Dutch Post-Impressionist Painter, 1853-1890 Vincent Willem van Gogh (30 March 1853 ?C 29 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist artist. Some of his paintings are now among the world's best known, most popular and expensive works of art. Van Gogh spent his early adult life working for a firm of art dealers. After a brief spell as a teacher, he became a missionary worker in a very poor mining region. He did not embark upon a career as an artist until 1880. Initially, Van Gogh worked only with sombre colours, until he encountered Impressionism and Neo-Impressionism in Paris. He incorporated their brighter colours and style of painting into a uniquely recognizable style, which was fully developed during the time he spent at Arles, France. He produced more than 2,000 works, including around 900 paintings and 1,100 drawings and sketches, during the last ten years of his life. Most of his best-known works were produced in the final two years of his life, during which time he cut off part of his left ear following a breakdown in his friendship with Paul Gauguin. After this he suffered recurrent bouts of mental illness, which led to his suicide. The central figure in Van Gogh's life was his brother Theo, who continually and selflessly provided financial support. Their lifelong friendship is documented in numerous letters they exchanged from August 1872 onwards. Van Gogh is a pioneer of what came to be known as Expressionism. He had an enormous influence on 20th century art, especially on the Fauves and German Expressionists.  Related Paintings of Vincent Van Gogh :. | Still Life with Straw Hat | Still Life with mackerel, lemon and tomato | Olive Picking (nn04) | Gemusegarten am Montmartre | Farmhouses in a Wheat Field near Arles |
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Lucas Cranach
Kronach 1472-Weimar 1553 German painter and engraver. The son of a painter, he settled in Wittenberg c.1504 and was court painter successively under three electors of Saxony. There he maintained a flourishing workshop and was twice burgomaster. Cranach was a close friend of Martin Luther, whose doctrine he upheld in numerous paintings and woodcuts, and he has been called the painter of the Reformation. He was a rapid and prolific painter, and the work turned out by his studio is uneven in quality. Naïve and fanciful, often awkward in draftsmanship, it has, nonetheless, freshness and originality and a warm, rich palette. His portraits are particularly successful. Among his best-known works are Repose in Egypt (Gemäldgalerie, Staatliche Mus., Berlin-Dahlem); Judgment of Paris (Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe); Adam and Eve (Courtauld Inst., London); and Crucifixion (Weimar). The latter contains figures of Luther and Cranach. His many famous protraits include those of Elector John Frederick and Self-Portrait (Uffizi). Cranach was also an accomplished miniaturist. He produced a few copperplates and designs for woodcuts. His son and pupil Lucas Cranach, the Younger,
Elias Martin
Swedish Painter, 1739-1818,Painter and engraver. After training in his father joinery shop and with the painter Friedrich Schultz (1709-69), he was engaged to design ornamentation for ships of the coastal fleet at Sveaborg (Finland). There he also taught drawing to the son of Field Marshal Count Augustin Ehrensv?rd (1710-72) while himself learning printmaking techniques from the Field Marshal. During this period Martin produced accurate studies of Finland coastal scenery and the Sveaborg fortress (e.g. Stockholm, Nmus.), as well as purely imaginary landscapes based on engravings. In 1766 he went to Paris and with Alexander Roslin help was able to study under Joseph Vernet at the Acad?mie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture. A direct result of his studies was a View of Paris from the Quay Beneath the Pont Neuf (1766-7; Stockholm, Nmus.).
Aniello Falcone
(1600-1665) was an Italian Baroque painter, active in Naples and noted for his painted depictions of battle scenes. Born in Naples the son of a tradesman, he showed his artistic tendency at an early age. He first received some instruction from a relative, and then became one of the most prominent pupils apprenticed under Jose de Ribera. Salvatore Rosa, in turn, is said to have apprenticed under Aniello. The Anchorite, ca. 1650 Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Aniello Falcone Besides battle pictures, large and small, taken from biblical as well as secular history, he painted various religious subjects, which, however, count for little in his general reputation. He became, as a battle painter, almost as celebrated as Giacomo Borgognone, and was named L' Oracolo delle Battaglie. His works have animation, variety, truth to nature, and careful color. Falcone was bold, generous, accustomed to arms, and an excellent fencer. In the insurrection of 1647, led by Masaniello, he resolved to be bloodily avenged for the death, at the hands of two Spaniards, of a nephew and of a pupil in the school of art which he had established in Naples. Salvator Rosa, Carlo Coppola, among others, and he formed an armed band named the Compagnia della Morte, or Company of Death. (See Salvator Rosa.) They battled in the streets by day; at night they were painters again, and handled the brush with impetuous zeal. Rule restored, they decamped. Falcone and Rosa made off to Rome; here Borgognone noticed the works of Falcone, and became his friend, and a French gentleman induced him to go to France, where Louis XIV became one of his patrons. Ultimately Jean-Baptiste Colbert obtained permission for the painter to return to Naples, and there he died in 1665.