Marcantonio Franceschini | Baroque painter

Marcantonio Franceschini, (born April 5, 1648, Bologna, Papal States [Italy] - died Dec. 24, 1729, Bologna), Italian painter🎨, a leading artist of the Bolognese school of the Baroque period🎨.

Franceschini worked in Genoa, Modena, and Rome as well as in Bologna and worked extensively for patrons in Austria and Germany.

He was made director of the Clementina Academy in Bologna in 1721.

Franceschini was the last important representative of the tradition of the Carracci🎨; the works of Lodovico Carracci🎨 and Francesco Albani are the main sources of his style.

Lorenzo Pasinelli | Baroque painter

Lorenzo Pasinelli (September 4, 1629 - March 4, 1700) was an Italian painter🎨 active mainly in Bologna during the late Baroque period.

He was born in Bologna, and initially trained in the studio of Simone Cantarini. He then pursued studies in Rome. Despite that training, his works have an air of Mannerism🎨.

In an overview of two major Bolognese painters circa 1700, one author describes that Pasinelli:

• "Lorenzo liked the design of Raphael🎨 joined with the charm of Paolo Veronese🎨; while Carlo (Cignani) liked the grace of Correggio🎨 united to the erudition of Annibale (Carracci)🎨 ... while Pisanelli did not attain a fullness of correct design, which (Veronese) had advanced ... no one will fail to recognize in Pisanelli large picturesque fire and great new ideas, but sometimes is a tad forced in his movements, and using new and bizarre clothes".

El Greco | Mannerist painter

Doménikos Theotokópoulos / Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος (1541-1614), most widely known as El Greco ("The Greek"), was a painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance.

"El Greco" was a nickname, a reference to his Greek origin, and the artist normally signed his paintings with his full birth name in Greek letters, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος (Doménikos Theotokópoulos), often adding the word Κρής (Krēs, "Cretan").

17th century Artists | Sitemap

The 17th century was the century that lasted from January 1, 1601, to December 31, 1700, in the Gregorian calendar.

It falls into the Early Modern period of Europe and in that continent (whose impact on the world was increasing) was characterized by the Baroque cultural movement, the latter part of the Spanish Golden Age, the Dutch Golden Age, the French Grand Siècle dominated by Louis XIV, the Scientific Revolution, and according to some historians, the General Crisis.

The greatest military conflicts were the Thirty Years' War, the Great Turkish War, and the Dutch-Portuguese War.

It was during this period also that European colonization of the Americas began in earnest, including the exploitation of the silver deposits, which resulted in bouts of inflation as wealth was drawn into Europe.

La Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi /The fountain of the four rivers, 1651

Market painting | Page 2

Hendrik Martensz Sorgh (Dutch Baroque Era painter, ca.1611-1670)

Donato Creti | Astronomical Observations, 1711

Donato Creti (24 February 1671 - 31 January 1749) was an Italian painter🎨 of the Rococo period, active mostly in Bologna.

The series of Astronomical observations was commissioned in 1711 by the Bolognese count Luigi Marsili.

He had the artist Donato Creti paint all the planets in as many small pictures and made a gift of these to the Pope to convince him of the importance for the Holy Church of an astronomical observatory.

The gift made it possible to achieve his goal, because with the support of Clement XI (pontiff from 1700-1721) the first public astronomical observatory was opened in Bologna a short time later.

Donato Creti | Osservazioni Astronomiche - Marte

Mattia Preti | Baroque Era painter

Mattia Preti (24 February 1613 - 3 January 1699) was an Italian Baroque artist🎨 who worked in Italy and Malta. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Saint John.

Born in the small town of Taverna in Calabria, Preti was called Il Cavalier Calabrese (the Calabrian Knight) after appointment as a Knight of the Order of St. John (Knights of Malta) in 1660.

His early apprenticeship is said to have been with the "Caravaggist" Giovanni Battista Caracciolo, which may account for his lifelong interest in the style of Caravaggio🎨.

Gaspar van Wittel | Baroque / Veduta painter

Caspar van Wittel or Gaspar van Wittel - born Jasper Adriaensz van Wittel; Italian name variations: Gaspare Vanvitelli, Gasparo degli Occhiali- (1652/1653, Amersfoort - September 13, 1736, Rome) was a Dutch painter and draughtsman who had a long career in Rome.

He played a pivotal role in the development of the genre of topographical painting known as veduta.

He is credited with turning topography into a painterly specialism in Italian art.

Johannes Vermeer | Baroque Era painter

The life and art of Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) are closely associated with the city of Delft.

He was born in Delft in 1632 and lived there until his death in 1675. His father, Reynier Vermeer, was a silk weaver who produced caffa, a fine satin fabric, but in 1631 he also registered in the Saint Luke’s Guild in Delft as a master art dealer.

By 1641 he was sufficiently prosperous to purchase a large house, the “Mechelen”, which contained an inn on the market square in Delft and from which he probably also sold paintings.

Johannes Vermeer | The Girl with a Pearl Earring, 1665

Girl with a Pearl Earring / Meisje met de parel is Vermeer’s most famous painting.

It is not a portrait, but a ‘tronie’ - a painting of an imaginary figure. Tronies depict a certain type or character; in this case a girl in exotic dress, wearing an oriental turban and an improbably large pearl in her ear.

Johannes Vermeer was the master of light. This is shown here in the softness of the girl’s face and the glimmers of light on her moist lips. And of course, the shining pearl. | © Mauritshuis Museum in Hague

El Greco | Life and Artworks

El Greco, byname of Doménikos Theotokópoulos (born 1541, Candia [Iráklion], Crete-died April 7, 1614, Toledo, Spain), master of Spanish painting, whose highly individual dramatic and expressionistic style met with the puzzlement of his contemporaries but gained newfound appreciation in the 20th century. He also worked as a sculptor and as an architect.

El Greco never forgot that he was of Greek descent and usually signed his paintings in Greek letters with his full name, Doménikos Theotokópoulos. He is, nevertheless, generally known as El Greco ("the Greek"), a name he acquired when he lived in Italy, where the custom of identifying a man by designating country or city of origin was a common practice.

he curious form of the article (El), however, may be the Venetian dialect or more likely from the Spanish.

Adam de Coster | Baroque / Genre painter

Little is known of the biography of Adam de Coster (1586 in Mechelen - 4 May 1643 in Antwerp).

Born in 1586 in the Flemish city of Mechelen, a province of Antwerp, he appears to have spent much of his career in Antwerp and became a Master of the Guild of Saint Luke around 1607.

His portrait was reproduced as an engraving in Anthony van Dyck's🎨 Iconography, where he was described as "pictor noctium", signaling that his reputation as a painter of night scenes had firmly been established in Northern Europe by the 1630s.

Although documentary evidence only ever records de Coster outside of Antwerp in 1635 when he visited Hamburg, Nicolson has noted that correspondences between his paintings and the works of the Lombard artist Antonio Campi suggest a possible sojourn to Italy.

Gerard van Honthorst | Baroque Era painter

Gerard van Honthorst (1590-1656) became one of the main Dutch followers of Caravaggio, whose style he popularised in Holland on his return from a stay in Rome, 1610-20.

With paintings such as 'Christ before the High Priest' he became one of the few Dutch painters to achieve international fame.

Baroque Art History and Sitemap

Baroque was the principal European style in the visual arts of the 17th century.

The term covers various national styles that range from the complex and dramatic Italian art of the 17th century to the restrained genre scenes, still-lifes and portraits characteristic of the Dutch Baroque.

In Italy, Caravaggio painted altarpieces and introduced innovations such as dramatic lighting effects that influenced painters like Artemisia Gentileschi. Other artists, such as the Giovanni Battista Gaulli and Pietro da Cortona, executed illusionistic ceiling paintings.

Johannes Vermeer | Girl with a Pearl Earring, 1665

Johannes Vermeer | Legacy

Originally, Vermeer's (1632-1675) works were largely overlooked by art historians for two centuries after his death. A select number of connoisseurs in the Netherlands did appreciate his work, yet even so, many of his works were attributed to better-known artists such as Metsu or Mieris.

The Delft master's modern rediscovery began about 1860, when German museum director Gustav Waagen saw The Art of Painting in the Czernin gallery in Vienna and recognized the work as a Vermeer, though it was attributed to Pieter de Hooch at that time.

Research by Théophile Thoré-Bürger culminated in the publication of his catalogue raisonné of Vermeer's works in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts in 1866.

Pieter de Hooch | Pittore del Secolo d'oro Olandese

Pieter de Hooch (1629-1684) è stato un pittore Olandese.

All'età di sedici anni studiò ad Haarlem sotto la guida del maestro Nicolaes Berchem appena rientrato da un soggiorno in Italia.

La sua carriera si svolse all'Aia, ad Amsterdam e soprattutto a Delft, dove compose le sue opere, ritraendo scene di vita familiare della borghesia locale in vaste composizioni di carattere patriottico, in singoli ritratti o in scene di carattere.

Pieter de Hooch | Baroque Era painter

Pieter de Hooch, Hooch also spelled Hoogh or Hooghe (baptized Dec. 20, 1629, Rotterdam, Neth-buried March 24, 1684, Amsterdam), Dutch genre painter of the Delft school, noted for his interior scenes and masterful use of light.

De Hooch was a pupil of Claes Berchem at Haarlem.

From 1653 he was in the service of Justus de Grange and lived in Delft, The Hague, and Leiden.

He was a member of the Painters’ Guild of Delft from 1654-1657, but after that date there are no traces of his career until about 1667, when his presence was recorded in Amsterdam.

Sir Peter Paul Rubens | Baroque Era painter

Peter Paul Rubens, (born June 28, 1577, Siegen, Nassau, Westphalia [Germany] - died May 30, 1640, Antwerp, Spanish Netherlands [now in Belgium]), Flemish painter who was the greatest exponent of Baroque painting's🎨, dynamism, vitality, and sensuous exuberance. Though his masterpieces include portraits and landscapes, Rubens is perhaps best known for his religious and mythological compositions.

As the impresario of vast decorative programs, he presided over the most famous painter’s studio in Europe. His powers of invention were matched by extraordinary energy and versatility.

The art of Peter Paul Rubens is a fusion of the traditions of Flemish realism with the Classicizing tendencies of the Italian Renaissance🎨. Rubens was able to infuse his own astounding vitality into a powerful and exuberant style that came to epitomize the Baroque art of the 17th century.

Giacomo Ceruti | Baroque / Genre / Portrait painter

Giacomo Antonio Melchiorre Ceruti (October 13, 1698 - August 28, 1767) was an Italian🎨 late Baroque painter🎨, active in Northern Italy in Milan, Brescia, and Venice. He acquired the nickname Pitocchetto (the little beggar) for his many paintings of peasants dressed in rags.

He was born in Milan, but worked primarily in Brescia. He may have been influenced early by Antonio Cifrondi and/or Giacomo Todesco (Todeschini), and received training from Carlo Ceresa. While he also painted still-life paintings and religious scenes, Ceruti is best known for his genre paintings, especially of beggars and the poor, whom he painted realistically and endowed with unusual dignity and individuality.

Ceruti gave particular attention to this subject matter during the period 1725-1740, and about 50 of his genre paintings from these years survive.

Guercino | Baroque painter

Giovanni Francesco Barbieri (1591-1666) was called Guercino in reference to his pronounced squint.

He was the leading Bolognese painter after the death of Guido Reni. His earlier pictures typically combine the chiaroscuro effects of Caravaggio with a charm and softness not usually found in followers of this artist.