1776-1837 British John Constable Locations 1837). English painter and draughtsman. His range and aspirations were less extensive than those of his contemporary J. M. W. Turner, but these two artists have traditionally been linked as the giants of early 19th-century British landscape painting and isolated from the many other artists practising landscape at a time when it was unprecedentedly popular. Constable has often been defined as the great naturalist and deliberately presented himself thus in his correspondence, although his stylistic variety indicates an instability in his perception of what constituted nature. He has also been characterized as having painted only the places he knew intimately, which other artists tended to pass by. While the exclusivity of Constable approach is indisputable, his concern with local scenery was not unique, being shared by the contemporary Norwich artists. By beginning to sketch in oil from nature seriously in 1808, he also conformed with the practice of artists such as Thomas Christopher Hofland (1777-1843), William Alfred Delamotte, Turner and, particularly, the pupils of John Linnell. Turner shared his commitment to establishing landscape as the equal of history painting, despite widespread disbelief in this notion. Nevertheless, although Constable was less singular than he might have liked people to believe, his single-mindedness in portraying so limited a range of sites was unique, and the brilliance of his oil sketching unprecedented, while none of his contemporaries was producing pictures resembling The Haywain (1821; London, N.G.) or the Leaping Horse (1825; London, RA). This very singularity was characteristic of British artists at a time when members of most occupations were stressing their individuality in the context of a rapidly developing capitalist economy  Related Paintings of John Constable :. | The leaping horse | sadesfalrer | Cloud Study, Hampstead; Tree at Right, Royal Academy of Arts, London | A boat passing a lock | Boat-building near Flatford Mill |
Related Artists:
Anthonie van Montfoort
(Montfoort, 1533 or 1534 - Utrecht, 1583) was a Dutch painter His father was a mayor of Montfoort. He went to learn under Hendrick Sweersz. in Delft and Frans Floris in Antwerp. In 1552 he returned to Montfoort, where he married the daughter of the then mayor. Blocklandt then settled in Delft, where he produced paintings for the Oude Kerk and the Nieuwe Kerk, later lost to the beeldenstorm. Also he painted a work for the Janskerk (Gouda) called De onthoofding van Saint-Jacob, now in the museum there. In 1572, Blocklandt made a trip to Italy, after which he settled for good in Utrecht, joining a guild there in 1577. In 1579, he painted his best known work, the triptych The Assumption of Mary that is now in the Basilica of St. Martin in Bingen am Rhein. According to Carel van Mander, Blocklandt painted biblical scenes, mythological subjects and portraits. He is early-Mannerist in style and he and Joos de Beer (another pupil of Floris) were responsible for the Mannerist style begun by Utrecht artists around 1590. Van Mander wrote that De Beer had many paintings by Blocklandt in his workshop that his pupil Abraham Bloemaert later copied. Few works can definitely be attributed to him. One of these is "Joseph interpreting Pharaoh's dream", now in the Centraal Museum in Utrecht. He was also the teacher of the Delft portrait painter Michiel Jansz van Mierevelt.
Nanteuil, Robert
French, 1623-1678 French engraver, draughtsman and pastellist. He was the son of Lancelot Nanteuil, a wool merchant, and submitted his thesis in philosophy, for which he engraved the headpiece, at the Jesuit College of Reims, in 1645. He went on to work in the studio of Nicolas Regnesson, whose sister he married in 1646, before moving to Paris in 1647. His early work mainly consisted of portrait drawings in black lead on parchment (e.g. Paris, Louvre), and he continued to draw throughout his career. He took 155 of his 221 portraits directly from life. His drawing style was influenced by Philippe de Champaigne, and he based his engraving technique on the work of Claude Mellan and Jean Morin.
Ferdinand Hodler
1853-1918 Swiss Ferdinand Hodler Galleries Hodler was born in Berne and grew up in poverty. His father, Jean Hodler, made a meager living as a carpenter; his mother, Marguerite (n??e Neukomm), was from a peasant family. By the time Hodler was eight years old, he had lost his father and two younger brothers to tuberculosis. His mother remarried to a decorative painter, but in 1867 she too died of tuberculosis. Before he was ten, Hodler received training in decorative painting from his stepfather, and was subsequently sent to Thun to apprentice with a local painter, Ferdinand Sommer. Hodler's earliest works were conventional landscapes, which he sold in shops and to tourists. In 1871, at the age of 18, he traveled on foot to Geneva to start a career as a painter. The works of Hodler's early maturity consisted of landscapes, figure compositions and portraits, treated with a vigorous realism. He made a trip to Basel in 1875, where he studied the paintings of Hans Holbein??especially Dead Christ in the Tomb, which influenced Hodler's many treatments of the theme of death. In the last decade of the 19th century his work evolved to combine influences from several genres including symbolism and art nouveau. He developed a style which he called Parallelism, characterized by groupings of figures symmetrically arranged in poses suggesting ritual or dance. In 1884 Hodler met Augustine Dupin (1852?C1909), who became his companion and model for the next several years. Their son, Hector Hodler, was born in 1887. In 1889 Hodler married Bertha Stucki; they were divorced in 1891. Hodler's work in his final phase took on an expressionist aspect with strongly coloured and geometrical figures. Landscapes were pared down to essentials, sometimes consisting of a jagged wedge of land between water and sky. However, the most famous of Hodler's paintings portray scenes in which characters are engaged in everyday activities, such as the famous woodcutter (Der Holzfaller, Mus??e d'Orsay, Paris). This picture went on to appear on the back of the 50 Swiss Franc bank note issued by the Swiss National Bank. In 1898, Hodler married Berthe Jacques. In 1914 he condemned the German atrocities conducted using artillery at Rheims. In retaliation for this, German art museums excluded Hodler's work. In 1908 he met Valentine Gode-Darel, who became his mistress. She was diagnosed with cancer in 1913, and the many hours Hodler spent by her bedside resulted in a remarkable series of paintings documenting her disintegration. Her death in January 1915 affected Hodler greatly. He occupied himself with work; a series of about 20 introspective self-portraits date from 1916. By late 1917 his declining health led him to thoughts of suicide. He died on May 19, 1918 in Geneva leaving behind a number of unfinished works portraying the city.