Italian High Renaissance Painter, ca.1485-1576 Italian painter active in Venice. As a young man he was taught by the Bellini family and worked closely with Giorgione. His early works are so similar in style to Giorgione's as to be indistinguishable, but soon after Giorgione's early death Titian established himself as the leading painter of the Republic of Venice. Among his most important religious paintings is the revolutionary and monumental Assumption (1516 ?C 18) for Santa Maria dei Frari, in which the Virgin ascends to heaven in a blaze of colour accompanied by a semicircle of angels. Titian was also interested in mythological themes, and his many depictions of Venus display his work's sheer beauty and inherent eroticism. Bacchus and Ariadne (1520 ?C 23), with its pagan abandon, is one of the greatest works of Renaissance art. Titian was sought after for his psychologically penetrating portraits, which include portrayals of leading Italian aristocrats, religious figures, and Emperor Charles V. He reached the height of his powers in The Rape of Europa (c. 1559 ?C 62), one of several paintings done for Philip II of Spain. He was recognized as supremely gifted in his lifetime, and his reputation has never declined.  Related Paintings of Titian :. | Ansprache des Marques del Vasto an seine Soldaten | Pope Paul III and his Grandsons | Penitent Mary Magdalen | Equestrian Portrait of Charles V | An Allegory (mk05) |
Related Artists:
GHEYN, Jacob de II
Dutch engraver/painter (b. 1565, Antwerp, d. 1629, The Hague). was a Dutch painter and engraver, whose work shows the transition from Northern Mannerism to Dutch realism over the course of his career. De Gheyn received his first training from his father, Jacob de Gheyn I, a glass painter, engraver, and draftsman. In 1585, he moved to Haarlem, and studied under Hendrik Goltzius for the next five years. He moved again to Leiden in the middle of the 1590s. His first commission was for an engraving of the Siege of Geertruitenberg from Amsterdam city officials in 1593. Around 1600, de Gheyn abandoned engraving, and focused his work on painting and etching. Moving to The Hague in 1605, he was employed often by Dutch royalty, designing a garden in the Buitenhof for Prince Maurice of Orange which featured the two first grottoes in the Netherlands. After Prince Maurice's death in 1625, de Gheyn worked for Prince Frederick Henry, his brother. De Gheyn painted some of the earliest female nudes, vanitas, and floral still lifes in Dutch art. He is credited with creating over 1,500 drawings, including landscapes and natural history illustrations.
Sir Godfrey Kneller
1649-1723 Dutch (Resident in UK) Sir Godfrey Kneller Galleries was the leading portrait painter in England during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, and was court painter to British monarchs from Charles II to George I. His major works include The Chinese Convert (1687); a series of four portraits of Isaac Newton painted at various junctures of the latter's life; a series of ten reigning European monarchs, including King Louis XIV of France; over 40 "Kit-cat portraits" of members of the Kit-Cat Club; and ten "beauties" of the court of William III, to match a similar series of ten beauties of the court of Charles II painted by his predecessor as court painter, Sir Peter Lely. Sir John Vanbrugh in Godfrey Kneller's Kit-cat portrait, considered one of Kneller's finest portraits.Kneller was born Gottfried Kniller in L??beck, Germany. Kneller studied in Leiden, but became a pupil of Ferdinand Bol and Rembrandt in Amsterdam. He worked in Rome and Venice in the early 1670s, painting historical subjects and portraits, and later moved to Hamburg. He came to England in 1674, at the invitation of the Duke of Monmouth, accompanied by his brother, John Zacharias Kneller, who was an ornamental painter. He was introduced to, and painted a portrait of, Charles II. In England, Kneller concentrated almost entirely on portraiture. He founded a studio which churned out portraits on an almost industrial scale, relying on a brief sketch of the face with details added to a formulaic model, aided by the fashion for gentlemen to wear full wigs. His portraits set a pattern that was followed until William Hogarth and Joshua Reynolds. Nevertheless, he established himself as a leading portrait artist in England. When Sir Peter Lely died in 1680, Kneller was appointed Principal Painter to the Crown by Charles II. In the 1690s, Kneller painted the Hampton Court Beauties depicting the most glamorous ladies-in-waiting of the Royal Court for which he received his knighthood from William III. He produced a series of "Kit-cat" portraits of 48 leading politicians and men of letters, members of the Kit-Cat Club. Created a baronet by King George I, he was also head of the Kneller Academy of Painting and Drawing 1711-1716 in Great Queen Street, London. His paintings were praised by Whig luminaries such as John Dryden, Joseph Addison, Richard Steele, and Alexander Pope. Kneller died of fever in 1723 and his remains were interred in Twickenham Church (he was a churchwarden there when the 14th century nave collapsed in 1713 and was involved in the plans for its reconstruction). The site of the house he built in 1709 in Whitton near Twickenham is now occupied by the mid-19th century Kneller Hall, home of the Royal Military School of Music
Mattheus Ignatius van Bree
was a Belgian painter, sculptor and architect. He was born at Antwerp in 1773, was instructed by Regemorter; he afterwards went to Paris, and after having obtained by a 'Cato in Utica' the second prize for Rome, he went to that city in 1797e returning to his native country in 1804.[1] He painted numerous historical pictures, some of which are of large dimensions, and obtained a high reputation in Flanders. His conceptions are frequently poetical, and his compositions graceful, delineated with a light, free, and spirited pencil ; but his colouring is rather too florid in some instances. He was first professor at the Academy of Fine Arts at Antwerp, and in 1827 its director. Member of several other scientific institutions like the academies of Amsterdam, Rome, Munich and New York. Among his most important works are 'The Patriotism of the Burgomaster Van der Werft,' in the Town-Hall at Leyden, and 'The Death of Rubens,' in the Museum at Antwerp. He brought forward some of the most eminent of the later Flemish painters, among whom are Wappers, De Keyser, F. de Braekeleer, and others of whom their country is justly proud. Van Bree died at Antwerp in 1839.