Philippe Mercier | Rococo painter

Philippe Mercier (also spelled Philip Mercier; 1689 - 18 July 1760) was an artist of French Huguenot descent from the German realm of Brandenburg-Prussia (later Kingdom of Prussia), usually defined to French school.

Active in England for most of his working life, Mercier is considered one of the first practitioners of the Rococo style, and is credited with influencing a new generation of 18th-century English artists.

Mercier was born c. 1689-1691 in Berlin, the son of Pierre Mercier (died 1729, Dresden), a Huguenot tapestry-worker.

Sir Peter Lely | Baroque painter

Sir Peter Lely (14 September 1618 - 7 December 1680) was a painter of Dutch origin whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court.

Lely was born Pieter van der Faes to Dutch parents in Soest in Westphalia, where his father was an officer serving in the armed forces of the Elector of Brandenburg.

Lely studied painting in Haarlem, where he may have been apprenticed to Pieter de Grebber.

He became a master of the Guild of Saint Luke in Haarlem in 1637.

He is reputed to have adopted the surname "Lely" (also occasionally spelled Lilly) from a heraldic lily on the gable of the house where his father was born in The Hague.

Orazio Borgianni | Baroque painter

Orazio Borgianni (6 April 1574 - 14 January 1616) was an Italian painter and etcher of the Mannerist and early-Baroque periods. He was the stepbrother of the sculptor and architect Giulio Lasso.

Borgianni was born in Rome, where he was documented in February 1604. He was instructed in the art of painting by his brother, Giulio Borgianni, called Scalzo.

The patronage by Philip II of Spain induced him to visit Spain, where he signed an inventory in January 1605.

He returned to Rome from Spain after April 1605 at the height of his career, and most of the work of his maturity was carried out 1605–16.

Cesare Dandini | Baroque painter

Cesare Dandini (1 October 1596 - 7 February 1657) was an Italian painter of the Baroque period, active mainly in his native city of Florence.

He was the older brother of the painter Vincenzo Dandini (1609-1675).

His nephew, Pietro was a pupil of Vincenzo, and Pietro's two sons, Ottaviano Dandini and the Jesuit priest Vincenzo also worked as painters in Florence.

According to the biographer Baldinucci, Cesare first worked under Francesco Curradi, then Cristofano Allori, and finally Domenico Passignano.

Eustache Le Sueur | Baroque painter

Eustache Le Sueur or Lesueur (19 November 1617 – 30 April 1655) was a French artist and one of the founders of the French Academy of Painting. He is known primarily for his paintings of religious subjects. He was a leading exponent of the neoclassical style of Parisian Atticism.

Training and career

He was born in Paris, where he spent his entire life. His father, Cathelin Le Sueur, a turner and sculptor in wood, placed him with Vouet, in whose studio he rapidly distinguished himself.

Admitted at an early age into the guild of master-painters, he left them to take part in establishing the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1648 and was elected as one of the original twelve elders in charge of its administration.

Tomasz Rut, 1961 | Neo Baroque painter

Named one of the most collectible living artists, Tomasz Rut continues to expand the realm of contemporary figurative painting to the artistic limits reached only by the Great Masters of the past. Often compared to the epic works of the Antiquity, Renaissance and Baroque, his Classical artwork, inducted into The Vatican Collection by Pope Benedict XVI, resurrects the dormant tradition of figurative painting, emulating the style, harmonious elegance and passion in the spirit of Michelangelo, Raphael or Caravaggio, but does it in an eloquent, modern adaptation, accommodating the contemporary viewer.

Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder | Baroque painter

Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder (1573-1621) was a Flemish-born Dutch still life painter and art dealer.

He is recognised as one of the earliest painters who created floral still lifes as an independent genre.

He founded a dynasty of painters who continued his style of floral and fruit painting and turned Middelburg into the leading centre for flower painting in the Dutch Republic.

Timeline of Art History

An Art Period is a phase in the development of the work of an artist, groups of artists or art movement.

The history of art is immense and the earliest cave paintings pre-date writing by almost 27,000 years!

Ancient Classical art

Minoan art

Ancient Greek art

Roman art

Ancient Egyptian colors