ART “4”
“2”-DAY 14 September |
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Died on 14 September 1784: Michel~Nicolas~Bernard Lépicié,
French painter, draftsman, and professor, born on 16 June 1735. He painted
portraits, domestic genre scenes, and historical subjects. His best works,
although not entirely free from the sentimentality of the period, have something
of the tranquil beauty associated with Chardin. His father, François-Bernard
Lépicié [06 Oct 1698 – 17 Jan 1755] was an engraver
and writer on art. His mother, Renée-Elisabeth Marlie Lépicié [1714–1773],
was also an engraver. — Nicolas-Bernard Lépicié was taught engraving by his father before entering the studio of the painter Carle Vanloo. In 1759 he won second prize in the Prix de Rome competition at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, but he never went to Rome. He was approved (agréé) by the Académie Royale in 1764 on presentation of a vast painting of The Landing of William the Conqueror on the English Coast. He subsequently painted a series of pictures, including The Baptism of Christ (1765) and Christ and the Little Children (1767), as well as a Conversion of Saul (1767). In 1769 he was received (reçu) as a full member by the Académie Royale on presentation of Achilles and the Centaur Chiron. He became an assistant professor in 1770 and a professor in 1777. His studio had a fine reputation, and several painters prominent in the Neo-classical generation were trained there, including Carle Vernet, Jean-Baptiste Regnault, Jean-Joseph Taillasson, Henri-Pierre Danloux, Jean-Frédéric Schall, Nicolas-Antoine Taunay. Lépicié's early success was doubtless facilitated by his father’s reputation and by the friendship of Charles-Nicolas Cochin II, who had succeeded Bernard Lépicié as Secrétaire Perpétuel of the Académie Royale in 1755 and owned at least five of Nicolas-Bernard’s works. — LINKS — Le Petit Dessinateur: the painter Carle Vernet at age 14 (1772, 41x33cm) — A Mother Feeding her Child (1774) — Narcissus (1771; 329x424pix, 41kb) — Cour de ferme (1784, 64x77cm; 469x574pix excluding frame, 63kb including frame) _ Traversant une grave crise morale vers la fin de sa vie, l'artiste se retira fréquemment à la campagne et peignit des scènes rustiques, alors comparées à celles du flamand Teniers. Ce tableau s'accorde avec l'esprit d'un temps nouvellement épris de la vie simple des champs, loin de la ville corrompue. — Achilles is Instructed in Music by the Centaur Chiron (1769; 142x195cm; gif 351x504pix, 64kb) _ Academy admission piece. In Greek mythology, the centaur Chiron, who was skilled in the arts of music, war, hunting, ethics and medicine, had advised King Peleus, a mortal though a descendant of Zeus, how to make the sea nymph Thetis marry him. The child born from this union, Ligyron, had a problem with his heels which started when his mother gave him a bath, out in the sticks, without washing his heels, in fact without even getting them wet. Ligyron was not put in leg-irons, but he was handed over as an infant to be educated by Chiron, who renamed him Achilles. Achilles grew up to have severe psychological problems. He spent nine years as a transvestite, until he was recruited for an overseas military adventure which dragged on, unsuccessfully but bloodily, for another nine years until something snapped in Achilles's mind. At one time he refused to fight, and on another occasion he spent ten days dragging around behind his chariot the corpse of a dead enemy. For this desecration the gods withdrew their protection and he died in action. _ Compare: L'éducation d'Achille par le centaure Chiron by Lépicié's student Jean-Baptiste Regnault [1754 – 1829], Der Erziehung des Akilles (411x536pix, 253kb) by Christian Gottlieb Schick [15 Aug 1776 – 07 May 1812], Achilles and the Centaur Chiron (425x338pix, 45kb) by Pompeo Batoni [25 Jan 1708 – 04 Feb 1787], L'éducation d'Achille par Chiron (1690; 1100x767pix, 110kb) by Pierre Puget [16 Oct 1620 – 02 Dec 1694], The Infant Achilles Handed over to Chiron (125x163cm; 800x1076pix, 131kb) by Donato Creti [1671-1749] — [Quoi? Pas de portrait par Lepicié de l'épicier du coin?] |
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Born on 14 September 1876: Cesar Klein,
German painter, printmaker, poster and stage designer, who died on 13 May
1954. — [Only an oxymoron moron would say that Klein was gross.] — He attended the Kunstgewerbeschule in Hamburg about 1894, and art academies in Düsseldorf and Berlin about 1897. In the first decades of the 20th century he exhibited with the New Secessionists. He drew and painted still-lifes and figures in landscapes and interiors in a strongly Expressionist style, which revealed his admiration for Cubism and for the work of Ferdinand Hodler. He was an assiduous worker; besides paintings, woodcuts and lithographs, he designed stained-glass windows, mosaics, murals, and painted ceilings. He also decorated the interiors of a number of Berlin theaters, as well as the Marmorhaus cinema (1913). Klein and Gerhard Marcks joined Gropius to organize the 1914 Deutscher Werkbund exhibition in Cologne. — Plakat zur Wahl der Nationalversammlung: Arbeiter Bürger Bauern Soldaten ... (1919; 461x644pix, 96kb) — Commedia dell'Arte Scenes (1926) five details (each approximately 310x436pix, 29kb) _ this is from a wooden inlay decorating the balcony rear wall of Berlin's Renaissance-Theater. It bears the reverse text: "Berliner Theater sind eine Reise wert – Intarsie aus dem Zuschauerraum des Renaissance-Theaters – Entwurf: Cesar Klein". _ César Klein leitete die Klasse für Wand-, Glasmalerei und Bühnenbild an den Vereinigten Staatsschulen für freie und angewandte Kunst Berlin, als er den Auftrag für das Renaissance-Theater erhielt. Sein Intarsienwandbild zeigt Szenen und Motive der Commedia dell'arte mit den für sie typischen Figuren Harlekin, Pierrot, Columbine und anderen, die in ein System aus Stufenfolgen und Podien gestellt sind. Die Ausführung erfolgte durch die Intarsienwerkstatt Nast, die zu den bekanntesten Berlins gehörte. Die Bildfolge besteht aus gängigen Handlungsmotiven der Commedia dell'arte, in der es immer um die Liebe geht: Szenen der Werbung, Verführung, des heimlichen Stelldicheins, der Intrige, Verwirrung, Eifersucht, Entführung und des Duells. Kleins Darstellung des Maskenspiels, Reminiszenzen an Vorbilder wie Callot und Watteau, stellen Theatergeschichte dar. — The X (350x330pix, 30kb) — Brustbild einer südländischen Frau in italienischer oder südfranzösischer Tracht (1927, 18x14cm; 369x270pix, 39kb) — Brustbild einer Frau mit ornamentiertem Kostüm (1927, 17x11cm; 385x270pix, 44kb) |
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Died on 14 September 1743: Nicolas
Lancret, Parisian genre painter, draftsman, and collector,
born on 22 January 1690. — [Son style, Lancret l'ancrait dans l'imitation
de Watteau. Et quand il faisait une gravure, Lancret l'encrait?] His brilliant depictions of fêtes galantes, or scenes of courtly amusements taking place in Arcadian settings, reflected the society of his time. — He was, with Pater, the principal imitator of Watteau. After failing as a history painter he was influenced by Gillot's theatrical scenes as Watteau had been, and he spent the rest of his life painting fêtes galantes. — Lancret came from a family of Parisian artisans. After an apprenticeship with the history painter Pierre Dulin, and a term at the Royal Academy's school, he entered in 1712 the studio of Claude Gillot. Gillot, then director of scene designs and costumes for the Opera, probably introduced him to Jean-Antoine Watteau, with whom he developed a close stylistic affinity. In 1719 he was elected to membership in the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture as a painter of fêtes galantes, a category created two years earlier for Watteau. Lancret participated in the Exposition de la Jeunesse from 1722 to 1725, and exhibited regularly at the official Salons from 1737. He received a number of royal commissions (e.g., decorations for the Chateau de la Muette, the Louvre, and Versailles) and enjoyed the patronage of many prominent amateurs, including Frederick II of Prussia. Lancret gradually evolved an individual style, more decorative but less poetic and symbolic than Watteau's. Although he produced portraits and history paintings, his work is devoted primarily to aristocratic genre scenes- outdoor gatherings with themes of the dance, music, the hunt, and elegant repasts. Lancret's charming works are a perfect reflection of the spirit and customs of eighteenth-century French society. — Lancret was one of the most prolific and imaginative genre painters of the first half of the 18th century in France, and, although after his death he was long regarded as a follower and imitator of Antoine Watteau, his work is markedly personal and often innovative. He began training as an engraver but soon apprenticed himself to Pierre Dulin [1669–1748], a moderately successful history painter; by 1708 he had enrolled as a student at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Paris. At an unknown date Lancret entered the workshop of the genre and decorative painter Claude Gillot, who had been Watteau’s master. He then turned away from the history painting pursued by his friend François Lemoyne. Lancret’s move to Gillot is thought to have resulted from the increasing popularity of Watteau’s genre scenes of elegant figures in garden settings. Although Lancret never studied formally under Watteau — whom he probably met around 1712 — Lancret was strongly influenced by his work, particularly in his early paintings. In 1719 Lancret was received (reçu) into the Académie Royale as a painter of fêtes galantes, a category that had been created two years earlier especially for Watteau. Lancret’s morceau de réception, Conversation galante, depicts a garden scene peopled by figures dressed in commedia dell’arte costume. — Jean-Baptiste Descamps was a student of Lancret. — LINKS — Breakfast Before the Hunt (1740, 61x133cm) _ detail 1 _ detail 2 _ detail 3 dog — End of the Hunt (1740, 60x135cm) _ detail 1 _ detail 2 _ detail 3 — The Music Party (1740, 61x129cm) _ detail 1 _ detail 2 _ detail 3 — Baigneuses (1740, 61x130cm) _ detail 1 _ detail 2 — The Bird Cage (44x48cm; 916x1000pix, 180kb) _ Watteau's originality could be copied but not kept alive once Watteau himself was dead. He created a vogue, and this perhaps damaged his own art in the eyes of the next generation. Without Watteau the fête galante was soon to dwindle to triviality, but his example gave further impetus to the uncoordinated desire for freedom. The difficult balance between decoration and genre was to be held best in France by Nicolas Lancret, immensely successful during his lifetime, but who has perhaps suffered too much in reputation for his proximity to Watteau. Frederick the Great felt none of this, and collected both painters in quantity. Lancret did not attempt any psychological insight, but his eternal charm and his keen eye for contemporary manners led to pictures which occasionally are minor masterpieces. — Mademoiselle de Camargo Dancing (1730, 42x55cm; 790x1046pix, 189kb) _ One of the most celebrated dancers of her day, she was twenty when Lancret painted this portrait of her in character; it was immediately engraved. — Company in the Park (65x70cm; 980x1010pix, 192kb) — Fête dans un Bois (1725, 64x91cm; 770x1117pix, 176kb) — Luncheon Party (1735; 973x790pix, 74kb) _ The composition reflects Lancret's dependence on Watteau, under whom he had briefly studied about 1717. Watteau's profound poetic feeling becomes in Lancret no more than a picturesque and amiable evocation of the life of society. — Lady and Gentleman with two Girls and a Servant (1742, 89x98cm; 850x931pix, 118kb) — The Seat of Justice in the Parliament of Paris in 1723 (1724, 56x82cm; 718x1059pix, 136kb) — Winter (1738, 69x89cm; 800x1034pix, 131kb) — Summer (1738; 156kb) — The Swing (639x800pix, 36kb) — Le Moulinet (701x545pix, 51kb) — A Scene from Corneille's Tragedy "Le Comte d'Essex" (1734; 172kb) — The Marriage Contract (1738; 145kb) |
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Born on 14 September 1867: Charles Dana Gibson,
US Golden
Age illustrator, who drew "Gibson
Girl" (and many other subjects). He died on 23 December 1944. — She was tall and graceful as a gazelle, with a long neck balanced on broad shoulders and a mass of upswept wavy hair. She played tennis and golf, rode horses and bikes, and looked as coolly elegant in her shirtwaists as she did in evening dress. She was the US 's ideal, the wholly imaginary but throughly convincing Gibson Girl. When the first of his "girls" appeared in one of Charles Dana Gibson's illustrations in the early 1890's, the US was still something of a social backwater. The country's newly rich were prone to proving their worth by marrying their daughters off to titled Europeans, no matter how fusty or gout ridden. Gibson disapproved. And in his lampoons of such behavior, he created an image of US womanhood where none had existed before. In her sweeping skirts and towering pompadour, the Gibson Girl, who appeared week after week in the humor magazine Life, among other publications, was an enticingly noble creature. Slightly aloof, she was a goddess forever being wooed by unworthy suitors. Not even the squarejawed, clean-shaven Gibson Man quite measured up. But while she was definitely upper crust, she was not a snob. In short, she was a paragon. Men idolized her and women looked to her to learn how to dress, walk, sit, and dine. "You can always tell when a girl is taking the Gibson Cure," wrote on observer, "by the way she fixes her hair." In fact, the whole country seemed to be taking the Gibson Cure. People filled their parlors and bedrooms with franchised likenesses of the girl, framed as lithographs, engraved on wood, printed on chinaware, embossed on spoons, and repeated on wallpaper. So great was her popularity between the 1890's and World War I that Gibson earned as much as $65'000 a year (close to one million dollars of 2003), and women on two continents claimed to have been his original model. During those prewar decades the Gibson Girl made a lot of people feel pride in being of the US, for hers was a style that few could resist. "Parents in the United States are no better than eleswhere," wrote one European visitor, "but their daughters! Divinely tall, brows like Juno, throats that Aphrodite might envy. — Portrait of Gibson on a Time cover — LINKS — The Old Cover Artist Goes Landscape (1922) _ closely watched by four Gibson girls. — Three untitled drawings from The Weaker Sex (1903): [dizzy between two girls] _ [4 girls and bug-sized man] _ [doctor listens to hearbeat of man watching maid] — A Park Orator (1896) — Two drawings from A Widow and her Friends (1901): She decides to die in spite of Dr. Bottles _ Woman in Mourning — Three drawings from Other People (1911): Molly Bawn _ Man with Cane _ Free Lunch |
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Died on 14 September 1637: Theodor
Rombouts (or Rombout), Flemish artist born on 02 July 1597.
He was a brother-in-law of Jan
Philips van Thielen. — In his native Antwerp he was a student of Janssens, an Italianate painter of merit, then from about 1616 to about 1625 he was in Italy. In Rome, he came under the strong influence of the art of Caravaggio. Among others, two paintings by Rombouts, The Luteplayer and The Fortuneteller, are characterized by a Caravaggesque dramatic contrast of light and dark. Upon his return to Antwerp, he continued to paint genre scenes of musicians and cardplayers, as well as religious subjects, using a strong tenebroso (heavily shadowed) style. In later years, Rombouts adopted a lighter, looser palette that suggests the influence of both Peter Paul Rubens and Anthony van Dyck . Cavalier and a Market Girl, the painting of a market girl confronted with the amorous advances of a young cavalier, dates from this later period. The scene may may be an allegory of the sense of touch; the artichoke in the foreground is a reminder that if not handled carefully, a beautiful and delicious thing can be a source of pleasure or pain. Perhaps the artist is telling us that relationships can be like the artichoke-attractive and yet potentially painful. — The Backgammon Players (1634, 160 x 235cm; 460x700pix, 42kb — ZOOM to 794x1400pix, 77kb) Two works by Theodoor Rombouts are among his most intriguing and unusual. As another painter drawn to Italy following his training in Antwerp, Rombouts quickly adopted many of Caravaggio's most superficial traits. Stylistic lessons learned by Rombouts in Italy are clearly evident in the work exhibited here. Caravaggesque lighting and figure placement are among the elements marking the new direction seen in his oeuvre at the time. When comparing The Backgammon Players the viewer is struck by how these and other features soon become tempered as Flemish influences reassert themselves in pictures by Rombouts. Two motifs — a drawn curtain and the raking light on the back wall-serve as signposts for this transition. In The Musicians (648x386pix, 35kb — ZOOM to 1111x772pix, 59kb), for example, where Caravaggio's influence is more evident, a heavy drape is pulled back to reveal an unarticulated wall. Only the strong contrasts of the raking light across this wall give any indication of the relative depth of the room. The Raleigh picture again finds Rombouts pressing his figures to the extreme foreground of the composition, but the room is deeper, the curtain all but eliminated, and the raking light reduced to a minimum. Here, the mildly classicizing Flemish style of Rubens and Van Dyck assumes a greater presence. The deeper space and monumental yet mildly classicizing figures found in The Backgammon Players effectively remove it from the more Caravaggesque manner seen in The Musicians. The painter's capitulation in The Backgammon Players to the manner of the great Flemish masters of the seventeenth century is almost complete. Although it falls within the mainstream of the Flemish Baroque style, the painting is not entirely divorced from the innovations of Caravaggio. There are many reminders of this Antwerp painter's sojourn in Italy and his waning attraction for the art of Caravaggio, including the placement of the figures, the rustic character given to some of them, and the hint of Caravaggesque tenebrism. Recent scholarship on The Backgammon Players has centered on two aspects of its composition: the identification of some of the figures and an interpretation of the game of backgammon, or tric-trac. Genre scenes with moralizing overtones, both in paintings and prints, have long been associated with Rombouts, and interpretation of these scenes, including the Raleigh picture, has emphasized the negative qualities connected with games, be they cards or backgammon. Slatkes, for example, in explaining early misunderstandings of the imagery, linked the two games. There was some early confusion concerning both the subject matter and date of this late work by Rombouts when Roggen described it as depicting chess players and incorrectly read the date as 1632. The error regarding the subject was understandable, given the unusually elegant rendering of the various figures, in addition to their elaborate costumes, graceful gestures, and upper-class demeanor. Indeed, these are exactly what one would expect to find in a painting of the courtly game of chess rather than in one of backgammon, much less highly regarded. Except for the inclusion of the backgammon board, everything in the manner in which Rombouts has handled his subject matter, including the attitude of the three onlookers to the viewer's right, suggests that he may have originally had the old allegorical chess game of the sexes in mind. Backgammon, in contrast, was usually associated with, at best, idle time-wasting and at worst, gambling and violent behavior. Do the colorful costume and feathered hat of the work's principal "player" in the Raleigh picture, including the sword at his waist, link him to the more aristocratic figures of the woman and her young daughter? Or should the viewer instead come to more negative conclusions regarding the character of this man, and by association his followers? It remains to be seen whether messages related to other sins, to games of love, or to backgammon's condemnation by the church can be read into the scene. Among the obstacles interfering with such interpretations for The Backgammon Players are the portraits found within the composition. The three prominent figures in the painting have been linked to known portraits of the painter, his wife, and young daughter. Their presence calls into question any possible negative tone of the imagery. Vlieghe, in citing professional pride and marital harmony as reasons behind some of Rombouts's other images of himself and family, is not as certain about the function of this work. Consequently, the difficulty encountered by scholars in trying to reconcile the two opposing faces of The Backgammon Players leaves the full significance of this mature work by Rombouts lost within the shadows of the seventeenth century. — LINKS — Allegory of the Five Senses (207x288cm; 870x1199pix, 168kb) _ detail: Hearing (1121x820pix, 119kb) _ Art-lovers in the 16th and 17th centuries were very fond of emblematic paintings, although the content of a work of art often served merely as a pretext for a display of painterly ingenuity. The Allegory of the Five Senses by Theodore Rombouts fits this pattern perfectly. From left to right, sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell are represented by figures and attributes set in a lively and colorful composition. The painting was commissioned by Bishop Anton Triest, a well-known patron of the arts in Ghent. — Two Card Players and Three Bystanders (152x206cm; 800x1123pix, 136kb) _ As far as the subject matter is concerned, this is a genre painting, depicting as it does a jolly scene from everyday life probably with a moralizing undertone. The painting is large in format, realistic in conception and traditional in style, and its subject is portrayed in sober and monumental fashion. — Two Card Players (850x997pix, 102kb) _ The influence of Rubens, the best painter in all genres in the 17th-century Flanders, overlaid that of Caravaggio which had swept over north European painting since before 1600. Rombouts hesitated between Caravaggio and Rubens as can be detected in this picture. |
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