1712-1787 English By 1728 he had left Preston, and the following year he was working in London for the Flemish topographical and sporting painter Peter Tillemans. There he specialized in landscape painting and copying various works in Tillemans studio after Marco Ricci, Giovanni Paolo Panini and Jan van Bloemen. Devis earliest known commission, Hoghton Towers from Duxon Hill, Lancashire (1735; priv. col., see 1983 exh. cat., no. 3), painted for Sir Henry Hoghton during a trip to Preston in 1734-5, shows Tillemans influence in its attention to detail and the use of thin, transparent paint. Thomas Lister with his Family (c. 1738; Chicago, IL, A. Inst.) demonstrates a similar interest in landscape, featuring the family group in Gisburn Park, Lancs. Devis had returned to London by 1742 and established himself as a painter of conversation pieces, with a studio in Great Queen Street. Roger Hesketh with his Family is typical of his work at this time; it shows how Devis transformed the intimacy of a Dutch 17th-century genre scene into an elegant interior with the group of sitters connected by formal, schematic gestures. Roger Hesketh stands apart, in a tastefully contrived pose, his legs crossed and right arm thrust inside his waistcoat. His son, Fleetwood, stands with his hand resting on a dog next to his wife, who is seated with an infant on her lap. The adjacent telescope, globe and marine paintings are intended to advertise Hesketh interest in astronomy and travel.  Related Paintings of Arthur Devis :. | Mrs Edward Travers in a landscape garden | Sir Nathaniel and Lady Caroline Curzon | Probably Dorothy Savile,Countess of Burlington,seated in the Orange tree garden at Chiswick | The Clavey family in their garden at Hampstead | The Young Poet |
Related Artists:
Jose Joaquim da Rocha
painted Coronation of Our Lady in 1790
Jan van Gool
Johan, or Jan van Gool (1685 - 1763) was a Dutch painter and writer from The Hague, now remembered mainly as a biographer of artists from the Dutch Golden Age. According to the RKD he learned to paint from Simon van der Does and Mattheus Terwesten. He became a member of the Confrerie Pictura in 1711. He was first regent, and then five years later became director, of the Hague Drawing School from 1720-1734. He spent most of his time in the Hague, but travelled to England twice and is recorded there in 1711. He specialized in Italianate landscapes. He is best known today for his book of artist biographies, otherwise known as the "Nieuw Schouburg". The full title is De Nieuwe Schouburg der Nederlantsche kunstschilders en schilderessen: Waer in de Levens- en Kunstbedryven der tans levende en reets overleedene Schilders, die van Houbraken, noch eenig ander schryver, zyn aengeteekend, verhaelt worden. (The Hague, 1750).
J.P. Lemke