Master of the Female Half-Lengths | Renaissance painter

The Master of the Female Half-Lengths, active ca.1530-1540, was a Dutch Northern Renaissance painter* or likely a group of painters of a workshop.

The name was given in the 19th century to identify the maker or makers of a body of work consisting of 67 paintings to which since 40 more have been added.

The works were apparently the product of a large workshop that specialized in small-scale panels depicting aristocratic young ladies at half-length.

Gerard ter Borch | Baroque painter

Gerard Terborch, Terborch also spelled Ter Borch or Terburg (1617-1681), Dutch Baroque painter who developed his own distinctive type of interior genre in which he depicted with grace and fidelity the atmosphere of well-to-do, middle-class life in 17th-century Holland.

Terborch’s father had been an artist and had visited Rome but from 1621 was employed as a tax collector.

Van Gogh | Saintes-Maries (series)

Saintes-Maries is the subject of a series of paintings that Vincent van Gogh made in 1888.

When Van Gogh lived in Arles, he took a trip to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer on the Mediterranean sea, where he made several paintings of the seascape and town.

The work he produced in Saintes-Maries took on a more experimental and expressive style than his earlier work.

Over the course of his visit, Van Gogh made two paintings of the sea, one of the village, and nine drawings.

Vincent van Gogh | Small bottle with peonies and blue delphiniums, 1886

Vincent van Gogh began experimenting with color in his still life flower series.

By the summer of 1885, the artist created some 40 paintings with a traditional approach, meaning that the flowers were in a vase and placed in the center of the canvas.

His 1886 painting Small Bottle with Peonies and Blue Delphiniums, done with oil on painter's board -a cheaper material than canvas-, from the Gemeente Museum collection, is one of them.

Flowers became the subject of many of the artist's works during this period.

But after painting over 10 species in mid-September, he sought out other subjects including fruit, shoes, fish and budding flower bulbs.

Vincent van Gogh | Small bottle with peonies and blue delphiniums, 1886 | Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

Johan Barthold Jongkind | Impressionist painter

Johan Barthold Jongkind (1819-1891) painter and printmaker whose small, informal landscapes continued the tradition of the Dutch landscapists while also stimulating the development of Impressionism.

Jongkind first studied under local landscape painters at The Hague.

In 1846 he moved to Paris and worked under the genre painter Eugène Isabey and François Picot.

Vincent van Gogh | Sunflowers series

Sunflowers (original title, in French: Tournesols) are the subject of two series of still life paintings by the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh.

The earlier series, executed in Paris in 1887, depicts the flowers lying on the ground, while the second set, executed a year later in Arles, shows bouquets of sunflowers in a vase.

In the artist's mind both sets were linked by the name of his friend Paul Gauguin, who acquired two of the Paris versions.

Vincent van Gogh | Sunflowers, 1887 | National Gallery, London

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 | Lady with Her Maidservant Holding a Letter, 1667

Lady with Her Maidservant Holding a Letter is a painting produced by Jan Vermeer (Delft, 1632-1675), now in the Frick Collection in New York City.

The work of Johannes Vermeer (also known as Jan), is well known for many characteristics that are present in this painting.

The use of yellow and blue, female models, and domestic scenes are all signatures of Vermeer.

This oil on canvas portrays two women, a Mistress and her Maid, as they look over the Mistress' love letter.

Mistress and Maid was painted over the years 1666-1670 on a canvas.

The painting shows an elegant mistress and her maid as they look over a love letter that the mistress just received.