British 1829-1896 Sir John Everett Millais Galleries After his marriage, Millais began to paint in a broader style, which was condemned by Ruskin as "a catastrophe". It has been argued that this change of style resulted from Millais' need to increase his output to support his growing family. Unsympathetic critics such as William Morris accused him of "selling out" to achieve popularity and wealth. His admirers, in contrast, pointed to the artist's connections with Whistler and Albert Moore, and influence on John Singer Sargent. Millais himself argued that as he grew more confident as an artist, he could paint with greater boldness. In his article "Thoughts on our art of Today" (1888) he recommended Vel??zquez and Rembrandt as models for artists to follow. The Two Princes Edward and Richard in the Tower (1878) The Boyhood of Raleigh (1871)Paintings such as The Eve of St. Agnes and The Somnambulist clearly show an ongoing dialogue between the artist and Whistler, whose work Millais strongly supported. Other paintings of the late 1850s and 1860s can be interpreted as anticipating aspects of the Aesthetic Movement. Many deploy broad blocks of harmoniously arranged colour and are symbolic rather than narratival. Later works, from the 1870s onwards demonstrate Millais' reverence for old masters such as Joshua Reynolds and Vel??zquez. Many of these paintings were of an historical theme and were further examples of Millais' talent. Notable among these are The Two Princes Edward and Richard in the Tower (1878) depicting the Princes in the Tower, The Northwest Passage (1874) and the Boyhood of Raleigh (1871). Such paintings indicate Millais' interest in subjects connected to Britain's history and expanding empire. His last project was to be a painting depicting a white hunter lying dead in the African veldt, his body contemplated by two indifferent Africans. This fascination with wild and bleak locations is also evident in his many landscape paintings of this period, which usually depict difficult or dangerous terrain. The first of these, Chill October (1870) was painted in Perth, near his wife's family home. Many others were painted elsewhere in Perthshire, near Dunkeld and Birnam, where Millais rented grand houses each autumn in order to hunt and fish. Millais also achieved great popularity with his paintings of children, notably Bubbles (1886) ?C famous, or perhaps notorious, for being used in the advertising of Pears soap ?C and Cherry Ripe.   Related Paintings of Sir John Everett Millais :. | Blow Thou Winter Wind | Mrs James Wyatt Jnr and her Daughter | Vanessa | Dimensions and material of painting | The North-West Passage |
Related Artists:
Willem Pieterszoon Buytewech
(1591/1592, Rotterdam - September 23, 1624, Rotterdam) was a Dutch painter, draughtsman and etcher of the Golden Age. He is often considered the "inventor" of Dutch genre painting. For his preference of irony, his contemporaries named him Gheestige Willem (Jolly or spiritual William). Buytewech was the son of Pieter Jacobsz, a cobbler and candlemaker. He learned his trade in Haarlem, where he became a member of the artists' guild (Haarlem Guild of St. Luke) in 1612, together with Hercules Segers and Esaias van de Velde.[1] Frans Hals, who was a member of this guild since 1610, had much influence on Buytenwech's work, as shown by the many drawings that the latter made after Hals's paintings. After his marriage on November 10, 1613 with Aeltje van Amerongen, of a patrician family, he returned to Rotterdam. There Hendrik Martenszoon Sorgh was one of his pupils. Buytewech was primarily a graphic artist, mostly of landscapes and genre pieces, but occasionally also of biblical and allegorical themes. Of his paintings only eight have survived to this date, all genre pieces, most depicting merry companies. Willem Buytewech's Merry CompanyHe died at the age of only 32 or 33 of unrecorded causes. His son Willem Willemsz Buytewech (1625-1670), born after his death, would become a painter as well.
Peter Monamy
was an English marine painter who lived between 1681 and 1749. Peter Monamy was baptised at the church of St Botolph's-without-Aldgate, London, England, on 12 January 1681 (new style). He was the last known surviving child of Peter, or Pierre, Monamy, born 1650 in Guernsey, and his English wife, Dorothy Gilbert; and the grandson of Andre Monamy, 1612-1680, who had been a strongly committed Commonwealth Parliamentarian in Guernsey during the 1650s. Dorothy Gilbert was the daughter of James Gilbert, who was Master of the Worshipful Company of Gunmakers in 1670 and 1672. The Monamy family had been prominent merchants and residents of Guernsey since at least the 1560s, and in the Channel Islands since the 1530s. The painter's father, Pierre, had a brother named Andre, or Andrew, who was active in London as a merchant trader in salt and wool, during the late 17th and early 18th centuries. In December, 1696, Andrew Monamy, together with his cousin, Daniel Le Febvre, is described as "guardian" of the children of Peter (i.e. Pierre) Monamy, deceased. The elder Peter Monamy appears to have died in about 1685. On 3 September 1696, Peter Monamy, aged 15, was bound as an apprentice for seven years by indenture to William Clark, a former (1687) Master of the Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers, one of London's ancient guilds of craftsmen. Clark is recorded in several capacities in the London of the late 17th century, as a constable and juryman, with premises in Thames Street, and on London Bridge, and practised as what would today be called an interior decorator, with a thriving business. House decoration comprised a wide range of activities, including the provision of paintings as overdoors, and on panelling, house murals on canvas as well as decorative sign-boards for trade establishments. William Clark died before January, 1704, when his will was proved.
Christian Berentz
German, 1658-1722