Dutch Baroque Era Painter, ca.1625-1679 Daily life was Jan Steen's main pictorial theme. Many of the genre scenes he portrayed are lively to the point of chaos and lustfulness, even so much that a Jan Steen household, meaning a messy scene, became a Dutch proverb (een huishouden van Jan Steen). Subtle hints in his paintings seem to suggest that Steen meant to warn the viewer rather than invite him to copy this behaviour. Many of Steen's paintings bear references to old Dutch proverbs or literature. He often used members of his family as models. Jan Steen painted also quite a few self-portraits, in which he showed no tendency of vanity. Steen did not shy from other themes: he painted historical, mythological and religious scenes, portraits, still lifes and natural scenes. His portraits of children are famous. He is also well known for his mastery of light and attention to detail, most notably in textiles. Steen was prolific, producing about 800 paintings, of which roughly 350 survive. Steen's work was valued much by contemporaries and as a result he was reasonably well paid for his work. He did not have any students, but his work proved a source of inspiration for many painters.  Related Paintings of Jan Steen :. | Die verkehrte Welt | Merry Company in an inn | A company celebrating the birthday of Prince William III, 14 November 1660 | The way you hear it is the way you sing it | The Drinker |
Related Artists:
Francisco Barrera
Spanish, 1595-1657,Spanish painter. Although he is sometimes thought to have been a Sevillian painter, his career is documented in Madrid. Barrera enjoyed considerable prestige and authority within the artistic community of the Spanish capital and in 1634 and 1639 represented his profession in significant legal battles concerning the status and rights of painters. However, Barrera's known paintings, all of which are still-lifes, are those of a derivative artist of modest abilities. In Still-life with Basket of Grapes, signed and dated 1642 (Florence, Uffizi), his arrangement of objects in a window-frame and on a stone ledge derives from works by Juan van der Hamen y Le?n but without that artist's refined compositional sense or mastery of pictorial space. The rather weak modelling of objects in this painting is consistent with Barrera's other still-lifes, which are further characterized by their light tonality, bland colouring and monotonous brushwork. Comparable stylistic features are found in the more accomplished still-lifes of Antonio Ponce, with whom Barrera is documented in the 1630s. Barrera's best works are those depicting the Four Seasons, signed and dated 1638 (Seville, priv. col., see 1982 exh. cat., pp. 78-85). These are still-lifes of abundant seasonal foodstuffs and, in landscape settings, large symbolic and genre figures drawn from traditional iconography.
BRUEGHEL, Jan the Elder
Flemish painter (bc1568, Bruxelles, d. 1625, Antwerpen).
John Kensett
1816-1872 John Kensett Art Galleries Artist John Frederick Kensett was born on March 22, 1816 in Cheshire, Connecticut, and died on December 14, 1872 in New York City. He attended school at Cheshire Academy, and studied engraving with his immigrant father, Thomas Kensett, and later with his uncle, Alfred Dagget. He worked as engraver in the New Haven area until about 1838, after which he went to work as a bank note engraver in New York City. In 1840, along with Asher Durand and John William Casilear, Kensett traveled to Europe in order to study painting. There he met and traveled with Benjamin Champney. The two sketched and painted throughout Europe, refining their talents. During this period, Kensett developed an appreciation and affinity for 17th century Dutch landscape painting. Kensett and Champney returned to the United States in 1847. After establishing his studio and settling in New York, Kensett traveled extensively throughout the Northeast and the Colorado Rockies as well as making several trips back to Europe. Kensett is best known for his landscape of upstate New York and New England and seascapes of coastal New Jersey, Long Island and New England. He is most closely associated with the so-called "second generation" of the Hudson River School. Along with Sanford Robinson Gifford, Fitz Hugh Lane, Jasper Francis Cropsey, Martin Johnson Heade and others, the works of the "Luminists," as they came to be known, were characterized by unselfconscious, nearly invisible brushstrokes used to convey the qualities and effects of atmospheric light. It could be considered the spiritual, if not stylistic, cousin to Impressionism. Such spiritualism stemmed from Transcendentalist philosophies of sublime nature and contemplation bringing one closer to a spiritual truth. In 1851 Kensett painted a monumental canvas of Mount Washington that has become an icon of White Mountain art. Mount Washington from the Valley of Conway was purchased by the American Art Union, made into an engraving by James Smillie, and distributed to 13,000 Art Union subscribers throughout the country. Other artists painted copies of this scene from the print. Currier and Ives published a similar print in about 1860. This single painting by Kensett helped to popularize the White Mountain region of New Hampshire. Kensett's style evolved gradually, from the traditional Hudson River School manner in the 1850s into the more refined Luminist style in his later years. By the early 1870s Kensett was spending considerable time at his home on Contentment Island, on Long Island Sound near Darien, Connecticut.