French Rococo Era Painter, 1732-1806 was a French painter and printmaker whose late Rococo manner was distinguished by remarkable facility, exuberance, and hedonism. One of the most prolific artists active in the last decades of the Ancien Regime, Fragonard produced more than 550 paintings , of which only five are dated. Among his most popular works are genre paintings conveying an atmosphere of intimacy and veiled eroticism. He was born at Grasse, Alpes-Maritimes, the son of François Fragonard, a glover, and Françoise Petit. He was articled to a Paris notary when his father's circumstances became strained through unsuccessful speculations, but showed such talent and inclination for art that he was taken at the age of eighteen to François Boucher, who, recognizing the youth's rare gifts but disinclined to waste his time with one so inexperienced, sent him to Chardin's atelier. Fragonard studied for six months under the great luminist, then returned more fully equipped to Boucher, whose style he soon acquired so completely that the master entrusted him with the execution of replicas of his paintings. Though not yet a pupil of the Academy, Fragonard gained the Prix de Rome in 1752 with a painting of "Jeroboam Sacrificing to the Golden Calf", but before proceeding to Rome he continued to study for three years under Charles-Andre van Loo. In the year preceding his departure he painted the "Christ washing the Feet of the Apostles" now at Grasse cathedral. On September 17, 1756, he took up his abode at the French Academy in Rome, then presided over by Charles-Joseph Natoire. While at Rome, Fragonard contracted a friendship with a fellow painter, Hubert Robert. In 1760, they toured Italy together, executing numerous sketches of local scenery. It was in these romantic gardens, with their fountains, grottos, temples and terraces, that Fragonard conceived the dreams which he was subsequently to render in his art. He also learned to admire the masters of the Dutch and Flemish schools (Rubens, Hals, Rembrandt, Ruisdael), imitating their loose and vigorous brushstrokes. Added to this influence was the deep impression made upon his mind by the florid sumptuousness of Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, whose works he had an opportunity to study in Venice before he returned to Paris in 1761. In 1765 his "Coresus et Callirhoe" secured his admission to the Academy. It was made the subject of a pompous (though not wholly serious) eulogy by Diderot, and was bought by the king, who had it reproduced at the Gobelins factory. Hitherto Fragonard had hesitated between religious, classic and other subjects; but now the demand of the wealthy art patrons of Louis XV's pleasure-loving and licentious court turned him definitely towards those scenes of love and voluptuousness with which his name will ever be associated, and which are only made acceptable by the tender beauty of his color and the virtuosity of his facile brushwork;   Related Paintings of Jean-Honore Fragonard :. | A Boy as Pierrot | Education is Everything | The Stolen Kiss | Inspiration | Blindekuhspiel |
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Ubaldo Gandolfi
Italian Painter, San Matteo della Decima, 1728 - Ravenna, 1781 was an Italian painter of the late-Baroque period, mainly active in and near Bologna. He was born in San Matteo della Decima and enrolled by the age of 17 at the Clementine Academy, where he apprenticed with Ercole Graziani the Younger, Felice Torelli, and Ercole Lelli. He was from a large family of prolific artists, including his sons Giovanni Battista and Ubaldo Lorenzo, as well as his brother Gaetano and nephews Mauro, Democrito (who became a pupil of Antonio Canova), and niece Clementina. Together, they are considered the last representative of the grand manner of painting characteristic of the Bolognese school, that had risen to prominence nearly two centuries earlier with the Carracci. Gandolfi's work ranges from Baroque to Neoclassic styles, and specifically recalls the style of Ludovico Carracci. He completed, in 1770-75, a series of canvases on mythological narratives for the Palazzo Marescalchi in Bologna (two are now in Museum of North Carolina ). He died in Ravenna in 1781.
Ion Andreescu
n. 15 februarie 1850, Bucuresti . 22 octombrie 1882, Bucuresti He was born in Bucharest into a merchant family. In 1869 he entered Theodor Aman Fine Arts School. By 1872 he was an instructor of drawing and calligraphy at the Bishop School in Buzau. In 1873 he left the Bishop School for the Tudor Vladimirescu Communal Secondary School, also in Buzau. Then, in 1875 he left the Communal Secondary School for Buzau Craftsmanship School. Influenced by Nicolae Grigorescu, he left Romania for Paris to further his education. In Paris, he began painting at Barbizon. His work was exhibited with the works of better known painters such as Manet, Monet and Renoir. In 1881 he returned to Romania, ill with tuberculosis. His death followed shortly in 1882.
Sir Edward john poynter,bt.,P.R.A
1836-1919 English painter, draughtsman, decorative designer and museum official. He came from an artistic family: his great-grandfather was Thomas Banks the sculptor, and Ambrose Poynter, his father, was an architect and watercolour painter. Edward began studying art in 1852 under Thomas Shotter Boys, a friend of his father. In 1853-4 Poynter visited Rome, where he was greatly impressed by the large-scale academic painting of Frederic Leighton. Returning to London, he studied at Leigh's Academy and the studio of William Dobson (1817-1898). Poynter entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1855 but his admiration for French painting led him to Charles Gleyre's studio in Paris the following year. He remained there until 1859, with fellow students George Du Maurier, Thomas Armstrong and Whistler; their activities are described in Du Maurier's novel Trilby (1894). At this time Poynter received his first commissions for decorative work. He began designing stained glass and painting furniture and, after his return to England, he was employed by his friend the architect William Burges to decorate the ceiling of Waltham Abbey, Essex, in 1860.