1617-1681 Dutch Gerard Ter Borch Locations Gerard Ter Borch was born in Zwolle. His first teacher was his father, Gerard Ter Borch the Elder, who in his youth had spent some years in Rome and returned with drawings he had made as well as some he had collected in Italy. The son precociously revealed his gifts as a draftsman, as shown in his drawing of a man on horseback (1625). Ter Borch traveled widely. In 1634 he was in Haarlem, in 1635 in London, in 1640 probably in Rome. A visit to Spain is reflected in reminiscences of Diego Velazquez in the style and psychological penetration of Ter Borch s portraits. His famous portrait Helena van der Schalke as a Child (ca. 1644) calls to mind Velazquez s Infantas; the placement of the figure in palpable yet undefined space, without the indication of a floor line, is a masterful adoption of the Spanish masters invention. Between 1645 and 1648 Ter Borch was in Munster, Germany, where he went to seek portrait commissions during the meetings that ended the 80 years of war between the United Provinces and Spain. His small group portrait Swearing of the Oath of Ratification of the Treaty of Munster is a rare example in Dutch 17th-century painting of the recording of an actual historical event. It includes more than 50 recognizable portraits. The painter asked for this work the enormous price of 6, 000 guilders. Apparently no buyer was found, for the picture was in the hands of his widow after his death. From 1654 on Ter Borch lived mainly in Deventer, where he married, became a citizen, held honorary office, and died on Dec. 8, 1681. Ter Borch s early paintings were mainly scenes of military life, painted with great subtlety of color and values. Later he showed a predilection for small, dainty interior scenes, in which he revealed his delight in the sheen of satin and the grace of charming women. The elegance of his figures has tended to obscure the fact that in many cases they are shown as participants in situations of amatory commerce. The figures and costumes are painted with care and high finish that is not matched in the settings and backgrounds, which are often not well realized. The Music Lesson (ca. 1675) is a characteristic late example of Ter Borchs favorite subject matter. His most able pupil, Caspar Netscher, became a successful portraitist in the small-scale and fashionable tradition of his master.  Related Paintings of Gerard Ter Borch :. | The Reading Lesson | The Ratification of the Treaty of Munster, 15 May 1648 | The Letter_a | Three Figures conversing in an Interior, known as The Paternal Admonition | The Galass of Lemonade |
Related Artists:
Stefano Ussi
Italian, 1822-1901,Italian painter. He received his formal training at the Accademia delle Belle Arti in Florence (1837-50, expelled 1838-40) under Tommaso Gazzarini (1790-1853), Pietro Benvenuti and Giuseppe Bezzuoli. In 1854 he won a scholarship to study in Rome and for several years worked on the large-scale painting that established his reputation, the Expulsion of the Duke of Athens from Florence
Alma-Tadema, Sir Lawrence
b.Jan. 8, 1836, Dronrijp, Netherlands. d.June 25, 1912, Wiesbaden, Germany. Painter and designer of Dutch birth. The son of a notary, Alma-Tadema demonstrated an early artistic ability. In 1852 he entered the Antwerp Academy, where he studied under Gustaf, Baron Wappers, and Nicaise de Keyser. An important influence at this time was Louis De Taye, Professor of Archaeology at the academy and a practising artist. Alma-Tadema lived and worked with De Taye from 1857 to 1859 and was encouraged by him to depict subjects from the early history of France and Belgium. This taste for historical themes increased when Alma-Tadema entered Baron Henri Leys studio in 1859 and began assisting him with his monumental frescoes for the Antwerp Town Hall. While in Leys studio, Alma-Tadema produced several major paintings, for example the Education of the Children of Clovis (1861; ex-Sir John Pender priv. col., see Zimmern, p. 3) and Venantius Fortunatus Reading his Poems to Radagonda (1862; Dordrecht, Dordrechts Mus.), which are characterized by their obscure Merovingian subject-matter, rather sombre colouring and close attention to detail.
Il Pordenone
(c. 1484 - 1539), was an Italian painter of the Venetian school, active during the Renaissance. Vasari, his main biographer, identifies him as Giovanni Antonio Licinio. He was commonly named il Pordenone from having been born in 1483 at Corticelli, a small village near Pordenone in Friuli. He ultimately dropped the name of Licinio, having quarrelled with his brothers, one of whom had wounded him in the hand; he then called himself Regillo, or De Regillo. Others say he once took up his maternal name of Cuticelli[1] His signature runs Antonius Portunaensis, or De Portunaonis. He was knighted as a cavaliere by Charles V. As a painter, Pordenone was a scholar of Pellegrino da San Daniele, but a leading influence of his style was Giorgione; the popular story that he was a fellow-pupil with Titian under Giovanni Bellini is false. It was claimed that Pordenone's first commission was given him by a grocer in his home town, to try his boast that he could paint a picture as the priest commenced High Mass, and complete it by the time Mass was over; he completed the picture in the required time.[2] The district about Pordenone had been somewhat fertile in capable painters; but Pordenone is the best known, a vigorous chiaroscurist and flesh painter. The 1911 Britannica states that "so far as mere flesh-painting is concerned he was barely inferior to Titian in breadth, pulpiness and tone". The two were rivals for a time, and Licinio would sometimes affect to wear arms while he was painting. He excelled in portraits; he was equally at home in fresco and in oil-color. He executed many works in Pordenone and elsewhere in Friuli, Cremona, and Venice; at one time he settled in Piacenza, where one of his most celebrated church pictures, St. Catherine disputing with the Doctors in Alexandria is located; the figure of St. Paul in connection with this picture is his own portrait.