(18 February 1815 - 26 August 1869), also known as Henri Leys, was a Belgian painter and printmaker. Henri Leys was born and died in Antwerp. He studied with Mathieu Ignace Van Bree (1773-1839) at the Koninklijke Academie voor Schone Kunsten in Antwerp and then with his brother-in-law Ferdinand De Braekeleer (1792-1883). At the start of his career, he worked with the Belgian Romantic painter Egide Charles Gustave Wappers (1803-1874). Both artists were interested in nationalistic subjects painted in styles that owe much to the example of 16th- and 17th-century Flemish painting. In 1835 Leys went to Paris where he visited the studio of Eugene Delacroix and met Paul Delaroche. During the 1840s, Leys began painting scenes set in 16th-century Antwerp, combining details studied from life with a deliberately archaizing style reminiscent of 16th-century German painters like Albrecht Derer and Quinten Matsys. Some of the pictures have specific historical subjects, but others are genre scenes. With these pictures, he earned a following among many younger artists in Belgium as well as a considerable reputation in France, where he won a gold medal at the International Exhibition in Paris in 1855 for his historical painting The Mass of Berthal de Haze (Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Brussels). In 1862 Leys was created a baron by King Leopold I. At the time of his death, he was engaged in decorating the interior of the Antwerp Town Hall with monumental frescoes depicting the city's history (1863-9). There are easel replicas of these in Brussels. Among the artists who studied with him are James Tissot and Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema. His best-known pupil is his nephew Henri De Braekeleer (1840-1888).   Related Paintings of Henri Leys :. | Witches- Sabbath | fars portratt | Carrying the Cross | Michael Dahl, selfportrait | Portrait of Jose Monino, 1st Count of Floridablanca |
Related Artists:
Luis Egidio Melendez
(Naples, 1716-Madrid, 1780) was a Spanish painter. Although he received little acclaim during his lifetime and died in poverty, Melendez is recognized today as the greatest Spanish still-life painter of the 18th century. His mastery of composition and light, and his remarkable ability to convey the volume and texture of individual objects enabled him to transform the most mundane of kitchen fare into powerful images. Luis Egidio Melendez de Rivera Durazo y Santo Padre was born in Naples in 1716. His father, Francisco Melendez de Rivera Diaz (1682- after 1758), was a miniaturist painter from Oviedo who had moved to Madrid with his older brother, the portrait painter Miguel Jacinto Melendez (1679-1734) in pursuit of artistic instruction. Whereas Miguel remained in Madrid to study and became a painter in the court of Philip V, Francisco left for Italy in 1699 to seek greater artistic exposure. Francisco took a special interest in visiting the Italian academies and settled in Naples where he married Maria Josefa Durazo y Santo Padre Barrille.Luis was a year old when his father, who had been a soldier in a Spanish garrison and lived abroad for almost two decades, returned to Madrid with the family. Luis Egidio, his brother Jose Agusten, and Ana, one of his sisters, began their careers under the tutelage of their father, who was appointed the King's Painter of Miniatures in 1725.After several years, in his words: painting royal portraits in jewels and bracelets to serve as gifts for envoys and ambassadors, he entered the workshop of Louis Michel van Loo (1707-1771), a Frenchman who had been made royal painter of Philip V of Spain. Between 1737 to 1742, Melendez worked as a part of a team of artist dedicated to copying van Loo's prototypes of royal portraits for the domestic and overseas market, but at least he had a foothold in the palace. He had his artistic sights on a distinguished career as a court painter.
Lyon, Corneille de
Dutch practicing in France, approx. 1500-1575 Dutch painter, active in France. It is uncertain whether he was apprenticed in his native city of The Hague or in Antwerp, and nothing is known of him before 1533, when he was recorded in Lyon. It was possibly in the same year, while the French court was resident in Lyon, that Corneille was made painter to Queen Eleanor, the second wife of Francis I. In 1541 Corneille was painter to the Dauphin (later Henry II), and when the new king succeeded to the throne (1547) and made his state entry into Lyon in 1548, Corneille became Peintre du Roi. Corneille had obtained his naturalization papers in December 1547 and retained French nationality for the rest of his life. He married Marguerite Fradin, the daughter of a Lyon printer of some importance, and this allowed him to enter Lyon society. His studio was extremely prosperous until c. 1565, the year he is known to have visited Antwerp, but disappeared completely after his death despite the fact that he founded a dynasty of painters. His sons Corneille de La Haye II (b 1543) and Jacques de La Haye and his daughter Cl?mence de La Haye were all painters, and the family continued to be known for its artists until the 18th century. Corneille de Lyon was a Protestant, like all those in the circles in which he moved, and it may be that the decline of his fortunes in the 1560s was precipitated by the reversion of Lyon to the Catholic faction
Dirck Barendsz
(1534?C1592) was a Dutch Renaissance painter from Amsterdam who traveled to Italy in his youth to learn from the Italian masters, most notably Titian.