English Romantic Painter, 1775-1851 Joseph Mallord William Turner (23 April 1775 ?C 19 December 1851) was an English Romantic landscape painter, watercolourist and printmaker, whose style is said to have laid the foundation for Impressionism. Although Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, he is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting. Turner's talent was recognised early in his life. Financial independence allowed Turner to innovate freely; his mature work is characterised by a chromatic palette and broadly applied atmospheric washes of paint. According to David Piper's The Illustrated History of Art, his later pictures were called "fantastic puzzles." However, Turner was still recognised as an artistic genius: the influential English art critic John Ruskin described Turner as the artist who could most "stirringly and truthfully measure the moods of Nature." (Piper 321) Suitable vehicles for Turner's imagination were to be found in the subjects of shipwrecks, fires (such as the burning of Parliament in 1834, an event which Turner rushed to witness first-hand, and which he transcribed in a series of watercolour sketches), natural catastrophes, and natural phenomena such as sunlight, storm, rain, and fog. He was fascinated by the violent power of the sea, as seen in Dawn after the Wreck (1840) and The Slave Ship (1840). Turner placed human beings in many of his paintings to indicate his affection for humanity on the one hand (note the frequent scenes of people drinking and merry-making or working in the foreground), but its vulnerability and vulgarity amid the 'sublime' nature of the world on the other hand. 'Sublime' here means awe-inspiring, savage grandeur, a natural world unmastered by man, evidence of the power of God - a theme that artists and poets were exploring in this period. The significance of light was to Turner the emanation of God's spirit and this was why he refined the subject matter of his later paintings by leaving out solid objects and detail, concentrating on the play of light on water, the radiance of skies and fires. Although these late paintings appear to be 'impressionistic' and therefore a forerunner of the French school, Turner was striving for expression of spirituality in the world, rather than responding primarily to optical phenomena. Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western Railway painted (1844).His early works, such as Tintern Abbey (1795), stayed true to the traditions of English landscape. However, in Hannibal Crossing the Alps (1812), an emphasis on the destructive power of nature had already come into play. His distinctive style of painting, in which he used watercolour technique with oil paints, created lightness, fluency, and ephemeral atmospheric effects. (Piper 321) One popular story about Turner, though it likely has little basis in reality, states that he even had himself "tied to the mast of a ship in order to experience the drama" of the elements during a storm at sea. In his later years he used oils ever more transparently, and turned to an evocation of almost pure light by use of shimmering colour. A prime example of his mature style can be seen in Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western Railway, where the objects are barely recognizable. The intensity of hue and interest in evanescent light not only placed Turner's work in the vanguard of English painting, but later exerted an influence upon art in France, as well; the Impressionists, particularly Claude Monet, carefully studied his techniques.  Related Paintings of Joseph Mallord William Turner :. | Landscape | View and edge | Landscape | Sailing boats at sea (mk31) | Buttermere-See mit Teilansicht von Cromackwater |
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Charles de La Fosse
(June 16, 1636 - December 13, 1716), French painter, was born in Paris. He was one of the most noted and least servile pupils of Le Brun, under whose direction he shared in the chief of the great decorative works undertaken in the reign of Louis XIV. Leaving France in 1662, he spent two years in Rome and three in Venice. The influence of his prolonged studies of Veronese is evident in his "Finding of Moses" (Louvre), an in his "Rape of Proserpine" (Louvre), which he presented to the Royal Academy as his diploma picture in 1673. He was at once named assistant professor, and in 1674 the full responsibilities of the office devolved on him, but his engagements did not prevent his accepting in 1689 the invitation of Lord Montagu to decorate Montagu House. He visited London twice, remaining on the second occasionetogether with Rousseau and Monnoyer more than two years. William III vainly strove to detain him in England by the proposal that he should decorate Hampton Court, for Le Brun was dead, and Mansart pressed La Fosse to return to Paris to take in hand the cupola of Les Invalides. The decorations of Montagu House are destroyed, those of Versailles are restored, and the dome of the Invalides (engraved, Picart and Cochin) is now the only work existing which gives a full measure of his talent. During his latter years La Fosse executed many other important decorations in public buildings and private houses, notably in that of Crozat, under whose roof he died on 13 December 1716. This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
Pieter Cornelis (Piet) Mondriaan
(March 7, 1872?CFebruary 1, 1944) was a Dutch painter. He was an important contributor to the De Stijl art movement and group, which was founded by Theo van Doesburg. He evolved a non-representational form which he termed Neo-Plasticism.
Hans Holbein
German 1497-1543 Hans Holbein Galleries Holbein always made highly detailed pencil drawings of his portrait subjects, often supplemented with ink and colored chalk. The drawings emphasize facial detail and usually did not include the hands; clothing was only indicated schematically. The outlines of these drawings were then transferred onto the support for the final painting using tiny holes in the paper through which powdered charcoal was transmitted; in later years Holbein used a kind of carbon paper. The final paintings thus had the same scale as the original drawings. Although the drawings were made as studies for paintings, they stand on their own as independent, finely wrought works of art. How many portraits have been lost can be seen from Holbein's book (nearly all pages in the Royal Collection) containing preparatory drawings for portraits - of eighty-five drawings, only a handful have surviving Holbein paintings, though often copies have survived. David Hockney has speculated in the Hockney-Falco thesis that Holbein used a concave mirror to project an image of the subject onto the drawing surface. The image was then traced. However this thesis has not met with general acceptance from art historians. A subtle ability to render character may be noted in Holbein's work, as can be seen in his portraits of Thomas Cromwell, Desiderius Erasmus, and Henry VIII. The end results are convincing as definitive images of the subjects' appearance and personality.