1581-1644 Italian Bernardo Strozzi Galleries Strozzi was born in Genoa. He was probably not related to the other Strozzi family. In 1598, at the age of 17, he joined a Capuchin monastery, a reform branch of the Franciscan order. When his father died c1608, he left the order to care for his mother, earning their living with his paintings, which were often influenced by Franciscan teachings, for example his Adoration of the Shepherds (c. 1615) . In 1625, he was charged with illegally practicing as a painter. When his mother died c1630, Bernardo was pressured in court by the Capuchin's to re-enter the order. He was briefly imprisoned in Genoa , and upon release fled to Venice to avoid confinement in a monastery in 1631. He became nicknamed all his life as il prete Genovese (the Genoa priest). Saint Christopher, by Strozzi.Early paintings, such as The Ecstasy of St Francis show the dark emotionalism of Caravaggio. But by the second decade of the 17th century, while working in Venice, Strozzi had synthesized a personal style which fused painterly influences of the North (including Rubens and Veronese) with a monumental realistic starkness. For example, in the painting The Incredulity of Thomas, the background is muted, yet Jesus' face, haloed and his outline, misty, in a style atypical of Caravaggio. Never as dark as the Caravaggisti, Venice infused his painting with a gentler edge, a style more acceptable to the local patronage, and one derived from his precursors in Venice, Jan Lys (died 1629) and Domenico Fetti (died 1626), who had also fused the influence of Caravaggio into Venetian art. Examples of this style can be found in his Parable of the Wedding Guests (1630),Christ giving keys of Heaven to Saint Peter (1630),, Saint Lawrence distributing Alms at San Nicol?? da Tolentino[7] and a Personification of Fame (1635-6). He was also likely influenced by Velazquez (who visited Genoa in 1629-30). After a commission to paint Claudio Monteverdi his fame grew, and his portrait paintings included many of the leading Venetians. His pupils and painter strongly influenced by him included Giovanni Andrea de Ferrari (1598-1669), Giovanni Bernardo Carbone, Valerio Castello and, Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione.  Related Paintings of Bernardo Strozzi :. | St Maurice and the Angel | Portrait of Claudio Monteverdi in Venice | The Portrait of the Wedding Guest | Holy Family with St. John the Baptist | Portrait of a Knight |
Related Artists:
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American Painter, 1845-1927
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Spanish Neoclassical Painter, 1781-1859 was a Spanish painter of the Neoclassic period. Born in Santander. Studied in Madrid with Cosme de Acuna and Gregorio Ferro, both rectors of the Academia de San Fernando at the beginning of the 19th century. Don Fernando La Serna, who was named ambassador to France at the time, brought Madrazo to Paris, where he entered the studio of Jacques-Louis David. There, under royal patronage from King Carlos IV, he executed a painting of the Death of Lucretia and other canvases on events from classic Greco-Roman history. He moved to Rome during Napoleonic times, where he was briefly jailed for failing to complete oaths of loyalty to the newly installed Napoleon II of France as King of Rome. In Rome, he was admitted to the Accademia di San Luca. King Carlos IV named him pintor de camara (painter of the chamber), a position confirmed by King Ferdinand VII.
GRAFF, Anton
Swiss-born German Painter, 1736-1813 Swiss painter, active in Germany. He was a pupil of Johann Ulrich Schellenburg (1709-95) in Winterthur and continued his training with Johann Jakob Haid in Augsburg between 1756 and 1765. He worked for the court painter Leonhard Schneider (1716-62) in Ansbach from 1757 to 1759, producing large numbers of copies of a portrait of Frederick the Great (probably by Antoine Pesne). This was an important step in furthering his career, as were the months he spent in Regensburg (1764-5) painting miniatures of clerics and town councillors. He was court painter to the Elector Frederick-Christian of Saxe-Weimar in Dresden from 1766 and taught at the Hochschule der Bildende Kenste there. In 1771 he travelled to Berlin, where he painted portraits of Jakob Mendelssohn, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing and J. G. Sulzer. Sulzer introduced him at court, which resulted in many commissions. He was invited several times to teach at the Akademie der Kenste in Berlin, but he remained in Dresden. He often travelled to Leipzig, and in summer he frequently went to Teplitz