Dutch Post-Impressionist Painter, 1853-1890 Vincent Willem van Gogh (30 March 1853 ?C 29 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist artist. Some of his paintings are now among the world's best known, most popular and expensive works of art. Van Gogh spent his early adult life working for a firm of art dealers. After a brief spell as a teacher, he became a missionary worker in a very poor mining region. He did not embark upon a career as an artist until 1880. Initially, Van Gogh worked only with sombre colours, until he encountered Impressionism and Neo-Impressionism in Paris. He incorporated their brighter colours and style of painting into a uniquely recognizable style, which was fully developed during the time he spent at Arles, France. He produced more than 2,000 works, including around 900 paintings and 1,100 drawings and sketches, during the last ten years of his life. Most of his best-known works were produced in the final two years of his life, during which time he cut off part of his left ear following a breakdown in his friendship with Paul Gauguin. After this he suffered recurrent bouts of mental illness, which led to his suicide. The central figure in Van Gogh's life was his brother Theo, who continually and selflessly provided financial support. Their lifelong friendship is documented in numerous letters they exchanged from August 1872 onwards. Van Gogh is a pioneer of what came to be known as Expressionism. He had an enormous influence on 20th century art, especially on the Fauves and German Expressionists.  Related Paintings of Vincent Van Gogh :. | Vase with Zinnias and Other Flowers (nn04) | Street in Saintes-Maries (nn04) | Farmhouses in a Wheat Field near Arles | Le Moulin de la Galette (nn04) | Orchard in Blossom (nn04) |
Related Artists:
Karl Heffner
painted Am Ufer in 1849 - 1925
Nicholas Chevalier
Russia landscape artists and cartoonist . 1828-1902 was an Australian artist. Chevalier was born in St Petersburg, Russia, the son of Louis Chevalier, who came from Vaud, Switzerland, and was overseer to the estates of the Prince de Wittgenstein in Russia. Nicholas' mother was Russian. Nicholas left Russia with his father in 1845, and studied painting and architecture in Lausanne, Switzerland and at Munich. In 1851 Chevalier moved to London and worked as an illustrator in lithography and water-colour. He also designed a fountain which was erected in the royal grounds at Osborne, and two of his paintings were hung at the Academy in 1852. Further study in painting followed at Rome. About the end of 1854 Chevalier sailed from London to Australia to join his father and brother, and in August 1855 obtained work as a cartoonist on the newly established Melbourne Punch. Later he did illustrative work for the Illustrated Australian News and also worked in chromo-lithography. In 1864, when the National Gallery of Victoria was founded, an exhibition of pictures by Victorian artists was held, the government underook to buy the best picture exhibited for £200. Chevalier's oil painting "The Buffalo Ranges" was selected, and was the first picture painted in Australia to be included in the Melbourne collection. In 1867 Chevalier visited New Zealand, travelling widely and doing much work there which was exhibited at Melbourne on his return. In 1869 he joined the H.M.S. Galatea as an artist with the Duke of Edinburgh, on the voyage to the East and back to London with stops in Tahiti, Hawaii, Japan, China, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and India. The pictures painted during the voyage were exhibited at South Kensington. In January 1874 Chevalier was commissioned by Queen Victoria to travel to St Petersburg and paint a picture of the marriage of the Duke of Edinburgh. Chevalier made London his headquarters and was a constant exhibitor at the Academy from 1871 to 1887.
Carl Rahl
Carl Rahl, sometimes spelled Karl Rahl (13 August 1812 - 9 July 1865), was an Austrian painter. Rahl was born in Vienna to Carl Heinrich Rahl (1779 - 1843), an engraver. He attended the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna and won a prize at the age of 19. From there he traveled to Munich, Stuttgart, Hungary, and in 1836 to Italy. He remained in Italy from 1836 to 1843, where he in particular studied representatives of the Venetian and Roman schools of art, and painted die Auffindung von Manfreds Leiche (1836). Rahl's style, especially his views on color and perspective, were largely formed during his years in Rome. He returned after 1843 to Vienna for two years, and then led an itinerant life for the next five years, traveling through Holstein, Paris, Rome, Copenhagen, and Munich, making a living as a portrait painter. In this period he painted Manfreds Einzug in Luceria (1846), and die Christenverfolgung in den Katakomben. In 1850, he was appointed professor at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, but for political reasons he was soon dismissed from the position. He then opened a private art school, which expanded quickly into a studio that produced monumental-scale paintings and enjoyed considerable success. He was commissioned by Greek philanthropist Simon Sinas to paint a number of works for the facade and vestibule of Vienna's Fleischmarkt Greek Church (Ludwig Thiersch being commissioned for the remainder of the frescoes), which was then being rebuilt by architect Theophil Freiherr von Hansen. In addition, Sinas commissioned four paintings depicting heroes of the Greek War of Independence, and a further four paintings to decorate his residence. Rahl decorated the Heinrichshof in 1861 with personifications of Art, Friendship, and Culture, and the Palais Todesco with representations from the mythology of Paris. In 1864, he painted a number of allegorical figures in the stairway of the Waffenmuseum (now part of the Kunsthistorisches Museum). In this period he also painted several frescoes: Mädchen aus der Fremde (in a villa of Gmunden), a composition for a ballroom of a palace in Oldenburg, and a cycle from the tale of the Argonauts. Also, he painted the tympanum of the Athens Academy building, designed by Theophil von Hansen in 1859 and executed by Ernst Ziller (completed in 1885), and paintings in the portico of the Athens university, designed by Christian Hansen (Theophil Hansen's son). The central painting show Bavarian king Otto I surrounded by the Muses; the left hand fresco shows Prometheus bringing fire down from Mount Olympus.