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   Related Paintings of Sir Godfrey Kneller :. | Portrait of Samuel Pepys | Self Portrait | Sir Isaac Newton | Portrait of George I of Great Britain | Margaret Cecil Countess of Ranelagh (mk25 |
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Giacinto Gigante
(1806-1876) was an Italian painter. Gigante was introduced to painting by his father Gaetano Gigante. His brothers Achille Gigante and Ercole Gigante also became landscape artists. He trained in the style of Hackert and was influenced by the technical drawing carried out at the Naples Royal Institute of Fine Arts. Along with Achille Vianellihe was to be strongly influenced by a large colony of foreign painters then present in Naples including Huber and Pitloo. From Wolfgang Huber Gigante learnt watercolour technique and the use of the panoramic ?-amera lucidae method. Via Huber he met the Dutch artist Anton Sminck van Pitloo, who became his teacher for a few years. In 1823 Gigante won the Naples Royal Institute of Fine Arts drawing competition. In 1826 he displayed four works at the first Esposizione di Belle Arti. Reportedly though Gigante did not fit in well with the life of the Naples Royal Institute of Fine Arts and left. Around 1826 he was living in Naples in Vicoletto del Vasto 15, with Van Pitloo, Carl Götzloff and Teodoro Duclere. He is considered the foremost exponent of the 19th-century Neapolitan "Posillipo School" of painting.
George Romney
1734-1802 George Romney Galleries By 1757 he was becoming well-known as a portraitist. He fell ill during his apprenticeship and was nursed back to health by Mary Abbott, daughter of his landlady. In 1762, by which time he was married with two children, he went to London, and saw early success with a painting, The Death of General Wolfe which won a prize from the Royal Society of Arts. Romney soon had a thriving portrait business in Long Acre. Despite his great success George Romney was never invited to join the Royal Academy nor did he ever apply to join. While there has been much speculation about his relationship with the Academy there is no doubt that he normally remained aloof maintaining that a good artist should succeed without being a member. His own career certainly supported this belief and it was only towards the end of his life that he expressed the slightest regret for his views Portrait of Miss Juliana Willoughby, 1781-83 (National Gallery of Art, Washington DC) Emma Hamilton as a bacchante by George Romney, 1785In 1773 he travelled to Italy with fellow artist Ozias Humphrey to study art in Rome and Parma, returning to London in 1775 to resume business, this time in Cavendish Square (in a house formerly owned by noted portraitist Francis Cotes). In 1782 he met Emma Hamilton (then called Emma Hart) who became his muse. He painted over 60 portraits of her in various poses, sometimes playing the part of historical or mythological figures. He also painted many other contemporaries, including fellow artist Mary Moser. After an absence of almost forty years, he returned to his family in Kendal in the summer of 1799. He was greeted by his loyal, devoted and unquestioning wife. George Romney is a kinsman of Mitt Romney, U.S politician.
Paul-Camille Guigou
1834-1871 French Paul Camille Guigou Gallery French painter. Born into a family of landowners, he became a notary's clerk at Apt in 1851 and then in 1854 at Marseille. He learnt to paint with Camp, a teacher at the school in Apt, and then at Marseille with Emile Loubon (1809-63), director of the local Ecole des Beaux-Arts, who urged him (according to Guigou's biographers) to paint directly from nature. Guigou settled in Marseille in 1854, where he participated regularly in the annual Salon of the Societe Artistique des Bouches-du-Rhene. Guigou painted almost exclusively Proven?al landscapes, which were influenced by the works of the Barbizon painters, who exhibited in Marseille, and by the brownish tones and picturesque figures of Loubon's paintings. The Road to Gineste (1859) and The Washerwoman (1860; both Paris, Mus. d'Orsay) reflect the independent tradition of Proveneal painting during the Second Empire, which was characterized by warm colouring and precise lighting used to separate and distinguish forms. His knowledge of the works of Gustave Courbet, acquired during a visit to Paris in 1859, doubtless increased his liking for broad technique and sincere vision, articulated in a strong and ordered construction of space: for example, The Gorges of the Luberon (c. 1861; Amiens, Mus. Picardie).