Albert Anker
1831-1910
Swiss Albert Anker Galleries
During his studies, Anker produced a series of works with historical and biblical themes, including paintings of Luther and Calvin. Soon after returning to Ins, though, he turned to what would become his signature theme: the everyday life of people in rural communities. His paintings depict his fellow citizens in an unpretentious and plain manner, without idealising country life, but also without the critical examination of social conditions that can be found in the works of contemporaries such as Daumier, Courbet or Millet. Although Anker did paint occasional scenes with a social significance, such as visits by usurers or charlatans to the village, his affirmative and idealistic Christian world-view did not include an inclination to issue any sort of overt challenge.
Also prominent in Anker's work are the more than 30 still lifes he created. They depict both rural and urban table settings in the tradition of Chardin, their realist solidity reflecting Anker's vision of a harmonic and stable world order. In addition, Anker created hundreds of commissioned watercolours and drawings, mostly portraits and illustrations, including for an edition of Jeremias Gotthelf's collected works. To provide for a steady income, Anker also decorated more than 500 faience plates for the Alsatian producer Theodore Deck.
Anker was quick to reach his artistic objectives and never strayed from his chosen path. His works, though, exude a sense of conciliation and understanding as well as a calm trust in Swiss democracy; they are executed with great skill, providing brilliance to everyday scenes through subtle choices in colouring and lighting. Their parochial motives belie the open-mindedness towards contemporary European art and events that Anker's correspondence reflects. Related Paintings of Albert Anker :. | Auf dem Ofen | The Little Knitters | Auf dem Ofen | The Artist's Daughter Louise | Schoolboy | Related Artists: Alois Auer von WelsbachWels1813-1869 Vienna HEYDEN, Jan van derDutch Baroque Era Painter, 1637-1712
Dutch painter, draughtsman, printmaker and inventor. In 1650 he moved to Amsterdam with his family; his father, a Mennonite, who had pursued various occupations rather unsuccessfully, died that year. Jan's artistic training may have begun with drawing lessons in the studio of a relative, perhaps his eldest brother, Goris van der Heyden, who made and sold mirrors; Jan may also have studied the reverse technique of glass painting with an artist in Gorinchem. Painting occupied relatively little of his time, however, although he continued to pursue it throughout his long life. His prosperity was mainly due to his work as an inventor, engineer and municipal official. He designed and implemented a comprehensive street-lighting scheme for Amsterdam, which lasted from 1669 until 1840 and was adopted as a model by many other towns in the Netherlands and abroad. In 1672, Vittore CarpaccioItalian
1455-1526
Vittore Carpaccio Locations
His name is associated with the cycles of lively and festive narrative paintings that he executed for several of the Venetian scuole, or devotional confraternities. He also seems to have enjoyed a considerable reputation as a portrait painter. While evidently owing much in both these fields to his older contemporaries, Gentile and Giovanni Bellini, Carpaccio quickly evolved a readily recognizable style of his own which is marked by a taste for decorative splendour and picturesque anecdote. His altarpieces and smaller devotional works are generally less successful, particularly after about 1510, when he seems to have suffered a crisis of confidence in the face of the radical innovations of younger artists such as Giorgione and Titian.
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