English Romantic Painter, 1775-1802
English painter, draughtsman and printmaker. With his rival, J. M. W. Turner, he extended the technical possibilities of watercolour and in doing so demonstrated that watercolours could have the visual impact and emotional range of oils. Although close in style throughout the 1790s, by 1800 Turner and Girtin were beginning to diverge: whereas the former dissolved forms to express his idea of Nature in a state of flux, the latter sought out a landscape's underlying patterns to convey his awe of Nature's permanence as well as its grandeur. Girtin's reduction of landscape to simple and monumental forms Related Paintings of Thomas Girtin :. | Bamburgh Castle, | Die Kathedrale von Durham und die Brucke, vom Flub Wear aus gesehen | Guisborough Priory, Yorkshire | Interior of Lindisfarne Priory | Kirkstall Abbey, Yorkshire | Related Artists:
PANTOJA DE LA CRUZ, JuanSpanish Painter, 1553-1608
Spanish painter. He must have moved to Madrid when he was very young, receiving his training in the workshop of Alonso S?nchez Coello, painter to Philip II. On numerous occasions he declared himself to be a follower of S?nchez Coello, in whose workshop he was an oficial, and he probably collaborated to a considerable degree on many of his master's mature works. There are very few signed works by Pantoja from before the death of S?nchez Coello, although some anonymous paintings from the workshop are probably by him. In Madrid in 1587 Pantoja married a woman of some means, and by the following year, when S?nchez Coello died, he was an independent painter, aspiring to his master's position. Documentation exists from 1590 concerning portraits by Pantoja of members of the royal family including one of Don Felipe, the future Philip III (1593; Vienna, Ksthist. Mus.). On Philip's accession to the throne in 1598 Pantoja painted another portrait of him (Vienna, Ksthist. Mus.) and became the official portrait painter for the court and for the nobility of Madrid; there is detailed documentation for his work from this time. He painted clothing and jewels with precision, in minute detail and with a dry objectivity in the Flemish tradition. His treatment of faces, however, clearly reveals his study of Venetian portraiture, and in particular that of Titian, as well as sharp psychological penetration. In his portraits of royal children he maintained, albeit with a certain rigidity, the charm that S?nchez Coello in his paintings had given these infant figures tightly swathed in official robes
Johann Georg von Dillis (born Gmain, December 26, 1759 - died Munich, September 28, 1841) was a German painter. Son of a gamekeeper and forester, he was educated in Munich with support from the prince-elector of Bavaria. Initially he was trained for the priesthood, but by 1786 his real interest, art, was beginning to be developed, and he taught drawing both at court and to private families. In 1790 he was appointed inspector of the Hofgarten Galerie, the princely collection. He continued in a curatorial role for the Bavarian court for much of the rest of his career; this allowed him some freedom to travel and expand his knowledge of European art. In 1792 he traveled to Dresden, Prague, and Vienna, and in 1794 he made his first trip to Italy, where he made watercolor studies from nature. A further trip to Italy followed in 1805, and brought him to Rome, where he met Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes, who introduced him to the idea of painting in open air. He studied the work of Simon Denis and Joseph Mallaord William Turner, and encountered Washington Allston. The next year, in Paris, he saw oil sketches by Jean-Joseph-Xavier Bidauld, and with Ludwig, the crown prince visited the Musee Napoleon; he would later advise the prince on collecting and other matters artistic, remaining in this capacity for the rest of his life. He also made several trips to Italy to purchase art for the royal collection. In 1816 he was made responsible for packing and returning to Munich from Paris art stolen from Bavaria by Napoleon. In the fall of 1817 he and Ludwig traveled to Sicily before spending four months in Rome. Dillis helped to shape the collections of the Alte Pinakothek, which opened in 1836. He died in Munich in 1841.
Frederick SmallfieldBritish Painter and Etcher , (1829-1911)