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• 1 2017-01-14T20:21:20-08:00 Blake Marginalia SA xxix A01 4 plain 2017-03-18T12:06:28-07:00
  Here is an Acknowledgement of all that I could wish
  But if it is True. Why are we to be told that Masters who could Think had not the Judgment to Perform the Inferior Parts of Art as Reynolds artfully calls them. But that we are to learn to Think from Great Masters & to Learn to Perform from Underlings? Learn to design from Rafael & to Execute from Rubens [line cut away]
  
  Annotation written in pen.
• 1 media/790px-Rembrandt_van_Rijn_-_Self-Portrait_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg 2017-03-08T22:56:55-08:00 Rembrandt von Rijn 2 (1606-1669) image_header 2017-03-09T10:09:20-08:00 A prolific painter, draftsman, and etcher, Rembrandt is usually regarded as the greatest artist of Holland’s “Golden Age.” He worked first in his native Leiden and, from 1632 onward, in Amsterdam, where he had studied briefly (ca. 1624) with the influential history painter Pieter Lastman. Rembrandt never went abroad, but he voraciously surveyed the work of Northern artists who had lived in Italy, like Lastman, the Utrecht painter Gerrit van Honthorst (Rembrandt’s main link to Caravaggio), Anthony van Dyck, and—mostly through prints—Adam Elsheimer and Peter Paul Rubens. In the Leiden period, Rembrandt also responded strongly to earlier Netherlandish artists such as Lucas van Leyden (1489/94–1533). However, a crucial aspect of Rembrandt’s development was his intense study of people, objects, and their surroundings “from life,” as is obvious in paintings like his early self-portraits and the Saint Paul in Prison of 1627 (Stuttgart, Staatsgalerie). Even by Dutch standards, Rembrandt’s preoccupation with direct observation was exceptional and continued throughout his career. Despite the constant evolution of his style, Rembrandt’s compelling descriptions of light, space, atmosphere, modeling, texture, and human situations may be traced back even from his late works (such as The Jewish Bride, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum) to the foundations of his Leiden years. It was also this program, in good part, that made Rembrandt a great teacher. His many pupils included Gerrit Dou, Govert Flinck, Ferdinand Bol, Nicolaes Maes, and Carel Fabritius.
   
  In Amsterdam, Rembrandt became a prominent portraitist, attracting attention with dramatic compositions like The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp (1632; The Hague, Mauritshuis). In securing commissions, the artist was assisted by the Mennonite art dealer Hendrick Uylenburgh, whose cousin Saskia married Rembrandt in 1634. The Mennonites advocated personal interpretation of scripture, which probably influenced Rembrandt’s subjective and often moving treatment of biblical subjects. The artist became highly successful in the 1630s, when he had several pupils and assistants, started his own art collection, and lived the life of a cultivated gentleman, especially in the impressive residence he purchased in 1639 (now the “Rembrandt House” museum). Rembrandt exudes confidence and urbanity in his Self-Portrait of 1640 (London, National Gallery), which was modeled upon courtly portraits by Raphael and Titian. These artists probably also inspired his Amsterdam signature, “Rembrandt” (dropping “van Rijn”).
   
  In the 1640s, Rembrandt’s frequently theatrical style of the previous decade gave way to a more contemplative manner, a mature example of which is Aristotle with a Bust of Homer (1653; 61.198). The change reflects period taste but also personal circumstances, such as Saskia’s death in 1642, financial problems, and the artist’s controversial relationship with his son’s nurse, Geertje Dircks, and then with his maidservant (and close companion) Hendrickje Stoffels. The great group portrait known as The Night Watch, dated 1642 (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum), could be said to mark the end of Rembrandt’s most successful years, but the legend that customer dissatisfaction ruined his reputation is refuted by later commissions from such prominent patrons as Jan Six and the Amsterdam city government. The extraordinary volume of Rembrandt’s production even after he declared insolvency in 1656 is punctuated by dozens of masterworks, like The Syndics of the Amsterdam Drapers’ Guild (1662; Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum).
   
  The powers of invention and perception that made Rembrandt a famous painter in his own time also made him a virtuoso draftsman (as is evident in works as different as The Last Supper after Leonardo da Vinci and Cottage among Trees (29.100.939) and the most innovative printmaker of the seventeenth century. In about 350 etchings, he extended the medium’s capacity to suggest various kinds of illumination and painterly effects. Some examples, like The Three Crosses of 1653, were radically revised in design and expression between different states.
   
  Rembrandt inspired numerous seventeenth-century Dutch and German painters, as well as eighteenth-century artists throughout Europe (for example, Fragonard and Tiepolo) and a broad range of nineteenth-century realists. Many imitations were made in later periods, but the great majority of Rembrandtesque paintings that are not by the master date from his lifetime and suggest that his approach appealed to a fairly large audience, especially in Amsterdam.
   
  Walter Liedtke
  Department of European Paintings, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  October 2003
  
  
• 1 media/Peter_Paul_Rubens_-_Self-Portrait_-_WGA20380.jpg 2017-03-08T23:09:15-08:00 Peter Paul Rubens 2 (1577-1640) image_header 2017-03-09T10:12:22-08:00 Peter Paul Rubens was born in Siegen in Germany, but from the age of 10 he lived and went to school in Antwerp. His first job, at the age of 13, was as court page to a countess. It was a prestigious position for a young man, but Rubens found it stifling and began training as an artist. 
  
  As soon as he had completed his training, he set out for Italy in order to see for himself the great Renaissance and classical works that he knew from copies. For eight years, he travelled and worked in Spain, copying and incorporating the techniques of Renaissance and classical art.
  
  Antwerp
  
  In 1608 news came that Rubens's mother was dying. He left immediately for Antwerp, but by the time he arrived she had died. Once home, Rubens decided to stay in the city. His reputation had preceded him, and in 1609 at the age of 33 he was appointed court painter to the rulers of the Netherlands, the Archduke Albert and his wife Isabella.The following year, he married his own Isabella - Isabella Brandt.
  
  Rubens could now afford to buy a grand house in a fashionable part of Antwerp. He built a large studio to accommodate his pupils and assistants (he received far too many commissions to complete them all single-handedly). He designed it himself in an Italian style. He also added a circular sculpture hall, based on the Pantheon, to the house.
  
  Rubens's major business was altarpieces, particularly suitable for an artist who enjoyed working on a grand scale. A diligent and disciplined man, he rose at 4am each day and worked until 5 in the evening before going out riding to keep himself physically fit. While painting, he would have someone read to him from a work of classical literature. An enthusiastic collector of gems, ancient sculpture and coins, and other curiosities (including an Egyptian mummy), Rubens's collection became a well-known attraction for visiting dignitaries.
  
  The diplomat
  
  In 1622 Rubens was commissioned to carry out a huge project in Paris for the notoriously difficult Maria de Medici, widow of King Henry IV of France. Two entire galleries were to be decorated with scenes from the lives of the queen and her late husband. The commission was a fraught one. Maria was awkward and changeable; and her favourite, Cardinal Richelieu, saw Rubens as a political threat. After years of wrangling, the project was abandoned half completed when Maria was banished from court.
  
  In 1625 the plague reached Antwerp. Rubens moved his family to Brussels until the worst of it had passed. They then moved back to Antwerp where, to Rubens's horror, his wife became ill and died, probably of plague. Usually a man who prided himself on his stoicism, Rubens was devastated by the loss of 'one whom I must love and cherish as long as I live'.
  
  Rubens threw himself into his diplomatic work in order to distract himself. He spent several months in England where he carried out several commissions for Charles I who was a passionate collector of art. One of the commissions that Rubens was to carry out for Charles was the decoration of the roof of his new Banqueting House at Whitehall.
  
  Court artist
  
  From the mid-1620s Rubens become increasingly busy with diplomatic duties. Antwerp, in the southern Netherlands, was part of an empire ruled by Catholic Spain. The Protestant northern Netherlands were united under Dutch rule. Both sides hoped to unite the Netherlands under their own regime.
  
  In 1610, a 12 year truce between the Dutch and the Spanish had allowed the Archdukes Albert and Isabella to continue their Catholic rule in peace and stability. In 1621 the truce came to an end and just at this crucial time, the sovereign Archduke Albert died. His consort, Isabella, continued as governor but her situation was a precarious one as Spain, France and England tried to decide who they should ally themselves with, and against whom. 
  
  Rubens was called upon to negotiate in France and England on behalf of Isabella as the representative of the Spanish Netherlands. Because painters often had reason to travel to foreign courts, he was well placed to carry out secret or delicate visits without his presence arousing suspicion. He became a close confidante of Isabella and she valued his advice.
  
  In 1624 Rubens was granted a patent of nobility by Isabella's nephew Philip IV and in 1627 she moved him even further up the social scale by making him a 'gentleman of the household'.
  
  Last yearsAfter 18 months abroad, Rubens had had enough of the thankless task of politicking. He returned to Antwerp to see his children and to look after his domestic affairs. He could also dedicate himself entirely to painting. One of his most important patrons in the 1630s was King Philip IV of Spain who commissioned over 80 paintings. 
  
  In 1630, at the age of 53, Rubens married again. To everyone's surprise he did not marry into the nobility, but chose Hélène Fourment, the 16 year-old daughter of a respectable merchant family. Rubens was clearly bowled over by his new wife with whom he had five children, and she figures in numerous portraits, including a version of 'The Judgement of Paris' in which she appears as Venus. 
  
  During his last years Rubens spent increasing amounts of time with his new young family in his country house, the Chateau de Steen. He began to paint more landscapes, often for his own enjoyment, rather than for sale. 
  
  Having suffered painfully from gout for several years, in 1639 a particularly bad attack left Rubens unable to paint and he died a few months later in May 1640.
  
  Biography written and found at the National Gallery.