1.
Habsburg Netherlands
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Habsburg Netherlands is the collective name of Holy Roman Empire fiefs in the Low Countries held by the House of Habsburg and later by the Spanish Empire, also known as the Spanish Netherlands. Then known as Seventeen Provinces, they were held by the Spanish Empire from 1556, in 1581, the Seven United Provinces seceded to form the Dutch Republic, the remaining Spanish Southern Netherlands eventually passed on to Habsburg Austria. Finally the Austrian Netherlands were annexed by the French First Republic in 1795, the Habsburg Netherlands was a geo-political entity covering the whole of the Low Countries from 1482 to 1581. The centre of the Burgundian possessions was the Duchy of Brabant, deeply disappointed, he entered into the disastrous Burgundian Wars and was killed in the Battle of Nancy. Upon the death of Mary of Burgundy in 1482, her possessions including the Burgundian Netherlands passed to her son. Through his father Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor from 1493, Philip was a Habsburg scion, the period 1481–1492 saw the Flemish cities revolt and Utrecht embroiled in civil war, but by the turn of the century both areas had been pacified by the Spanish rulers. Philips son Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, born in Ghent, succeeded his father in 1506 and his grandfather Emperor Maximilian I incorporated the Burgundian heritage into the Burgundian Circle, whereafter the territories in the far west of the Empire developed a certain grade of autonomy. Attaining full age in 1515, Charles went on to rule his Burgundian heritage as a native Netherlander and he acquired the lands of Overijssel and the Bishopric of Utrecht, purchased Friesland from Duke George of Saxony and regained Groningen and Gelderland. His Seventeen Provinces were re-organised in the 1548 Burgundian Treaty, whereby the Imperial estates represented in the Imperial Diet at Augsburg acknowledged a certain autonomy of the Netherlands. It was followed by a sanction by the Emperor the next year. By a 1522 inheritance treaty with his younger brother Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, Emperor Charles V had established the Austrian, upon his abdication in 1556, the Seventeen Provinces fell to the Spanish Crown. Charless son and successor King Philip II of Spain by his despotism and Catholic persecutions sparked the Dutch Revolt, the Spanish hold on the northern provinces was more and more tenuous. In 1579 the northern provinces established the Protestant Union of Utrecht, after the secession of 1581, the southern provinces, called t Hof van Brabant remained with the House of Habsburg until the French Revolutionary Wars. After the extinction of the Spanish Habsburgs and the War of the Spanish Succession, the southern provinces were also known as the Austrian Netherlands from 1715 onwards
2.
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
3.
Landscape painting
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In other works, landscape backgrounds for figures can still form an important part of the work. Sky is almost always included in the view, and weather is often an element of the composition, detailed landscapes as a distinct subject are not found in all artistic traditions, and develop when there is already a sophisticated tradition of representing other subjects. The two main traditions spring from Western painting and Chinese art, going well over a thousand years in both cases. Landscape views in art may be imaginary, or copied from reality with varying degrees of accuracy. If the primary purpose of a picture is to depict an actual, specific place, especially including buildings prominently, within a few decades it was used to describe vistas in poetry, and eventually as a term for real views. However the cognate term landscaef or landskipe for a patch of land had existed in Old English. The earliest pure landscapes with no figures are frescos from Minoan Greece of around 1500 BCE. The frescos from the Tomb of Nebamun, now in the British Museum, are a famous example. These were frequently used, as in the illustrated, to bridge the gap between a foreground scene with figures and a distant panoramic vista, a persistent problem for landscape artists. The Chinese style generally showed only a distant view, or used dead ground or mist to avoid that difficulty, aesthetic theories in both regions gave the highest status to the works seen to require the most imagination from the artist. They were often also poets whose lines and images illustrated each other, a revival in interest in nature initially mainly manifested itself in depictions of small gardens such as the Hortus Conclusus or those in millefleur tapestries. The frescos of figures at work or play in front of a background of trees in the Palace of the Popes. Several frescos of gardens have survived from Roman houses like the Villa of Livia, a particular advance is shown in the less well-known Turin-Milan Hours, now largely destroyed by fire, whose developments were reflected in Early Netherlandish painting for the rest of the century. Landscape backgrounds for various types of painting became prominent and skilful during the 15th century. The Italian development of a system of graphical perspective was now known all over Europe. Indeed, certain styles were so popular that they became formulas that could be copied again and again, after the publication of the Small Landscapes, landscape artists in the Low Countries either continued with the world landscape or followed the new mode presented by the Small Landscapes. The popularity of landscape scenes can be seen in the success of the painter Frans Post. Salvator Rosa gave picturesque excitement to his landscapes by showing wilder Southern Italian country, there are different styles and periods, and subgenres of marine and animal painting, as well as a distinct style of Italianate landscape
4.
Mannerism
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Mannerism is a style in European art that emerged in the later years of the Italian High Renaissance around 1520, lasting until about 1580 in Italy, when the Baroque style began to replace it. Northern Mannerism continued into the early 17th century, stylistically, Mannerism encompasses a variety of approaches influenced by, and reacting to, the harmonious ideals associated with artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and early Michelangelo. Where High Renaissance art emphasizes proportion, balance, and ideal beauty, Mannerism exaggerates such qualities, Mannerism is notable for its intellectual sophistication as well as its artificial qualities. Mannerism favors compositional tension and instability rather than the balance and clarity of earlier Renaissance painting, Mannerism in literature and music is notable for its highly florid style and intellectual sophistication. The definition of Mannerism and the phases within it continue to be a subject of debate among art historians, for example, some scholars have applied the label to certain early modern forms of literature and music of the 16th and 17th centuries. The term is used to refer to some late Gothic painters working in northern Europe from about 1500 to 1530. Mannerism also has been applied by analogy to the Silver Age of Latin literature, the word mannerism derives from the Italian maniera, meaning style or manner. Like the English word style, maniera can either indicate a type of style or indicate an absolute that needs no qualification. Vasari was also a Mannerist artist, and he described the period in which he worked as la maniera moderna, james V. Mirollo describes how bella maniera poets attempted to surpass in virtuosity the sonnets of Petrarch. This notion of bella maniera suggests that artists thus inspired looked to copying and bettering their predecessors, in essence, bella maniera utilized the best from a number of source materials, synthesizing it into something new. As a stylistic label, Mannerism is not easily defined, “High Renaissance” connoted a period distinguished by harmony, grandeur and the revival of classical antiquity. The term Mannerist was redefined in 1967 by John Shearman following the exhibition of Mannerist paintings organised by Fritz Grossmann at Manchester City Art Gallery in 1965. The label “Mannerism” was used during the 16th century to comment on social behaviour, however, for later writers, such as the 17th-century Gian Pietro Bellori, la maniera was a derogatory term for the perceived decline of art after Raphael, especially in the 1530s and 1540s. From the late 19th century on, art historians have used the term to describe art that follows Renaissance classicism. By the end of the High Renaissance, young artists experienced a crisis, no more difficulties, technical or otherwise, remained to be solved. The young artists needed to find a new goal, and they sought new approaches, at this point Mannerism started to emerge. The new style developed between 1510 and 1520 either in Florence, or in Rome, or in both cities simultaneously and this period has been described as a natural extension of the art of Andrea del Sarto, Michelangelo, and Raphael. Michelangelo from an early age had developed a style of his own, one of the qualities most admired by his contemporaries was his terribilità, a sense of awe-inspiring grandeur, and subsequent artists attempted to imitate it
5.
World landscape
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The subject of each painting is usually a Biblical or historical narrative, but the figures comprising this narrative element are dwarfed by their surroundings. The compositional type was taken up by a number of other Netherlandish artists, there was a parallel development by Patinirs contemporary Albrecht Altdorfer and other artists of the Danube school. The treatment of landscape backgrounds in Early Netherlandish painting was admired in Italy. The backgrounds to many of Albrecht Dürers early prints were appropriated by a number of Italian artists and he typically uses three base colours to articulate his compositions, with a brownish foreground, a blue-green middle zone, and blues in the distance. The horizon-line is relatively high on the picture plane, Patinir came from Dinant on the Meuse where, in a startlingly un-Netherlandish landscape, there are dramatic rock cliffs and free-standing crags along the river. These are frequently recalled in his paintings, and came to form a feature of works by other artists. Both Kenneth Clark and Simon Schama see these as the last survivors of the landscape of symbols, relating them to medieval, jerome at Prayer anticipate the new style. In most respects the paintings retain the same elements as many 15th-century treatments of the same subjects but show, in modern cinematic terms, some paintings by Jan Sanders van Hemessen place genre figures in the foreground of paintings on religious or moral subjects. In the 17th century all these areas became established as independent genres in Dutch and Flemish painting. Patinirs invention was developed by Herri met de Bles, who was probably his nephew and he took the type into the new style of Northern Mannerism. Other artists were Lucas Gassel, the Brunswick Monogrammist, and Cornelis Massys, Patinir increasingly left the larger figures in his works to other masters, and also seems to have had a large workshop or circle of followers in Antwerp. The style was adopted and made more natural in the landscapes of Pieter Brueghel the Elder and they are larger than most previous works, with a genre scene with several figures in the foreground, and the panoramic view seen past or through trees. Bruegel was also aware of the Danube landscape style through prints, the Danube school was a contemporary group of German and Austrian artists who were also pioneers of landscape painting, and the first to regularly paint pure landscapes without figures. Other innovative works showed close-up views of dense forest with hardly any distant view or even sky and it is probable that at least Altdorfer had seen a Patinir by about 1531, one was in Augsburg from 1517. This extraordinary painting shows a view right across the Mediterranean, with a mass of tiny figures fighting a battle in the foreground. They are in modern Turkey, and the view extends beyond the island of Cyprus to the coast of Egypt and the Sinai peninsula, the painting originally formed one part of a set of historical paintings in the same format. Both the Netherlandish and Danubian approaches to painting were greatly influential for later artists. Though Rubens rapidly outgrew his influence, in some of his landscapes, such as the Summer, Peasants going to Market
6.
Joachim Patinir
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Joachim Patinir, also called Patenier, was a Flemish Renaissance painter of history and landscape subjects. He was Flemish, from the area of modern Wallonia, but worked in Antwerp, Patinir was a pioneer of landscape as an independent genre and he was the first Flemish painter to regard himself primarily as a landscape painter. He effectively invented the world landscape, a style of panoramic northern Renaissance landscapes which is Patinirs important contribution to Western art. There are only five paintings signed by Patinir, but many works have been attributed to him or his workshop with varying degrees of probability. The ones that are signed read, Joachim D. Patinier, the 2007 exhibition at the Museo del Prado in Madrid contained 21 pictures listed as by Patinir or his workshop, and catalogued a further 8 which were not in the exhibition. Patinir was the friend of not only Dürer, but with Quentin Metsys as well, the Temptation of St Anthony was done in collaboration with Metsys, who added the figures to Patinirs landscape. His career was contemporary with that of the other major pioneer of paintings dominated by landscape, Albrecht Altdorfer. He was probably the uncle of Herri met de Bles, who was his follower in establishing the world landscape and he may have studied with Gerard David at Bruges, who had been registered as a guild member in the same year as Patinir. In 1511, Patinir is believed to have travelled to Genoa with David, in 1521, Patinirs friend Albrecht Dürer attended his second wedding and painted his portrait. Dürer called Patinir der gute Landschaftsmaler, thus creating a neologism translated later into the French, Patinir often let his landscapes dwarf his figures, which are of very variable quality. The larger ones were at least sometimes painted by other artists, such specialisation had become common in the Low Countries at the time. Many of his works are large for Netherlandish panel paintings of the time, as are those of Hieronymus Bosch, another painter of large landscapes. Patinirs immense vistas combine observation of detail with lyrical fantasy. His landscapes use a high viewpoint with a horizon. He uses a consistent and effective colour scheme in his landscapes, examples of his work include The Rest on the Flight into Egypt, The Baptism of Christ, St. John at Patmos, Landscape with the Shepherds, and the Rest on the Flight to Egypt. There is also a triptych attributed to him called The Penitence of St. Jerome, Patinir died in Antwerp in 1524, and Quentin Metsys became the guardian of his children. Early Renaissance painting Renaissance in the Netherlands Grove, Hans Devisscher, subscription required Koch, Robert A. Joachim Patinir. Symbols & Allegories in Art, The Hereafter, los Angeles, The J. Paul Getty Museum,2005
7.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder
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He also painted no portraits, the other mainstay of Netherlandish art. After his training and travels to Italy, he returned in 1555 to settle in Antwerp and he does the same with the fantastic and anarchic world developed in Renaissance prints and book illustrations. He is sometimes referred to as Peasant Bruegel, to him from the many later painters in his family. From 1559, he dropped the h from his name and signed his paintings as Bruegel, the two main early sources for Bruegels biography are Lodovico Guicciardinis account of the Low Countries and Karel van Manders 1604 Schilder-boeck. Guicciardini recorded that Bruegel was born in Breda, but van Mander specified that Bruegel was born in a village near Breda called Brueghel, nothing at all is known of his family background. Van Mander seems to assume he came from a peasant background, in keeping with the over-emphasis on Bruegels peasant genre scenes given by van Mander and many art historians. Breda was already a significant centre as the base of the House of Orange-Nassau, with a population of some 8,000, from the fact that Bruegel entered the Antwerp painters guild in 1551, it is inferred that he was born between 1525 and 1530. His master, according to van Mander, was the Antwerp painter Pieter Coecke van Aelst, between 1545 and 1550 he was a pupil of Pieter Coecke, who died on 6 December 1550. Bruegel possibly got this work via the connections of Mayken Verhulst, maykens father and eight siblings were all artists or married an artist, and lived in Mechelen. In 1551 Bruegel became a master in the Guild of Saint Luke of Antwerp. He set off for Italy soon after, probably by way of France. He visited Rome and, rather adventurously for the period, by 1552 he had reached Reggio Calabria at the tip of the mainland. He probably continued to Sicily, but by 1553 was back in Rome, there he met the miniaturist Giulio Clovio, whose will of 1578 lists paintings by Bruegel, in one case a joint work. These works, apparently landscapes, have not survived, but marginal miniatures in manuscripts by Clovio are attributed to Bruegel, with one exception, Bruegel did not work the plates himself, but produced a drawing which Cocks specialists worked from. In 1563 he was married in Brussels, where he lived for the rest of his life, while Antwerp was the capital of Netherlandish commerce as well as the art market, Brussels was the centre of government. Van Mander tells a story that his mother-in-law pushed for the move to him from his established servant girl mistress. By now painting had become his main activity, and his most famous come from these years. His paintings were sought after, with patrons including wealthy Flemish collectors and Cardinal Granvelle, in effect the Habsburg chief minister
8.
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
9.
Antwerp
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Antwerp is a city in Belgium, the capital of Antwerp province in the region of Flanders. With a population of 510,610, it is the most populous city proper in Belgium and its metropolitan area houses around 1,200,000 people, which is second behind Brussels. Antwerp is on the River Scheldt, linked to the North Sea by the Westerschelde estuary, the Port of Antwerp is one of the biggest in the world, ranking second in Europe and within the top 20 globally. Antwerp has long been an important city in the Low Countries, the inhabitants of Antwerp are nicknamed Sinjoren, after the Spanish honorific señor or French seigneur, lord, referring to the Spanish noblemen who ruled the city in the 17th century. The city hosted the 1920 Summer Olympics, according to folklore, notably celebrated by a statue in front of the town hall, the city got its name from a legend about a giant called Antigoon who lived near the Scheldt river. He exacted a toll from passing boatmen, and for those who refused, he severed one of their hands, eventually the giant was killed by a young hero named Silvius Brabo, who cut off the giants own hand and flung it into the river. Hence the name Antwerpen, from Dutch hand werpen, akin to Old English hand and wearpan, a longstanding theory is that the name originated in the Gallo-Roman period and comes from the Latin antverpia. Antverpia would come from Ante Verpia, indicating land that forms by deposition in the curve of a river. Note that the river Scheldt, before a period between 600 and 750, followed a different track. This must have coincided roughly with the current ringway south of the city, however, many historians think it unlikely that there was a large settlement which would be named Antverpia, but more something like an outpost with a river crossing. However, John Lothrop Motley argues, and so do a lot of Dutch etymologists and historians, aan t werp is also possible. This warp is a hill or a river deposit, high enough to remain dry at high tide. Another word for werp is pol hence polders, historical Antwerp allegedly had its origins in a Gallo-Roman vicus. Excavations carried out in the oldest section near the Scheldt, 1952–1961, produced pottery shards, the earliest mention of Antwerp dates from the 4th century. In the 4th century, Antwerp was first named, having been settled by the Germanic Franks, the name was reputed to have been derived from anda and werpum. The Merovingian Antwerp was evangelized by Saint Amand in the 7th century, at the end of the 10th century, the Scheldt became the boundary of the Holy Roman Empire. Antwerp became a margraviate in 980, by the German emperor Otto I, in the 11th century Godfrey of Bouillon was for some years known as the marquis of Antwerp. In the 12th century, Norbert of Xanten established a community of his Premonstratensian canons at St. Michaels Abbey at Caloes
10.
Guild of Saint Luke
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The Guild of Saint Luke was the most common name for a city guild for painters and other artists in early modern Europe, especially in the Low Countries. They were named in honor of the Evangelist Luke, the saint of artists. One of the most famous such organizations was founded in Antwerp and it continued to function until 1795, although by then it had lost its monopoly and therefore most of its power. In most cities, including Antwerp, the government had given the Guild the power to regulate defined types of trade within the city. Guild membership, as a master, was required for an artist to take on apprentices or to sell paintings to the public. Similar rules existed in Delft, where members could sell paintings in the city or have a shop. The guild of Saint Luke not only represented painters, sculptors, and other artists, but also—especially in the seventeenth century—dealers, amateurs. In traditional guild structures, house-painters and decorators were often in the same guild, however, as artists formed under their own specific guild of St. Luke, particularly in the Netherlands, distinctions were increasingly made. In general, guilds also made judgments on disputes between artists and other artists or their clients, in such ways, it controlled the economic career of an artist working in a specific city, while in different cities they were wholly independent and often competitive against each other. Although it did not become an artistic center until the sixteenth century, Antwerp was one of, if not the first. It is first mentioned in 1382, and was given privileges by the city in 1442. The registers, or Liggeren, from the guild exist, cataloging when artists became masters, who the dean for each year was, what their specialities were, and the names of any students. Perhaps because of this link, for a period they had a rule that all miniatures needed a tiny mark to identify the artist, only under special privileges, such as court artist, could an artist effectively practice their craft without holding membership in the guild. Membership also allowed members to sell works at the guild-owned showroom, Antwerp, for example, opened a market stall for selling paintings in front of the cathedral in 1460, and Bruges followed in 1482. Guilds of St. Luke in the Dutch Republic began to reinvent themselves as cities there changed over to Protestant rule, many St. Luke guilds reissued charters to protect the interests of local painters from the influx of southern talent from places like Antwerp and Bruges. Many cities in the republic became more important artistic centres in the late sixteenth. Amsterdam was the first city to reissue a St. Lukes charter after the reformation in 1579, and it included painters, sculptors, engravers, for example, Gouda, Rotterdam, and Delft, all founded guilds between 1609 and 1611. On the other hand, these distinctions did not take effect at that time in Amsterdam or Haarlem, in the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke, however, a strict hierarchy was attempted in 1631 with panel painters at the top, though this hierarchy was eventually rejected
11.
Francesco I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany
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Francesco I was the second Grand Duke of Tuscany, ruling from 1574 until his death in 1587. He was the grand duke of the house of Medici. Born in Florence, he was the son of Cosimo I de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany and Eleanor of Toledo, by all reports, it was not a happy marriage. Joanna was homesick for her native Austria, and Francesco was neither charming nor faithful, Joanna died at the age of thirty one in 1578. Soon after the Grand Duchess Joanna had died, Francesco went on to marry his Venetian mistress, Bianca Cappello, after disposing of her husband. Because of the quick remarriage and similar occurrences among the Medici, rumours spread that Francesco, Francesco reportedly built and decorated Villa di Pratolino for Bianca. She was, however, not always popular among Florentines, Francesco also adopted Biancas daughter by her first marriage, Pellegrina. Like his father, Francesco was often despotic, but while Cosimo had known how to maintain Florentine independence, Francesco acted more like a vassal of the Habsburgs of Austria and he continued the heavy taxation of his subjects to pay large sums to the empire. He had an amateurs interest in manufacturing and sciences and he founded porcelain and stoneware manufacture, but these did not thrive until after his death. He continued his fathers patronage of the arts, supporting artists, Francesco and Bianca died on 19 and 20 October both at the Medici Villa in Poggio a Caiano. Although the original death certificates mention malaria, it has been speculated that the couple was poisoned, possibly by Francescos brother. Investigations of Francescos facial hair that were found among his remains have detected low levels of arsenic, testing showed proof that support the theory of arsenic-poisoning. The same findings were detected in organs from Francesco and it is believed that Francesco and Bianca were given small doses of arsenic for several days until it killed them. But the doses were too small and given over a too short period of time to be detected in Francescos facial hair. In this way their symptoms, such as fever, stomach-cramps and vomiting, easily could be misinterpreted as some kind of infection, Francesco was succeeded by his younger brother, Ferdinando I de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. In 1857, all members of the Medici family were exhumed and reburied in the place where they still lie today and these are the features of a right sided stroke possibly within the internal capsule. The presence of the orthopaedic footwear suggests that this stroke happened significantly before his death, during life, in his official portraits, the Grand Duke was always depicted as being in perfect physical condition. The cause of his stroke is not known but malaria is known to cause this condition There is a portrait of Francesco as a child by Bronzino
12.
Fresco
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Fresco is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly-laid, or wet lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster, the fresco technique has been employed since antiquity and is closely associated with Italian Renaissance painting. Buon fresco pigment mixed with water of temperature on a thin layer of wet, fresh plaster, for which the Italian word for plaster. Because of the makeup of the plaster, a binder is not required, as the pigment mixed solely with the water will sink into the intonaco. The pigment is absorbed by the wet plaster, after a number of hours, many artists sketched their compositions on this underlayer, which would never be seen, in a red pigment called sinopia, a name also used to refer to these under-paintings. Later, new techniques for transferring paper drawings to the wall were developed. The main lines of a drawing made on paper were pricked over with a point, the paper held against the wall, if the painting was to be done over an existing fresco, the surface would be roughened to provide better adhesion. This area is called the giornata, and the different day stages can usually be seen in a large fresco, buon frescoes are difficult to create because of the deadline associated with the drying plaster. Once a giornata is dried, no more buon fresco can be done, if mistakes have been made, it may also be necessary to remove the whole intonaco for that area—or to change them later, a secco. An indispensable component of this process is the carbonatation of the lime, the eyes of the people of the School of Athens are sunken-in using this technique which causes the eyes to seem deeper and more pensive. Michelangelo used this technique as part of his trademark outlining of his central figures within his frescoes, in a wall-sized fresco, there may be ten to twenty or even more giornate, or separate areas of plaster. After five centuries, the giornate, which were nearly invisible, have sometimes become visible, and in many large-scale frescoes. Additionally, the border between giornate was often covered by an a secco painting, which has fallen off. One of the first painters in the period to use this technique was the Isaac Master in the Upper Basilica of Saint Francis in Assisi. A person who creates fresco is called a frescoist, a secco or fresco-secco painting is done on dry plaster. The pigments thus require a medium, such as egg. Blue was a problem, and skies and blue robes were often added a secco, because neither azurite blue nor lapis lazuli. By the end of the century this had largely displaced buon fresco
13.
Sebastiaen Vrancx
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Sebastiaen Vrancx, Sebastiaan Vrancx or Sebastian Vranckx was a Flemish Baroque painter and draughtsman who is mainly known for his battle scenes, a genre that he pioneered in Netherlandish painting. He also created landscapes with mythological and allegorical scenes, scenes with robbers, village scenes and he was a gifted figure painter who was regularly invited to paint the staffage in compositions of fellow painters. Sebastiaen Vrancx was baptized on 22 January 1573 in the St James Church in Antwerp and his father Jan was a merchant. He was an apprentice in the workshop of Adam van Noort and it is believed that after finishing his apprenticeship, the artist visited Italy as he only became a master of the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1600. He commenced his career in Antwerp and gained the recognition of his fellow artists and he was particularly esteemed as a painter of battle scenes and Peter Paul Rubens is known to have owned a battle scene by the artist. In 1610 he was invited to join the elite Confrerie of Romanists, a condition of admission was that the member had travelled to Rome. The diversity and high positions held by the Confreries membership offered him an opportunity to meet with potential patrons. He was elected the dean of the chamber of the Guild in 1611. The position entitled Vrancx to carry a sword and it was in a vigorous pose with a sword on his side that he was portrayed by Anthony van Dyck. Vrancx was a member of the chamber of rhetoric the Violieren and he was very active in the chamber of rhetoric and when he served as its factor he wrote about 13 comedies and a number of poems. Vrancx collaborated with Jan Brueghel the Younger, Hendrick van Balen, Vrancx met with personal tragedy when his wife and sole child Barbara died a few months from each other in 1639. He himself died on 19 May 1647 in Antwerp, the pupils of Vrancx included Peter Snayers who became a leading battle painter and Balthasar Courtois, whose work is virtually unknown. There is no view of the size of Vrancx studio. In a letter of 1634, Jan Brueghel the Younger wrote to his business partner in Seville that, Vrancx has plenty to do but refuses to employ studio assistants and he does not allow copies to be put into circulation. Sebastiaen Vrancx is now known for his battle scenes, a genre he likely pioneered in Northern European art. His subject matter was, however, much wider than solely battle scenes and he is also known for a series of drawings depicting scenes from Virgils Aeneid. He also produced designs for the Antwerp printmakers and publishers, Sebastiaen Vrancx was probably the first artist in the Northern or Southern Netherlands who created depictions of battle scenes. His experience as an officer and captain of the Antwerp civil militia may have played a role in his interest in developing this genre, approximately half of his known works are devoted to military scenes
14.
Violieren
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The Violieren was a chamber of rhetoric that dates back to the 15th century in Antwerp, when it was a social drama society with close links to the Guild of St. Luke. It was one of three drama guilds in the city, the two being the Goudbloem and the Olyftack. In 1660 the Violieren merged with former rival Olyftack, and in 1762 the society was dissolved altogether, much of what is known today about Antwerps chambers of rhetoric comes from the city and guild archives. According to a note by the year 1480 in the records of the Guild of St. Luke. Their motto was Wt ionsten versaemt, from 1490, the chamber received an annual grant from the town of Antwerp. In 1493 they participated in a major contest in Mechelen and in 1496 they hosted their own Landjuweel in Antwerp, the society was popular throughout the 16th century and many noted artists were members. The French Wikipedia includes a list of the deans, there were occasional major productions, usually to celebrate particular events. In 1585 the Violieren participated in the entry into Antwerp of Alexander Farnese. On 16 June 1610 they performed a play on the market square to celebrate the ratification of the Twelve Years Truce. The constitutions of the chamber, dating back to 1480, were revised in 1619, a rhetoric competition drawing participants from across the Low Countries was hosted by the Peoene in Mechelen on 3 May 1620. Members of the Violieren carried off first prize for best rhyming rebus, first prize for best painted rebus, second prize for strongest line, in 1625 the city celebrated the success of the siege, with the Violieren performing at the celebrations. The leading officers of the chamber were the hooftman, prince, dean, the hooftman was an honorary president, a non-participating patron, who audited the chambers accounts and mediated disputes between members. He was elected for a term of three years, the prince, who chaired the actual running of the organisation, was also elected for three years. The dean, who did the work of administering the guild. Other officers were the directors, the properties master, the breuckmeesters who collected members fees. They worked under the direction of the princen van personagiën, the fee-paying members, or confreers, enjoyed not only freedom from militia duty but the full range of social provision that the guild provided. It was also possible to pay fees, rather than membership fees, as a sympathiser
15.
Chamber of rhetoric
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Chambers of rhetoric were dramatic societies in the Low Countries. Their members were called Rederijkers, from the French word rhétoricien and these societies were closely connected with local civic leaders and their public plays were a form of early public relations for the city. Most Dutch cities sponsored a chamber of rhetoric, and many cities had more than one, the building that currently houses the Frans Hals Museum was built with the proceeds of a lottery in which chambers of rhetoric participated from all over the country. The Haarlem society Trou moet Blycken still has many of the blazoens that it kept as host of that lottery. At the start of the 16th century, Antwerp had three societies, the Violieren, the Olyftack, and the Goudbloem, while Brussels. An important chamber of rhetoric in the Netherlands was De Egelantier in Amsterdam, Coster, Bredero, Hooft, during the Protestant Reformation the society sided with the reformers against the city government and enjoyed its most blooming period despite receiving very little funding from official sources. Because many of the rederijkers were by definition amateurs, the quality of their work was often rather low. One work of historical importance that came from the Rederijkers is the play Elckerlijc. List of chambers of rhetoric Medieval Dutch literature Dutch literature Flemish literature Conformisten en rebellen, Literature of the Low Countries, A Short History of Dutch Literature in the Netherlands and Belgium. Van Bruaene, A. L. Repertorium van de Rederijkerskamers in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden Overview of the Chambers of Rhetoric in the Southern Netherlands
16.
Willem van Haecht
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Willem van Haecht was a Flemish painter best known for his pictures of art galleries and collections. Willem van Haecht was born in Antwerp as the son of the landscape painter Tobias Verhaecht, Tobias Verhaecht was a prominent painter who had been the first teacher of Peter Paul Rubens. Willem was a pupil of his father and he worked in Paris from 1615 to 1619, and then travelled to Italy for about seven years. Van Haecht became a master in Antwerps guild of St. Luke in 1626 and this collection is represented in allegorical terms in the Gallery of Cornelis van der Geest. Alexander the Great Visiting the Studio of Apelles is another painting by van Haecht. It has significant documentary evidence as it is believed it is an image of elements drawn from Rubens collection. Haecht, Willem van, II, Grove Art Online, ISBN 0-300-07038-1 Media related to Willem van Haecht at Wikimedia Commons
17.
Jacques Backereel
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Jacques Backereel, was a Flemish Baroque landscape painter. According to Houbraken, who called him Jaques Backereel, he was one of those Backereelen that he discussed in his first volume of the Schouburgh. He mentioned him in his second volume as being the first teacher of Abraham Genoels who studied with him from his eleventh to his fifteenth year, according to Houbraken, Joachim von Sandrart mentioned 7 or 8 Backereel family members that he knew personally. Today he is one of only three Backereel brothers documented, the two are Gillis Backereel and Willem Backereel. According to the RKD he was known as Jackus Backel or Backereil. He was the teacher of Abraham Genoels and Franciscus van der Steen
18.
Martin Ryckaert
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Martin Ryckaert, also Maerten or Marten Rijckaert was a Flemish painter who was known for his small, usually imaginary landscapes in an Italianate style. Martin Ryckaert was a member of the Ryckaert family of artists, Martin was the son of David Ryckaert I, the brother of David Ryckaert II. As the result of a defect or because of an accident. Martin probably first studied with his father and was later a pupil of Tobias Verhaecht, Verhaecht was also Peter Paul Rubens’s teacher for a brief period. Martin became a member of the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke in 1607 and it is believed he traveled to Italy between 1607 and 1610 although no documentary evidence of this trip has been found. It is believed that during his stay in Italy he practised plein air sketching, Martin rejoined the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke in 1611 and was registered as the painter with one arm. He spent the remainder of his career in his native city. He was active in the local Chamber of rhetoric De Violieren and he never married and collected many paintings by his contemporaries in his house in the Meyerstraat in Antwerp. He was reportedly a friend of Anthony van Dyck, who painted his portrait showing Ryckaert dressed up as a king around 1630. This portrait was in the possession of Martin Ryckaert when he died and is today in the Prado in Madrid, the portrait was engraved by Jacob Neefs and then included in van Dycks book project entitled Iconography which contained portraits of famous people of that time. Ryckaert fell ill in early 1631 and died in Antwerp on 28 October and he left his entire fortune to his sister Maria and his brother Pauwel. His work mainly depicts imaginary landscapes with forests, often with waterfalls, rocks, ruins, architecture, Martin Ryckaert’s work shows similarities with that of the Antwerp painter Joos de Momper. It is difficult to assess the development of his work. The landscapes are in an Italianate style and thus resemble those of the Rome-based Flemish landscape painter Paul Bril, the placement, style and grouping of the figures in the landscapes are indebted to Jan Brueghel the Elder. This is most obvious in such as the Landscape with the Flight into Egypt that is based on a lost original by Brueghel. The colour treatment resembles that of Joos de Momper and his composition A rocky landscape with figures by an iron foundry has long been regarded as one of the oldest paintings of a blast furnace and finery in Europe. Media related to Marten Rijckaert at Wikimedia Commons
19.
Tower of Babel
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The Tower of Babel is a Near Eastern etiological myth that is recorded in the Jewish Tanakhs first book, it is meant to explain the origin of different languages. According to the story, a united humanity of the following the Great Flood, speaking a single language and migrating eastward. The Great Ziggurat of Babylon was 91 metres in height, Alexander the Great ordered it demolished circa 331 BCE in preparation for a reconstruction that his death forestalled. A Sumerian story with similar elements is told in Enmerkar. The story of the city of Babel is recorded in Genesis 11, everyone on earth spoke the same language. As people migrated east, they settled in the land of Shinar, People there sought to make bricks and build a city and a tower with its top in the sky, to make a name for themselves, so that they not be scattered over the world. God came down to look at the city and tower, and remarked that as one people with one language, nothing that they sought would be out of their reach. God went down and confounded their speech, so that they could not understand each other, and scattered them over the face of the earth, thus the city was called Babel. As it appears in the King James version of the Bible,1. Now the whole world had one language, as people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there. 2. They said to other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly. ”They used brick instead of stone. 3 And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens, let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth. ”4 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. 5 And the Lord said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do, now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. 6 Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. ”7 So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city. 8 Therefore its name is called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth, the phrase Tower of Babel does not appear in the Bible, it is always the city and the tower or just the city. The original derivation of the name Babel is uncertain, but it may come from bab-ilum, according to the Bible, the city received the name Babel from the Hebrew word balal, meaning to jumble or to confuse. The story of the Tower of Babel explains the confusion of tongues, the storys theme of competition between God and humans appears elsewhere in Genesis, in the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The 1st-century Jewish interpretation found in Flavius Josephus explains the construction of the tower as an act of defiance against God ordered by the arrogant tyrant Nimrod. There have, however, been some challenges to this classical interpretation, with emphasis placed on the explicit motive of cultural
20.
Hieronymus Cock
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Hieronymus Cock, or Hieronymus Wellens de Cock was a Southern Netherlandish painter and etcher as well as a publisher and distributor of prints. His house published more than 1,100 prints between 1548 and his death in 1570, a vast number by earlier standards and he was born into an artistic family. His father Jan Wellens de Cock and his brother Matthys Cock were both painters and draftsmen and he was admitted to the painters guild of Saint Luke in Antwerp in 1545. He resided in Rome from 1546 to 1548, when he returned to Antwerp in 1548, he founded his own publishing house, Aux quatre vents or In de Vier Winden. He issued his first prints there in 1548, the Italian historian of architecture Vincenzo Scamozzi copied many of the engravings published by Cock in 1551 for his volume on Rome entitled Discorsi sopra Lantichita di Roma. In 1559 and 1561 he published two series of prints by an anonymous Flemish draughtsman now referred to as the Master of the Small Landscapes. The series of landscapes were drawn from nature in the vicinity of Antwerp and had an important influence on the development of Flemish, Cock collaborated with the Spanish cartographer Diego Gutiérrez on a 1562 Map of America. The publication of these contributed to the spread of the so-called Floris style throughout the Netherlands. The Dutch publisher Philip Galle worked at Cocks printing house from 1557, at his death in 1570 he left behind the most prominent print publishing establishment in Europe north of the Alps. His widow Volcxken Diericx continued the house until her death in 1601. Hieronymus Cock had been working on publication at the time of his death. The quality of the 23 prints was outstanding as they had made by some of the leading engravers of the time such as Jan Wierix, Adriaen Collaert. The book includes a poem by Lampsonius dedicated to the memory of Hieronymus Cock, the portraits and texts present an honour roll of the earlier generations of Netherlandish artists. The publisher Hendrik Hondius I published in 1610 a book with almost the same title that contained 69 engraved portraits of painters, Hondius work included in its first part reworked versions of 22 of the portraits of the 1572 publication. The portrait of Hieronymus Cock was not included by Hondius maybe because the likeness was made after death, rather than drawn ad vivum as was the case for the other portraits
21.
Jan Brueghel the Elder
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Jan Brueghel the Elder was a Flemish painter and draughtsman. He was the son of the eminent Flemish Renaissance painter Pieter Brueghel the Elder, a close friend of, and regular collaborator with, Rubens, the two artists were the leading Flemish painters in the first three decades of the 17th century. He was an important innovator who created new types of such as flower garland paintings, paradise landscapes. He further created genre paintings that were imitations, pastiches and reworkings of his fathers works and he was court painter of the Archduke and Duchess Albrecht and Isabella, the governors of the Southern Netherlands. The artist was nicknamed Velvet Brueghel, Flower Brueghel, and Paradise Brueghel, the first is believed to have been given him because of his mastery in the rendering of fabrics. The second nickname is a reference to his specialization in flower still lifes and these paintings have now been reattributed to Jan Brueghel the Elder. Jan Brueghel the Elder was born in Brussels as the son of Pieter Brueghel the Elder and his mother was the daughter of prominent Flemish Renaissance artist Pieter Coecke van Aelst and Mayken Verhulst. His father died about a year after Jans birth in 1569, Mayken Verhulst was an artist in her own right. The early Flemish biographer Karel van Mander wrote in his Schilder-boeck published in 1604 that Mayken was the first art teacher of her two grandsons and she taught them drawing and watercolor painting of miniatures. Jan and his brother may also have trained with local artists in Brussels who were active as tapestry designers, Jan and his brother Pieter were then sent to Antwerp to study oil painting. According to Karel van Mander he studied under Peter Goetkint, an important dealer with a collection of paintings in his shop. Goetkint died on 15 July 1583 not very long after Jan had started his training and it is possible that Jan continued his studies in this shop, which was taken over by Goetkints widow as no other master is recorded. It was common for Flemish painters of that time to travel to Italy to complete their studies, Jan Brueghel left for Italy, first traveling to Cologne where his sister Marie and her family lived. He later visited Frankenthal, an important cultural centre where a number of Flemish landscape artists were active and he then went to Naples after probably spending time in Venice. In Naples he produced after June 1590 a number of drawings and he worked for Don Francesco Caracciolo, a prominent nobleman and priest and founder of the Clerics Regular Minor. Jan produced small-scale decorative work for Don Francesco, Brueghel left Naples for Rome where he resided from 1592 to 1594. Paul Bril was a landscape specialist from Antwerp who had moved to Rome at the end of the 16th century, together with his brother Mathijs Bril, he created atmospheric landscapes for many Roman residences. Brueghel took inspiration from Brils lively drawings and small-scale landscapes of the mid-1590s, during his time in Rome Jan Brueghel became acquainted with Hans Rottenhammer, a German painter of small highly finished cabinet paintings on copper
22.
Joos de Momper
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Joos de Momper the Younger or Joost de Momper the Younger was one of the foremost Flemish landscape painters between Pieter Brueghel the Elder and Peter Paul Rubens. Brueghels influence is evident in many of de Mompers paintings. He was born in a family of Antwerp and was named after his grandfather who was a landscape painter. He learned to paint from his father Bartholomeus de Momper who was a painter, in 1581 he became a master in the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke at only 17 years old. It is assumed that in the 1580s he travelled to Italy to study and his works were often featured in the prestigious gallery paintings of collections from the early seventeenth century. His registered pupils were Louis de Caullery and his son Philippe de Momper and his followers were Frans de Momper and Hercules Seghers. He was mentioned by Karel van Mander in his Schilder-boeck and his likeness was engraved by Anthony van Dyck, De Momper primarily painted landscapes, the genre for which he was highly regarded during his lifetime. Only a small number of the 500 paintings attributed to de Momper are signed, the large output points to substantial workshop participation. His wide panoramas also feature groups of small figures, De Momper’s works are chiefly inspired by the steep craggy Alpine slopes and high rock masses depicted in Pieter Brueghel the Elders work. His closeness to Jan Brueghel the Elder would have played a role in his exposure to the Bruegel idiom and this is also seen in some of the motifs of De Mompers work which go back to Pieter Bruegel’s inventions, such as winter landscapes and grain harvests. One of his works representing a Storm at Sea was previously attributed to Pieter Brueghel but is now ascribed to de Momper. Another influence on De Momper was that of landscape specialist Lodewijk Toeput, De Momper emphasized stylization over naturalistic effects and used depth and atmosphere to achieve his goal of spatial construction. He is regarded as representing the end of a rather than a revitalization or an innovation of landscape painting as was happening in the Dutch Republic in the 17th century. On the other hand, the size of his works and his collaboration with other leading artists suggest costliness
23.
Gillis van Coninxloo
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Gillis van Coninxloo was a Flemish painter of landscapes who played an important role in the development of Northern landscape art at the turn of the 17th century. He spent the last 20 years of his life abroad, first in Germany and he was born in Antwerp and studied under Pieter Coecke van Aelst, Lenaert Kroes and Gillis Mostaert. He travelled in France after completing his training and he became a member of the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1570 and worked in Antwerp until 1585 when Antwerp fell to the Spanish. He left first for Middelburg and then in 1587 for Frankenthal where he was active until 1595 and he then moved to Amsterdam where he died in 1607. He had many pupils including Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Govert Govertsz van Arnhem, Willem van den Bundel, Gillis van Coninxloo III, Jonas van Merle, Hercules Seghers, Coninxloo ranks as one of the most important Flemish landscape painters of around the turn of the 17th century. He exercised an influence on Jan Brueghel the Elder, Pieter Schoubroeck, Roelandt Savery. His early landscapes were often Northern Mannerist versions of the world landscape type. This painting achieves great intensity and atmospheric quality through its fine shades of brown and green, during his stay in Frankenthal from 1588 to 1595, he influenced several better known Flemish émigré landscape painters, who are now collectively referred to as the Frankenthal School. The early 17th century art historian Karel van Mander wrote about Coninxloo in his Schilder-boeck, some of his paintings are, The Judgment of Midas Latona Landscape with Venus and Adonis Landscape with Duck Hunters Vlieghe, H. Flemish art and architecture, 1585-1700. Yale University Press Pelican history of art
24.
Frans Francken the Younger
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Frans Francken the Younger was a Flemish painter and the best-known member of the large Francken family of artists. Francken created altarpieces and painted panels, but his reputation chiefly relies on his small and delicate cabinet pictures with historical, mythological. He was a frequent collaborator of leading Antwerp painters of his time, Frans Francken the Younger was born in Antwerp as the son of Frans Francken the Elder and Elisabeth Mertens. His father was a pupil of Antwerps leading history painter Frans Floris, Frans Francken the Younger trained with his father Frans the Elder. He, together with his brother Hieronymus Francken II, may also have received training with his uncle Hieronymus Francken I in Paris. Frans Francken the Younger likely first worked in the workshop before he became an independent master in the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1605. He was deacon of the Guild in 1616, franckens talent was recognised from an early age. He became a successful artist and operated a large workshop which made many copies of his original compositions. Already in 1607 he was able to buy a house in the city centre where he established his residence, on 8 November 1607 Francken married Elisabeth Plaquet with the special permission of the bishop. This may have had something to do with the fact that their son was born before the end of 1607. The son was given the name as his father and grandfather. He would be known as Frans III and earned himself later as a painter the nickname the Rubense Francken, three further boys and five girls were born to the Francken couple. One of them, Hieronymus, would become a painter. Frans Francken the Youngers pupils included Daniel Hagens, the Monogrammist N. F. his brother Hieronymus II, Frans Francken the Younger was a versatile artist who practised in many genres and introduced new subjects into Flemish art. Many of his works are historical, allegorical and biblical cabinet paintings with the focus on figures. Frans Francken the Younger introduced many other themes that later became popular, such as the Triumphal Procession of Amphitrite and Croesus. Francken also made a series of paintings depicting witches and witchcraft, Frans Francken the Younger signed his works with de jonge Frans Francken before the death of his father in 1616. From the late 1620s he used the signature de oude Fr, Francken, to distinguish himself from his son Frans III
25.
Gillis Coignet
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Gillis Coignet, Congnet or Quiniet was a Flemish Renaissance painter, who was strongly influenced by the Italian style. He painted historical and mythological subjects of a size, but was more successful in landscapes, in candlelight subjects. He was a Lutheran, which influenced his moves from Antwerp to Amsterdam. He spent most of the 1560s in Italy, Gillis was born in Antwerp, the son of Gillis sr. A scientific instrument maker, and Brigitta Anthonis and he had the misfortune to be born with a large hairy mole in his face, hence his nickname Gillis met de Vlek. According to the Guildbooks of the Guild of St. Luke, Van Manders claim that he stayed with the art dealer Anthony Palerme for some time is correct. The latter testified in 1586 that Gillis had been boarding with him when his parents were still alive, in 1561 Gillis was admitted to the Guild of St. Luke as a Master. In the second half of the 1560s he journeyed through Italy, according to the Florentine Accademio del Disegno, Giulio Cognietta fiamingo P was present at their meeting of 16 January 1568. In Terni he worked with a painter called Stello on frescoes, according to Van Mander, Stello was Flemish, Nicole Dacos identifies this Stello as a member of the family of painters Stellaert from Mechelen. Apparently Gillis also worked for Francesco de Medici, after 1570 he returned to Antwerp where he employed a number of apprentices. In July 1571 the painter Willem vanden Bosch wrote to the Duke of Alba that Gillis would like to enter the service of the Duke, Gillis was married to Magdalena de Kempeneer, but it is uncertain whether he married her before or after his Italian journey. They had only one child Juliana, at the end of the 1570s they lived in the house De hove van de Jonge Voetboog, which belonged to the Guild of St-Joris. In March 1580 he and his wife bought the lifelong usufruct of the house for 750 guilders on the condition that the Guild members could use the green at any time. The house stood in the Schuttershofstraat and had a rent value of 40 guilders, at that time Gillis was considered to be a Martinist. In 1581 Gillis became a member of the Armenbus of the Guild of St. Luke, after joining the Armenbus there was a waiting period before the benefits could be enjoyed. The Armenbus was chaired by two busmeesters, in the first year one was medebusmeester and in the year became hoofdbusmeester. In 1582, one year after joining the Armenbus Gillis became mede-busmeester, in the year he became hoofdbusmeester with Philip Galle. In 1584 Gillis became Dean of the Guild of St. Luke and it therefore can be no surprise that doubts about his religion and his behaviour were raised after the Reconciliation
26.
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
27.
Biografisch Portaal
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The Biografisch Portaal is an initiative based at the Huygens Institute for Dutch History in The Hague, with the aim of making biographical texts of the Netherlands more accessible. As of 2011, only information about deceased people is included. The system used is based on the standards of the Text Encoding Initiative, access to the Biografisch Portaal is available free through a web-based interface. The project is an undertaking by ten scientific and cultural bodies in the Netherlands with the Huygens Institute as main contact. In February 2012, a new project was started called BiographyNed to build a tool for use with the Biografisch Portaal that will link biographies to events in time. The main goal of the project is to formulate ‘the boundaries of the Netherlands’. List of Dutch people Official website
28.
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
29.
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
Media related to Tobias Verhaecht at Wikimedia Commons