Follower of Michelangelo Merisi called Caravaggio
DAEDALUS AND ICARUS
oil on canvas
29 7/8 by 39 5/8 in.; 75.5 by 100.5 cm.
Private collection
This is a depiction of the craftsman and father adhering ink black shining feathered wings the back of his adolescent son; wings that would ultimately result in the boy's demise.
The theme, as told by Ovid in his Metamorphoses (VIII:183–235), was a rare one in Caravaggesque painting the seventeenth century.
Icarus. In
Greek mythology, Icarus is the son of the master craftsman Daedalus, the
creator of the Labyrinth. Often depicted in art, Icarus and his father attempt
to escape from Crete by means of wings that his father constructed from
feathers and wax. Icarus' father warns him first of complacency and then of
hubris, asking that he fly neither too low nor too high, so the sea's dampness
would not clog his wings or the sun's heat melt them. Icarus ignored his
father's instructions not to fly too close to the sun; when the wax in his
wings melted he tumbled out of the sky and fell into the sea where he
drowned. More
on Icarus
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio
(29 September 1571 in Caravaggio – 18 July 1610) was an Italian
painter active in Rome, Naples, Malta, and Sicily between 1592 and 1610. His
paintings, which combine a realistic observation of the human state, both
physical and emotional, with a dramatic use of lighting, had a formative
influence on Baroque painting.
Caravaggio trained as a painter in Milan under Simone Peterzano
who had himself trained under Titian. In his twenties Caravaggio moved to Rome
where there was a demand for paintings to fill the many huge new churches and
palazzos being built at the time. It was also a period when the Church was
searching for a stylistic alternative to Mannerism in religious. Caravaggio's
innovation was a radical naturalism that combined close physical observation
with a dramatic use of chiaroscuro which came to be known as tenebrism (the
shift from light to dark with little intermediate value).
He gained attention in the art scene of Rome in 1600 with the
success of his first public commissions, the Martyrdom of Saint Matthew and
Calling of Saint Matthew. Thereafter he never lacked commissions or patrons,
yet he handled his success poorly. He was jailed on several occasions,
vandalized his own apartment, and ultimately had a death sentence pronounced
against him by the Pope after killing a young man, possibly unintentionally, on
May 29, 1606. He fled from Rome with a price on his head. He was involved in a
brawl in Malta in 1608, and another in Naples in 1609. This encounter left him
severely injured. A year later, at the age of 38, he died under mysterious
circumstances in Porto Ercole in Tuscany, reportedly from a fever while on his
way to Rome to receive a pardon.
Famous while he lived, Caravaggio was forgotten almost
immediately after his death, and it was only in the 20th century that his
importance to the development of Western art was rediscovered. More on Caravaggio
Gustave Moreau, 1826 - 1898, FRENCH
HÉLÈNE
Gouache and watercolor on paper
52 by 25cm., 20½ by 9¾in.
Private collection
Helen was the daughter of Zeus and Leda, and considered in Greek myth to be the most beautiful woman in the world. She was married to Menelaus, King of Sparta. When the Trojan prince Paris abducted Helen and carried her off to the city of Troy, the Greeks responded by mounting an attack on the city, thus beginning the Trojan War. Agamemnon, king of Mycenae and the brother of Menelaus, led an expedition of Greek troops to Troy and besieged the city for ten years because of Paris's insult. After the deaths of many heroes, including the Greeks Achilles and Ajax, and the Trojans Hector and Paris, the city fell to the ruse of the Trojan Horse. The Greeks slaughtered the Trojans and desecrated the temples More on Helen
Gustave Moreau, 1826 - 1898, FRENCH
HÉLÈNE
Detail at bottom
Gustave Moreau (6 April 1826 – 18
April 1898) was a French Symbolist painter whose main emphasis was
the illustration of biblical and mythological figures. Moreau was born in
Paris. His father, Louis Jean Marie Moreau, was an architect, who recognized
his talent. His first painting was a Pietà which is now located in the
cathedral at Angoulême. He showed A Scene from the Song of Songs and The Death
of Darius in the Salon of 1853. In 1853 he contributed Athenians with the
Minotaur and Moses Putting Off his Sandals within Sight of the Promised Land to
the Great Exhibition.
Moreau
became a professor at Paris' École des Beaux-Arts in 1891 and among his many
students were fauvist painters Henri Matisse and Georges Rouault. Jules
Flandrin, Theodor Pallady and Léon Printemps also studied with Moreau.
During his lifetime, Moreau produced more than 8,000
paintings, watercolors and drawings, many of which are on display in Paris'
Musée national Gustave Moreau at 14 rue de la Rochefoucauld (9th
arrondissement). The museum is in his former workshop, and began operation in
1903. André Breton famously used to "haunt" the museum and regarded
Moreau as a precursor of Surrealism. More on Gustave Moreau
Agnolo di Cosimo, 1503 - 1572
Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time (Allegory of the Triumph of Venus), c. 1540s
Oil on panel
57 1/2 × 45 7/10 in, 146 × 116 cm
National Gallery, London
The howling figure on the left has been variously interpreted as Jealousy, Despair and the effects of syphilis; the boy scattering roses and stepping on a thorn as Jest, Folly and Pleasure; the hybrid creature with the face of a girl, as Pleasure and Fraud; and the figure in the top left corner as Fraud and Oblivion. The erotic yet erudite subject matter of the painting was well suited to the tastes of King Francis I of France. It was probably sent to him as a gift from Cosimo I de' Medici, ruler of Florence, by whom Bronzino was employed as court painter. Bronzino was also an accomplished poet. The picture reflects his interest in conventional Petrarchan love lyrics as well as more bawdy poetic genres. National Gallery, London
He lived all his life in Florence, and from his late 30s was kept busy as the court painter of Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany. He was mainly a portraitist but also painted many religious subjects, and a few allegorical subjects, which include what is probably his best known work, Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time, c. 1544–45, now in London (Above). Many portraits of the Medicis exist in several versions with varying degrees of participation by Bronzino himself, as Cosimo was a pioneer of the copied portrait sent as a diplomatic gift.
He trained with Pontormo, the leading Florentine painter of the first generation of Mannerism, and his style was greatly influenced by him, but his elegant and somewhat elongated figures always appear calm and somewhat reserved, lacking the agitation and emotion of those by his teacher. They have often been found cold and artificial, and his reputation suffered from the general critical disfavour attached to Mannerism in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Recent decades have been more appreciative of his art. More on Agnolo di Cosimo
Louise d’Aussy-Pintaud, 1900-1990
"CHANSON D'AMOUR", c. 1944
OIL ON CANVAS
38 X 51.5 INCHES
38 X 51.5 INCHES
Private collection
D’Aussy-Pintaud began painting under the influence of her grandfather, an avid - albeit amateur - painter. She becam a student of sculptor M. A. Seysse, also in Bordeaux. Later, she would study under painter and mentor Biloul while attending the Gustave Moreau School in Paris.
Her earlier work is her best known, for her ability to observe the naked form in a refined and what has been described as an even chaste manner. D’Aussy-Pintaud’s painting of figures is classic and purist, while the very expressive backgrounds and landscapes are handled with expressionistic vigor.
Her work was exhibited in the Salon des Artistes Français between 1934 and 1942. In 1944, D’Aussy-Pintaud would ultimatlely settle with her husband in the city of Ciboure (Lapurdi) until the time of her death in 1990. More on Louise d’Aussy-Pintaud
Hans Rottenhammer the Elder, MUNICH 1564 - 1625 AUGSBURG
FEAST OF THE GODS
Oil on canvas
57 1/2 by 81 3/8 in.; 146.1 by 206.7.
Private collection
Johann Rottenhammer, or Hans Rottenhammer (1564 – 14 August 1625), was a German painter. He specialized in highly finished paintings on a small scale.
He was born in Munich, where he studied until 1588 under Hans Donauer the Elder. In 1593-4 he was in Rome, and he then settled in Venice from 1595-6 to 1606, before returning to Germany and settling in Augsburg, working also in Munich. He died in Augsburg, apparently in some poverty, and according to some sources an alcoholic. More on Johann Rottenhammer
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