the cortes of Madrid for the first time, Philip II moved his court to Madrid in 1561. The old Alcázar was built on the location in the 16th century, after it burned 24 December 1734, King Philip V ordered a new palace built on the same site. Charles III first occupied the new palace in 1764, the last monarch who lived continuously in the palace was Alfonso XIII, although Manuel Azaña, president of the Second Republic, also inhabited it, making him the last head of state to do so. During that period the palace was known as Palacio Nacional, there is still a room next to the Real Capilla, which is known by the name Office of Azaña. The palace has 135,000 square metres of floor space and it is the largest royal palace in Europe by floor area. The interior of the palace is notable for its wealth of art and the use of types of fine materials in the construction. These include paintings by such as Caravaggio, Francisco de Goya, and Velázquez, and frescoes by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Juan de Flandes, Corrado Giaquinto. Muhammad I, Umayyad Emir of Cordoba, between 860 and 880, after the Moors were driven out of Toledo in the 11th century, the castle retained its defensive function. Henry III of Castile added several towers and his son John II used it as a royal residence. However, during the War of the Castilian Succession the troops of Joanna la Beltraneja were besieged in the Alcázar, the only drawing of the castle from the Middle Ages is one made in 1534 by Cornelius Vermeyen. Habsburg Emperor Charles V extended and renovated the castle in 1537, using the architects Alonso de Covarrubias, Philip II made Madrid his capital in 1561 and added a continued the renovations. Philip III added a southern facade between 1610 and 1636. Philip V of Bourbon renovated the apartments in 1700
27.
Modello
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A modello, from Italian, is a preparatory study or model, usually at a smaller scale, for a work of art or architecture, especially one produced for the approval of the commissioning patron. The term gained currency in art circles in Tuscany in the fourteenth century, modern definitions in reference works vary somewhat. Alternative and overlapping terms are oil sketch and cartoon for paintings or stained glass, maquette, plastico or bozzetto for sculpture or architecture, the less frequently found term ricordo means a similar piece produced as a small copy after completion of the work as a record for the workshop. The National Gallery still describe it as probably a modello, presumably produced after work had already begun, the diminutive term modeletto will always be used of small-scale versions. As an Italian word, modello may be printed in italics, the French version of the word, modèle, may be used of French works, and is normally italicised. Earlier stages of the process may be recorded in preparatory drawings or studies, either for the whole composition, or a part of it. Famous examples are the designs produced for the competition in 1401 to design the North doors of the Florence Baptistry. Lorenzo Ghiberti won, beating six other artists, including Filippo Brunelleschi, Donatello and Jacopo della Quercia, the modelli survive, for a single panel, of the first two named
28.
Antonio Palomino
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Antonio Palomino was born to a respectable family at Bujalance, near Córdoba in 1653. He studied philosophy, theology and law at Córdoba, and had lessons in painting from Juan de Valdés Leal, who visited there in 1672, and afterwards from Juan de Alfaro y Gamez in 1675. After taking minor orders Palomino moved to Madrid in 1678, where he associated with Alfaro, Claudio Coello, and Juan Carreño de Miranda, and executed some indifferent frescoes. He soon afterwards married a lady of rank, and, having been appointed alcalde of the mesta, was himself ennobled, in 1688 he was appointed painter to King Charles II. The artist visited Valencia in 1697, and remained there for three or four years, again devoting himself to painting, including the ceilings of the church of the Santos Juanes. He painted the fresco in the dome of the sacristy of the Cartuja de Granada. After the death of his wife in 1725 Palomino took priests orders and he died on 13 August 1726. Palominos El Museo pictórico y escala óptica first appeared in 1715–24 in a folio edition. The first two parts, on the theory and practice of the art of painting, have had little influence, a German version was published at Dresden in 1781, and a reprint of the entire work at Madrid in 1797. A modern English translation of the abridgment by Nina Ayala Mallory came out in 1987 from Cambridge University Press
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Alte Pinakothek
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The Alte Pinakothek is an art museum located in the Kunstareal area in Munich, Germany. It is one of the oldest galleries in the world and houses one of the most famous collections of Old Master paintings, the name Alte Pinakothek refers to the time period covered by the collection—from the fourteenth to the eighteenth century. The Neue Pinakothek covers nineteenth-century art, and the recently opened Pinakothek der Moderne exhibits modern art, all three galleries are part of the Bavarian State Picture Collection, an organization of the Free state of Bavaria. King Ludwig I of Bavaria ordered Leo von Klenze to erect a new building for the gallery for the Wittelsbach collection in 1826, even the neo-renaissance exterior of the Pinakothek clearly stands out from the castle-like museum type usual in the early 19th Century. It is closely associated with the function and structure of the building as a museum, the museum galleries were designed to display Rubenss Last Judgment, one of the largest canvasses ever painted. The museum building was damaged by bombing in World War II but was reconstructed and reopened to the public in the late 1950s. The ornate, pre-war interior including the large loggia facing the south façade in the floor were not restored. A new wall covering was created in 2008 for the rooms on the floor of the Alte Pinakothek with a woven. The new color scheme of green and red draws on the design of the rooms, Elector Maximilian I commissioned in 1616 four hunt paintings from Peter Paul Rubens and acquired many other paintings, especially the work of Albrecht Dürer. He even obtained The Four Apostles in the year 1627 due to pressure on the Nuremberg city fathers, a few years later however 21 paintings were confiscated and moved to Sweden during the occupation of Munich in the Thirty Years war. Maximilians grandson Maximilian II Emanuel purchased a number of Dutch. Under Max Emanuels successors, the purchases were discontinued due to the tight budget. Also Max Emanuels cousin Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine collected Netherlandish paintings and he ordered from Peter Paul Rubens the The Big Last Judgment and received Raphaels Canigiani Holy Family as a dowry of his wife. Charles Theodore, Elector of Bavaria had a preference for Netherlandish paintings as well. By the late 18th century a number of the paintings were already displayed in Schleissheim Palace. Even though 72 paintings including The Battle of Alexander at Issus were taken to Paris in 1800 by the armies of Napoleon I. The Louvre held it until 1804, when Napoleon declared himself Emperor of France, when the Prussians captured the Château de Saint-Cloud in 1814 as part of the War of the Sixth Coalition, they supposedly found the painting hanging in Napoleons bathroom. Most of the paintings have not been returned, with the secularisation many paintings from churches and former monasteries entered into state hands
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Hermitage Museum
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The State Hermitage Museum is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia. One of the largest and oldest museums in the world, it was founded in 1754 by Catherine the Great and has open to the public since 1852. Its collections, of only a small part is on permanent display. The collections occupy a complex of six historic buildings along Palace Embankment, including the Winter Palace. Apart from them, the Menshikov Palace, Museum of Porcelain, Storage Facility at Staraya Derevnya, the museum has several exhibition centers abroad. The Hermitage is a state property. Since July 1992, the director of the museum has been Mikhail Piotrovsky, of the six buildings in the main museum complex, five, namely the Winter Palace, Small Hermitage, Old Hermitage, New Hermitage and Hermitage Theatre, are open to the public. The entrance ticket for foreign tourists more than the fee paid by citizens of Russia. However, entrance is free of charge the first Thursday of every month for all visitors, the museum is closed on Mondays. The entrance for visitors is located in the Winter Palace. A hermitage is the dwelling of a hermit or recluse, the word derives from Old French hermit, ermit hermit, recluse, from Late Latin eremita, from Greek eremites, literally people who live alone, which is in turn derived from ἐρημός, desert. Originally, the building housing the collection was the Small Hermitage. Today, the Hermitage Museum encompasses many buildings on the Palace Embankment, apart from the Small Hermitage, the museum now also includes the Old Hermitage, the New Hermitage, the Hermitage Theatre, and the Winter Palace, the former main residence of the Russian tsars. In recent years, the Hermitage has expanded to the General Staff Building on the Palace Square facing the Winter Palace, the Western European Art collection includes European paintings, sculpture, and applied art from the 13th to the 20th centuries. It is displayed, in about 120 rooms, on the first, drawings and prints are displayed in temporary exhibitions. Since 1940, the Egyptian collection, dating back to 1852 and it serves as a passage to the exhibition of Classical Antiquities. A modest collection of the culture of Ancient Mesopotamia, including a number of Assyrian reliefs from Babylon, Dur-Sharrukin, the collection of Classical Antiquities occupies most of the ground floor of the Old and New Hermitage buildings. Its floor is made of a marble mosaic imitating ancient tradition, while the stucco walls
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Masterpiece
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Historically, a masterpiece was a work of a very high standard produced in order to obtain membership of a guild or academy in various areas of the visual arts and crafts. The word masterpiece probably derives from the Dutch meesterstuk or German meisterstück via loan translation, masterprize was another early variant in English. In English, the term became used in a variety of contexts for an exceptionally good piece of creative work. Originally, the term referred to a piece of work produced by an apprentice or journeyman aspiring to become a master craftsman in the old European guild system. His fitness to qualify for membership was judged partly by the masterpiece, and if he was successful. Great care was taken to produce a fine piece in whatever the craft was, whether confectionery, painting, goldsmithing, knifemaking. In the 17th century, the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths, for instance, the workhouse had been set up as part of a tightening of standards after the company became concerned that the level of skill of goldsmithing was being diluted. The same goldsmithing organization still requires the production of a masterpiece, if they failed to be admitted, then they could continue to work for other goldsmiths but not as a master themselves. In some guilds, apprentices were not allowed to marry until they had obtained full membership, the practice of producing a masterpiece has continued in some modern academies of art, where the general term for such works is now reception piece. The Royal Academy in London uses the term work and it has acquired a fine collection of diploma works received as a condition of membership. Painting the Century,101 Portrait Masterpieces 1900–2000 Virtual Collection of Masterpieces Masterpieces at the Louvre
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Public domain
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The term public domain has two senses of meaning. Anything published is out in the domain in the sense that it is available to the public. Once published, news and information in books is in the public domain, in the sense of intellectual property, works in the public domain are those whose exclusive intellectual property rights have expired, have been forfeited, or are inapplicable. Examples for works not covered by copyright which are therefore in the domain, are the formulae of Newtonian physics, cooking recipes. Examples for works actively dedicated into public domain by their authors are reference implementations of algorithms, NIHs ImageJ. The term is not normally applied to situations where the creator of a work retains residual rights, as rights are country-based and vary, a work may be subject to rights in one country and be in the public domain in another. Some rights depend on registrations on a basis, and the absence of registration in a particular country, if required. Although the term public domain did not come into use until the mid-18th century, the Romans had a large proprietary rights system where they defined many things that cannot be privately owned as res nullius, res communes, res publicae and res universitatis. The term res nullius was defined as not yet appropriated. The term res communes was defined as things that could be enjoyed by mankind, such as air, sunlight. The term res publicae referred to things that were shared by all citizens, when the first early copyright law was first established in Britain with the Statute of Anne in 1710, public domain did not appear. However, similar concepts were developed by British and French jurists in the eighteenth century, instead of public domain they used terms such as publici juris or propriété publique to describe works that were not covered by copyright law. The phrase fall in the domain can be traced to mid-nineteenth century France to describe the end of copyright term. In this historical context Paul Torremans describes copyright as a coral reef of private right jutting up from the ocean of the public domain. Because copyright law is different from country to country, Pamela Samuelson has described the public domain as being different sizes at different times in different countries. According to James Boyle this definition underlines common usage of the public domain and equates the public domain to public property. However, the usage of the public domain can be more granular. Such a definition regards work in copyright as private property subject to fair use rights, the materials that compose our cultural heritage must be free for all living to use no less than matter necessary for biological survival
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Michael Bryan (art historian)
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Michael Bryan was an English art historian, art dealer and connoisseur. He was involved in the purchase and resale of the great French Orleans Collection of art, selling it on to a British syndicate, Bryan was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland, and educated at the Royal Grammar School under Dr. Moyce. In June 1784, he married Juliana Talbot, the sister of Charles Talbot, the 15th Earl of Shrewsbury, Bryan moved back to London in 1790 establishing himself as an authority and dealer in Fine Art. In 1793 or 1794, he went to the continent in search of fine pictures. Among other places he visited Holland, and remained there until an order arrived from the French government to stop all English citizens then resident there and he was, amongst many others, detained at Rotterdam. It was here that he met Jean-Joseph de Laborde who, in 1798, Bryan, in effect, became a middleman for the purchase, and contacted the Duke of Bridgewater, who authorised him to open negotiations. The collection was displayed in Bryans private art gallery in Pall Mall, London, in 1801 Bryan obtained, through the Duke of Bridgewater, the kings permission to visit Paris in order to purchase art from the cabinet of Monsieur Robit to bring back to England. Among other fine pictures, he returned with two by the baroque Spanish artist Murillo - The infant Christ as the Good Shepherd, in 1804 Bryan retired from the art world, and settled at his brothers home in Yorkshire, where he remained until 1811. In 1812 Bryan again visited London, and commenced writing his magnum opus - the Biographical and Critical Dictionary of Painters and Engravers in 2 volumes, the first part appeared in May 1813, and concluded in 1816. He owned a gallery in Londons Savile Row, which became a gathering place for artists. In 1818 he became involved with some speculative art purchases which proved a failure, on 14 February 1821, Bryan suffered a severe paralytic stroke, dying at Portman Square, London on 21 March of the same year. Bryans dictionary of painters and engravers ( London, Cambridge, New York and Bombay Edition of 1903 -1905, Volume 11903 Volume 2 Volume 3 Volume 4 Volume 51905 Bryan, Bryans dictionary of painters and engravers revised and enlarged by George C
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Integrated Authority File
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The Integrated Authority File or GND is an international authority file for the organisation of personal names, subject headings and corporate bodies from catalogues. It is used mainly for documentation in libraries and increasingly also by archives, the GND is managed by the German National Library in cooperation with various regional library networks in German-speaking Europe and other partners. The GND falls under the Creative Commons Zero license, the GND specification provides a hierarchy of high-level entities and sub-classes, useful in library classification, and an approach to unambiguous identification of single elements. It also comprises an ontology intended for knowledge representation in the semantic web, available in the RDF format
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Netherlands Institute for Art History
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The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center in the world. The center specializes in documentation, archives, and books on Western art from the late Middle Ages until modern times, all of this is open to the public, and much of it has been digitized and is available on their website. The main goal of the bureau is to collect, categorize, via the available databases, the visitor can gain insight into archival evidence on the lives of many artists of past centuries. The library owns approximately 450,000 titles, of which ca.150,000 are auction catalogs, there are ca.3,000 magazines, of which 600 are currently running subscriptions. Though most of the text is in Dutch, the record format includes a link to library entries and images of known works. The RKD also manages the Dutch version of the Art and Architecture Thesaurus, the original version is an initiative of the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, California. Their bequest formed the basis for both the art collection and the library, which is now housed in the Koninklijke Bibliotheek. Though not all of the holdings have been digitised, much of its metadata is accessible online. The website itself is available in both a Dutch and an English user interface, in the artist database RKDartists, each artist is assigned a record number. To reference an artist page directly, use the code listed at the bottom of the record, usually of the form, https, for example, the artist record number for Salvador Dalí is 19752, so his RKD artist page can be referenced. In the images database RKDimages, each artwork is assigned a record number, to reference an artwork page directly, use the code listed at the bottom of the record, usually of the form, https, //rkd. nl/en/explore/images/ followed by the artworks record number. For example, the record number for The Night Watch is 3063. The Art and Architecture Thesaurus also assigns a record for each term, rather, they are used in the databases and the databases can be searched for terms. For example, the painting called The Night Watch is a militia painting, the thesaurus is a set of general terms, but the RKD also contains a database for an alternate form of describing artworks, that today is mostly filled with biblical references. To see all images that depict Miriams dance, the associated iconclass code 71E1232 can be used as a search term. Official website Direct link to the databases The Dutch version of the Art and Architecture Thesaurus
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Virtual International Authority File
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The Virtual International Authority File is an international authority file. It is a joint project of national libraries and operated by the Online Computer Library Center. The project was initiated by the US Library of Congress, the German National Library, the National Library of France joined the project on October 5,2007. The project transitions to a service of the OCLC on April 4,2012, the aim is to link the national authority files to a single virtual authority file. In this file, identical records from the different data sets are linked together, a VIAF record receives a standard data number, contains the primary see and see also records from the original records, and refers to the original authority records. The data are available online and are available for research and data exchange. Reciprocal updating uses the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting protocol, the file numbers are also being added to Wikipedia biographical articles and are incorporated into Wikidata. VIAFs clustering algorithm is run every month, as more data are added from participating libraries, clusters of authority records may coalesce or split, leading to some fluctuation in the VIAF identifier of certain authority records
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Bryan, Michael (1886). "Coello, Claudio". In Graves, Robert Edmund. Bryan's Dictionary of Painters and Engravers (A–K). I (3rd ed.). London: George Bell & Sons.
