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| ^ Died
on 17 November 1767: Giovanni Battista Pittoni,
Venetian painter of religious, historical, and mythological
pictures, born in 1686 (or 1687?). — He was very popular in his
day and ranks as one of the best contemporaries of Tiepolo,
whom he succeeded as President of the Venice Academy of Painting, 1758-61.
Pittoni never left Italy, but he nevertheless received important foreign
commissions from the Swedish, Austrian, and German courts. His early
work was much indebted to Piazzetta
and Sebastiano
Ricci, but his style later became lighter and more colourful under
the influence of Tiepolo
(1696–1770) — LINKS — Annunciation (1758, 153x206cm) _ Of the many painters who followed Sebastiano Ricci (1659–1734) and Pellegrini (1675–1741), very few achieved results of any degree of originality. Of those who did Giambattista Pittoni turned the lessons of Ricci to his own use in a personal style whose elegant, rhythmic composition and delicate tonal clarity clearly announce his involvement in the world of rococo. Pittoni's taste for virtuoso display intensified still further towards the end of his career. It was in this period (1758) that he painted the 'Annunciation' to decorate the 'stanza dello studio' of the Old Academy which had been founded in 1750 at the Fonteghetto della Farina. The theatrical layout of the composition and the precious refinement of the drawing lend the sacred subject the air of an animated ballet with wonderfully fresh chromatic harmonies. |
| ^ Born
on 17 November 1690: Noël-Nicolas Coypel,
French painter who died on 14 December 1734. — Coypel, family of French painter of which Noël (1628-1707) was the head. Noël's son, Antoine (1661-1722) has a strong Italian element in his style. Antoine Coypel's half-brother, Noël-Nicolas (1690-1734) painted with much more charm, mainly mythological subjects, but he seems to have had a rather timid personality and did not achieve the worldly success of the other members of the family. Indeed, he was the best painter of the family, but is the least famous. Chardin was briefly his assistant. Antoine's son Charles-Antoine (1694-1752) was a much more forceful character than Noël-Nicolas — — Madame de Bourbon-Conti (1731, 138x107cm) _ Noël-Nicolas Coypel belonged to a French family of painters of which Noël (1628-1707) was the head. Noël-Nicolas painted mainly mythological subjects, but he seems to have had a rather timid personality and did not achieve the worldly success of the other members of the family. Indeed, he was the best painter of the family, but is the least famous. Chardin was briefly his assistant. |
| ^ Died
on 17 November 1958: Frank Cadogan Cowper,
English painter born on 16 October 1877. — Frank Cadogan Cowper, the last of the Pre-Raphaelites, was born at Wicken in Northamptonshire, the son of an author [who did not give him his own first name, otherwise the boy might have been teased as “cowper son”, or “cow person”]. He entered St John's Wood Art School in 1896 and enrolled at the Royal Academy Schools in 1897. He was greatly influenced during this time by exhibitions of the work of Ford Madox Brown (1896), Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1898) and John Everett Millais (1898). Cowper's work was first accepted at the Academy in 1899, and his first notable success was An Aristocrat Answering the Summons to Execution, Paris, 1793, exhibited in 1901. In 1902, after completing his training, Cowper travelled to Italy before working for six months in the studio of E.A. Abbey, R.A., a painter of historical subjects. In common with the earlier Pre-Raphaelite painters, minute detail and rich colors predominated in Cowper's work, and his output in early years appears to have been small (he only exhibited one or two pictures each year at the Academy until 1913). Following the example of the Pre-Raphaelite, William Holman Hunt, Cowper took immense trouble researching his subjects, travelling to Assisi before painting St Francis of Assisi and the Heavenly Melody, and having a grave dug for his depiction of Hamlet - the churchyard scene, exhibited in 1902. Cowper usually chose historical, literary or religious subjects for his pictures in which it was thought that 'he showed a good deal of invention'. as in St Agnes in Prison receiving from Heaven the 'Shining White Garment' Cowper was elected A.R.A in 1907; and was made a R.A. in 1934. In 1910, Cowper was commissioned to paint a mural for the House of Commons depicting a Tudor scene, and in 1912 completed further decorative panels there. In the 1920s he began painting numerous portraits of women, with softer effects and a 'cloying sweetness'. His major patron was Evelyn Waugh. During the Second World War Cowper moved to Jersey, but later returned to England, and settled in Gloucestershire in 1944. He continued to exhibit until 1957. He died in Cirencester the following year, aged eighty-one. [he avoided painting cows, or having anything to do with them, it seems, thus never becoming known as a cow person] — LINKS — St Agnes in Prison Receiving from Heaven the Shining White Garment (1905, 74x45cm) Venerated as a patoness of purity, St Agnes suffered martyrdom c.AD 303 under the Emperor Diocletian. Having vowed to live a life of chastity, she refused the suit of a Roman youth, who had her stripped and imprisoned. In prison she was visited by an angel who brought her a robe, white as snow, to cover her nakedness, and when condemned to be burnt as a witch, she was again saved by heavenly intervention. Eventually she was despatched by the sword. The picture was one of Cowper's most impressive works. It dates from the end of the early period when he was attempting to revive the original Pre-Raphaelite style, and in fact seems to borrow from specific paintings. Rossetti's Annunciation of 1850 find echoes in the subject, the relationship of the figures, the pose of the Saint and the motif of flames on the angel's feet. The realistic treatment of the straw recalls Millais' Return of the Dove to the Ark and there is perhaps even a hint of Madox Brown's Take Your Son, Sir in the arrangement of the 'shining white garment'. — La Belle Dame Sans Merci (1926, 102x97cm) _ This painting is based on La Belle Dame Sans Merci by John Keats. — The Four Queens Find Lancelot Sleeping (1954, 103x91cm) _ This painting is one of Cowper's last subject pictures. When exhibited in 1954, four years before his death, the art critic of The Times wrote: 'Mr F Cadogan Cowper, who must be the last Academician to have achieved the supreme distinction of having a rail put round his pictures to keep crowds at bay, shows another belated Pre-Raphaelite work'. It is indeed an astonishing case of Pre-Raphaelite survival. In subject, mood and technique it might belong to the 1900s. Only the features of the four Queens, who look like 1950s film stars, give a clue to its real date. The subject occurs in the Morte D'Arthur, Book 6, ch.3. Morgan Le Fay, 'Queen of the Land of Gore', the Queen of Northgalis, the Queen of Eastland and the Queen of the 'Out Isles', discover Lancelot asleep beneath an apple tree. Each wants him for her paramour, so Morgan Le Fay lays him under enchantment and has him carried to her castle where is asked to choose one of them. Faithful to Guinevere, he refuses, and eventually makes his escape. The theme had previously been treated by David Jones in a watercolor of 1941 — much more 'modern' in style than Cowper's later version. The motif of an armed knight lying full-length in the foreground also occurs in Cowper's 1926 painting La Belle Dame Sans Merci. His RA exhibits include two other Arthurian themes, The Damozel of the Lake and The Legend of Sir Percival (1953). — Portrait of Fraunces, Beatrice, James and Synfye (1919, 86x102cm) Children of James Christie Esq. |
| ^ Born
on 17 November 1793: Francis Danby, English
painter of Irish birth, specialized in landscapes, who died on 10 February
1861. — Danby was a landowner’s son and studied art at the Dublin Society. In 1813 he visited London, then worked in Bristol, initially on repetitious watercolours of local scenes: for example, View of Hotwells, the Avon Gorge (1818). In about 1819 he entered the cultivated circle of George Cumberland (1754-1849) and the Rev. John Eagles (1783-1855). Danby’s discovery of the ‘poetry of nature’ in local scenery and insignificant incidents was influenced by the theories of Eagles, published as The Sketcher (1856), and, less directly, by those of William Wordsworth, who had been associated with Bristol earlier in the century. Danby’s distinctive work began with the small panel paintings he produced for his Bristol audience. Boy Sailing a Little Boat (1822) recalls the rustic scenes of William Collins and the Bristol artist Edward Villiers Rippingille, but Danby emphasized the effect of sun and shade rather than sentiment Danby became the best-known member of the Bristol school of painters but preferred to exhibit more ambitious paintings in London. The Upas, or Poison-tree in the Island of Java attracted considerable attention when first shown at the British Institution in 1820, by its large scale (168x229cm) and sublime motif: a despairing adventurer coming upon the remains of his predecessors in the moonlit poisoned valley. It has deteriorated badly, like many of his works. Disappointed Love (1821) was his first Royal Academy exhibit. It differs from his Bristol works in its narrative content and in the pathetic fallacy by which the oppressive trees and wilting weeds echo the girl’s despair. When Danby moved to London in 1824 he abandoned naturalistic landscape and contemporary genre subjects to concentrate on painting poetical landscapes in the manner of Claude Lorrain and J. M. W. Turner’s Hannibal Crossing the Alps (1812), and also large biblical scenes to rival John Martin. Danby’s relationship with Martin was ambiguous, but undoubtedly competitive. Danby was elected ARA following the exhibition at the Royal Academy in 1825 of the Delivery of Israel out of Egypt (Exod. xiv) (1825). His poetic treatment of landscape seems to have inspired Martin’s Deluge (mezzotint, 1828), which was shown the following year at the British Institution. Danby himself was already contemplating painting a Deluge and his An Attempt to Illustrate the Opening of the Sixth Seal (Rev. vi. 12) (1828) in turn owed much to Martin’s conception of the Sublime. Danby quarrelled with the Royal Academy in 1829, when not elected RA (Constable won by one vote). At the same time his marriage had collapsed, and he had taken a mistress; his wife left London with the Bristol artist, Paul Falconer Poole, whom she subsequently married. The ensuing scandal forced Danby to move abruptly to Paris in 1830. Between 1831 and 1836 he worked in Geneva, producing chiefly watercolours and topographical paintings. He then lived in Paris, copying Old Master paintings. He returned to London late in 1838 where Deluge (1840) re-established his reputation when exhibited privately in Piccadilly, London, in May 1840. A huge rock rises in the midst of the flood, swarming with figures who struggle to gain the highest point. Their diminution implies immensity. The colour is appropriately, but uncharacteristically, sombre. Despite its success, it was his last work of this type. Danby continued to paint poetic fantasy landscapes throughout the 1840s and 1850s (e.g. Enchanted Castle - Sunset,1841), although they became increasingly unfashionable. He also produced landscapes and marine paintings, which derive in color and conception, although not in execution, from those of Turner. These found admirers, although they were too rich in colour and imprecise in detail for wide popularity. Evening Gun (1848), showing naval vessels in harbour, was well received at the Royal Academy in 1848 and the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1855. Danby moved to Exmouth, Devon, in 1847 where he built boats and painted. He was embittered by a life of nearly constant debt and by his failure to gain academic honours. He died a few days after Poole was elected RA. Two of his sons, James Francis Danby (1816-1875) and Thomas Danby (1817-1886), became painters. — LINKS — The Deluge (1840, 284x452cm) _ This painting depicts the story of the Flood as told in the book of Genesis. It shows the terrible punishment brought down by a wrathful God upon sinful mankind. |
| ^ Died
on 17 November 1708: Ludolf Backhuysen (or
Bakhuyzen, Backhuyzen), Dutch marine painter, active mainly
in Amsterdam, born on 18 December 1631.. — After the van de Veldes moved to England in 1672, Backhuysen became the most popular marine painter in Holland. He captures the drama and movement of ships, but seldom achieves the poetic effects of either van de Velde the Younger (1633–1707) or Jan van de Capelle. — LINKS — Ships in Distress in a Heavy Storm (1690) — Ships Running Aground in a Storm (1695, 173x341cm) _ While Dutch primacy in merchant shipping offered high rewards, its risks were equally significant. On their long journeys to the Mediterranean, the New World, Africa, and the East, merchant vessels were perennially endangered by warfare, piracy, treacherous shores, and storms. Several painters, most dramatically Ludolf Backhuysen, specialized in ships adrift in tempests. Backhuysen executed this painting (his largest surviving one) as if he were observing the disaster in the midst of the roiling seas, thus engaging beholders in the unfolding tragedy, encouraging them to empathize with the ships and their crews and to contemplate the powers of God, beyond full comprehension. But even as such paintings acknowledge the fragility of Dutch seaborne success, their distant shafts of sunlight usually hold out hope for reversals of misfortune. A brighter future may still save Backhuysen's ship at left, its Dutch flag unfurled against lightening skies. Collectors occasionally hung a tempest painting opposite a sunny shipping scene, implying that the power of God and nature, whether terrifying or benevolent, is always magnificent. — Ships in Distress off a Rocky Coast (1667) _ Backhuysen is the last representative of the great tradition of Dutch marine painting; eighteenth-century Dutch artists did much less of consequence in this category than in the others they practised. Backhuysen was born in Emden, Germany, and came to Amsterdam around the middle of the century where he remained for the rest of his life. His high-placed patrons include the burgomasters of Amsterdam, the Archduke of Tuscany, Czar Peter the Great, and various German princes. He is best known for his stormy scenes. When a storm threatened he sometime went by boat 'to the mouth of the Sea, in order to observe the crash of the Seawater under these conditions'. His Ships in Distress off a Rocky Coast shows the chilling drama he can bring to the theme. The large cargo ship in the centre is managing to make way along the perilous coast, while on the right, two vessels are in even greater danger. Later his storms become melodramatic, his chiaroscuro effects exaggerated, and his gigantic waves rather schematic and glass-like. — The Y at Amsterdam viewed from Mussel Pier (1673) [it is NOT the YMCA, but the River Y. Why? For one, the YMCA was founded in 1844, in London, by George Williams.Why Y for the name of the river? Does it have the shape of a Y?] |
| ^ Born
on on 17 November 1612: Pierre Mignard I “le Romain”,
French artist who died on 13 May 1695.— Much better known than his
elder brother Nicolas
Mignard. — French painter who was the rival of Le
Brun but an exponent of the same Academic theories. Like Le Brun
he was a pupil of Vouet,
but he went to Rome in 1636 and remained there until 1657, forming his
style on the approved models of the Carracci,
Domenichino
and Poussin.
He returned to Paris on the orders of Louis XIV and decorated the dome
of the Val-de-Grâce (1663), but his principal importance was as portrait
painter to the Court. He revived the earlier Italian type of allegorical
portrait, and a good example is the Marquise de Seignelay as Thetis (1691,
London, National Gallery). He was strongly opposed to the Académie royale,
and, in spite of his own stylistic origins, championed the Venetian or
'colourist' school; this, however, was probably only to oppose Le Brun.
When Le Brun died in 1690 Mignard was at once made 'premier peintre',
and, on the King's orders, the Academy had, in a single sitting, to appoint
Mignard Associate, Member, Rector, Director and Chancellor of the body
he had so long opposed. — LINKS — Clio (1689, 144x115cm) _ The Mignards followed the style of the Bolognese painters, especially that of Domenichino. On this painting Clio, the Muse of the historians, is a direct descendant of Domenichino's saints, in a somewhat more theatrical way. — Perseus and Andromeda (1679, 150x198cm) _ Ovid tells how Andromeda, daughter of an Ethiopian king, was chained to a rock by the sea-shore as a sacrifice to a sea-monster. Perseus (the son of Danaë whom Jupiter caused to conceive after turning himself into a shower of golden rain) flying overhead on Pegasus, the winged horse, fell in love at first sight. He swooped down just in time, slew the monster and released Andromeda. The picture represents the moment following the freeing of Andromeda. — The Marquise de Seignelay and Two of her Children (1691, 194x155cm) _ Pierre Mignard, known in his native France as Le Romain, lived in Rome from 1636 (visiting Venice and other northern Italian cities in 1654-5) until summoned home by King Louis XIV in 1657. His style was largely based on Annibale Carracci, Domenichino and Poussin. However, he pretended allegiance to Titian and Venetian colourism on his return to France, mainly to oppose his rival Lebrun, whom he succeeded in 1690 as First Painter to the King and Director of the Royal Academy. Despite all his years abroad, his work looks to us unmistakably French, at least as relating to the France of the Sun King's court: calculated and grand. Hogarth's xenophobic English judgement, half a century later, might apply to this superb portrait: 'insolence with an affectation of politeness'. But Mignard was doing no more than following the wishes of his sitter, the widow of Jean-Baptiste Colbert de Seignelay, Minister for the Navy. Catherine-Thérèse de Matignon, Marquise de Lonray, veuve de Seignelay, instructed Mignard to portray her as the sea-nymph Thetis, to whom was said (according to Ovid's Metamorphoses XI, 221-3): 'O goddess of the waves, conceive: thou shalt be the mother of a youth who, when to manhood grown, shall outdo his father's deeds and shall be called greater than he.' Past writers have attributed Mme de Seignelay's transformation into a sea goddess to her husband's office, but it was shown that this passage from Ovid is the key to the portrait. Like Thetis, Mlle de Matignon, of old Norman nobility, had been married off against her will to a social inferior: Colbert, her husband's father and the great Minister of the King, was the son of a draper. The goddess's husband, Peleus, had to rape Thetis to 'beget on her the great Achilles', the most celebrated Greek hero of the Trojan War. 'The hero's mother, goddess of the sea, was ambitious for her son' and by descending into the fiery crater of Etna, the volcano seen here smoking in the background, obtained for him armour made by Vulcan, the blacksmith god. This is the armour, 'work of heavenly art', worn in the guise of Achilles by Marie-Jean-Baptiste de Seignelay, the eldest son for whom Mme de Seignelay had just bought a military commission. The painting's brilliant effect depends in large measure on the vast expanse of Thetis' best ultramarine-blue cloak, contrasting wonderfully with the coral and pearls in her hair, and the mauves and greens of Achilles' garments. Ultramarine was the costliest of pigments, more expensive than gold itself and for that reason seldom used by this date, and never in such quantities. Thus did Mme de Seignelay confound the rumours put about by 'mauvaises langues' that she was bankrupt. And there is more: other rumours circulated that the noble widow either was, or wished to be, mistress to the king. The Cupid proffering a precious nautilus shell brimming over with a king's ransom in jewels publicises the liaison as a fait accompli. Thus might a classical education, and the talents of a Roman-trained and responsive artist, be put to insolent use 'with an affectation of politeness'. — The Heavenly Glory (1663) _ The Val-de-Grâce is one of the most important Baroque churches in Paris. It was designed by François Mansart, its dome follows the example of the St. Peter's in Rome. The circular fresco of the dome depicts the Trinity in Glory surrounded by saints, martyrs, and illustrious personalities. There are more then 200 figures in the composition including Queen Anne of Austria (the wife of Louis XIII), founder of the church. — Girl Blowing Soap Bubbles (1674, 132x96cm) — The Virgin of the Grapes (1645, 121x94cm) _ [compare Madonna and Child with Grapes (1537) by Lucas Cranach the Elder] |
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