The History of Art and The Curious Lives of Famous Painters

2010-07-24T21:42:00.000-07:00

2010-07-24T21:31:00.000-07:00

Black Death Plague and Art History - Medieval era

2009-10-06T16:12:00.001-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sw771FW6ljo

Jacob Tintoretto

2008-09-09T07:22:00.000-07:00

Jacob Tintoretto was born during a flood in Venice, the year was 1519. Known as Tintoretto-the "little dyer"-because his...more here

Ventura Salimbeni

2008-09-09T07:13:00.000-07:00

Ventura Salimbeni was one of the most outstanding painters of the Mannerist school in the 16th century. The prevailing characteristic of his paintings...more here

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres Quote

2008-09-02T05:40:00.000-07:00

A paintings is not completely finished until the artist has separated the spirit from body . -- Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres

Grant Wood Quote

2008-09-02T05:31:00.000-07:00

All the really good ideas I ever had came to me while I was milking a cow. --Grant Wood

Man Ray Art Quote

2008-09-02T05:27:00.000-07:00

All critics should be assassinated. -- Man Ray

Jan van Eyck

2008-09-01T07:13:00.000-07:00

Early Northern Renaissance Flemish Painter, founder of the Bruges school. Biography here

Rogier Van der Weyden

2008-09-01T07:04:00.000-07:00

The Annunciation, oil on panel — circa 1440 Musée du Louvre, Paris

Rogier van der Weyden's early training was in the workshop of the town goldsmith. Although it is not known if he ever actually worked in the trade. Approaching thirty, he began...more here

Matthias Grünewald, Flemish Painter of the Gothic Era

2008-09-01T06:52:00.000-07:00

Grünewald lived during troubled and restless times. The world was in transition. The old medieval order imposed by the Church was buckling under the expansion of towns, the rise of the merchant class, the emergence of national states, the spread of religious reform and invention of the printing press. People were becoming fascinated with science.....more here

Andrea del Verrocchio

2008-08-31T14:31:00.000-07:00

Verrocchio' s workshop was the first one in Florence where oil-painting was systematically carried on. He also guided Florence landscape painting into new paths. In contrast to...more here

Pietro Perugino

2008-08-31T14:25:00.000-07:00

Art historians regard the Renaissance to be the true beginning of art history. The term "renaissance" means "rebirth". Pietro Perugino's personal life was wild and....more here

Pietro Perugino

2008-08-31T14:17:00.000-07:00

Art historians regard the Renaissance to be the true beginning of art history. The term "renaissance" means "rebirth". Pietro Perugino's personal life was wild and ....more here

Francesco Francia

2008-08-31T14:07:00.000-07:00

One of the most famous Bolognese painters of the Italian Renaissance. Francesco Francia was born in Bologna a bustling town in Northern Italy. He collaborated...more here

A list of painters who often depicted the devil and the tortures of hell.

2008-08-30T07:51:00.000-07:00

A list of painters who often depicted the devil and the tortures of hell.
William Blake British, 1757-1827 Romantic Painter
Eugène Delacroix French, 1798 - 1863 Romantic Painter
Lucas Cranach German, 1472-1553 Northern Renaissance
Hieronymus Bosch Dutch, 1450-1516 Late Gothic, Surrealism
Pieter Brueghel the Elder Dutch, 1525-1569 Northern Renaissance
Albrecht Dure German, 1471 - 1528 Northern Renaissance

Satan in Art history

2008-08-30T07:43:00.000-07:00

Christian culture and values. Satan and his evil minions were often included as a sort of cautionary tale. These spiritually significant images are complex, fraught with religious fervor and symbolism. Symbols of Satan in art history include... more here

The Monastic Scriptorium

2008-08-30T07:36:00.000-07:00

In the earlier Middle Ages, books were generally handwritten and painted in monastic scriptorium. The scriptorium was looked upon as a sort of sanctified dwelling, and the craft of reproducing and embellishing.....more here

Simone Martini

2008-08-30T07:31:00.000-07:00

His subjects, like his predecessors, are all religious – the Virgin Mary, the Life of Christ, the Apostles, and Angeles.

Jacopo di Cione

2008-08-29T09:05:00.000-07:00

Jacopo strove to capture the mysterious and mystical nature of Christianity. His highly formalized...more here

Paolo Veneziano

2008-08-29T08:42:00.000-07:00

Throughout the Medieval period, Italian art was largely traditional, sticking to the techniques and style established by the Byzantine Church. Paolo Veneziano was one.....more here

Taddeo di Bartolo

2008-08-28T12:34:00.000-07:00

The prevailing characteristic of Taddeo di Bartolo's work being rich colour and spatial inventiveness. His gold...more here

Gothic Painting

2008-08-28T12:29:00.000-07:00

The Gothic period was tremendously culturally productive, in painting, sculpture, architecture and illuminated manuscripts. These art-works are complex, fraught with religious fervor and symbolism. more herear

Andrei Rublev

2008-08-28T12:26:00.000-07:00

Rublev was a monk in the Trinity-St. Sergius Monastery, and a devout follower of St. Sergius. He took a vow of silence and poured his passions and obsessions....more here

Master Dionysius

2008-08-28T12:21:00.000-07:00

Dionysius was born into a family of painters and goldsmiths. He was apprenticed from a young age. He completed many great works in his long life time and is considered....more here

Julian Alden Weir

2008-08-27T06:05:00.000-07:00

Julian Alden Weir was born into a family of notable nineteenth-century painters. Instructed....more here

George Inness

2008-08-27T06:02:00.000-07:00

About the Artist
George Inness received no formal education in art but traveled many times to Europe. While in France, Italy and England he met many influential painters and gleaned a .......more here

Principle Painters of Tonalism Movement

2008-08-27T05:56:00.000-07:00

Ralph Albert Blakelock 1847-1919

Thomas Wilmer Dewing 1851-1938

Robert Swain Gifford1840-1905

Alexander Thomas Harrison 1854 -1929

Lowell Birge Harrison 1854-1929

George Inness1825-1894

John La Farge 1835-1910

Arthur Frank Mathews 1860-1945

John Francis Murphy 1853-1921

Albert Pinkham Ryder 1847-1917

John Henry Twachtman 1853-1902

Julian Alden Weir 1852-1919

James Abbott McNeill Whistler 1843-1903

James Ensor

2008-08-27T05:52:00.000-07:00

James Ensor Art Quotations

I do not impose impressions. I attach no importance to labels. I don't like adjectives. -- James Ensor

more quotes here

Vincent van Gogh

2008-08-26T09:59:00.000-07:00

Vincent van Gogh Quotes

I wish they would only take me as I am.Vincent Van Gogh

Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well. -- Vincent van Gogh

more quotes

Principle painters of the Impressionist Movement

2008-08-26T09:56:00.000-07:00

Paul Cézanne
Auguste Renoir
Claude Monet
Alfred Sisley
Frederic Bazille
Gustave Caillebotte
Edgar Degas
Mary Cassatt
Armand Guillaumin
Berthe Morisot

Impressionism

2008-08-26T09:50:00.000-07:00

The Impressionist style of painting developed in the late 1870s in France. The artists sought to represent objects in their atmospheric veil, enveloped with light...more here

Agnolo Bronzino

2008-08-25T05:53:00.000-07:00

Bronzino, Pontormo’s close follower, had none of his master’s talent as a decorator, but happily much of his power as a portrait-painter. Would he had never attempted anything else! The nude without material or spiritual... more here

Saint Francis of Assisi

2008-08-25T05:50:00.000-07:00

St. Francis of Assisi Quotations

Sienese School

2008-08-25T05:46:00.000-07:00

From its vantage point high in the Tuscan hills, Sienna was exceptionally well placed to become one of the greatest artistic centers of medieval...more here

Duccio di Buoninsegna

2008-08-25T05:38:00.000-07:00

While Byzantine art is stormy and rigid, Sienese painting is youthful, lovely, and graceful. The prevailing characteristic being slender, supple....more here

SASSETTA

2008-08-25T05:33:00.000-07:00

Sassetta, born Stefano di Giovanni, was perhaps the greatest of the early 15th century Sienese painters. He dabbled...more her

Masaccio

2008-08-25T05:28:00.000-07:00

Masaccio's work is all about the holy and the profane; illuminating and suppressing. Spirituality and mans...more here

Dosso Dossi

2008-08-25T05:22:00.000-07:00

From an early age Dossi displayed exceptional original creative talent. He was gifted with the extraordinary talent not only of being a master storyteller but of innovation, with a naturalness, and almost.....more here

Paolo Uccello

2008-08-24T17:05:00.000-07:00

Paolo Uccello worked chiefly in Rome, Florence and Padua. His style is characterized by dazzling....more here

Hieronymus Bosch

2008-08-24T16:53:00.000-07:00

Hieronymus Bosch was Born as Jeroen van Aken although he signed his paintings as Jheronimus Bosch in order to bring recognition to his birthplace, Hertogenbosch, a small town in the province of North Brabant...more here

Lucas Cranach The Elder

2008-08-24T16:42:00.000-07:00

Lucas Cranach made a conscious decision to create artworks that appealed to the illiterate peasant class as well as the upper classes who looked for and found layers...more here

Ventura Salimbeni

2008-08-23T08:22:00.000-07:00

Ventura Salimbeni was one of the most outstanding painters of the Mannerist school in the 16th century. The prevailing characteristic of his paintings are unnaturally elongated.....more here

Theophanes The Greek

2008-08-23T08:17:00.000-07:00

Theophanes the Greek's painting style is best described as bleakly orthodox, in spirit and in doctrine. His holy figures, especially his Madonnas, are essentially graceful, detached creatures....more here

Andrea del Verrocchio

2008-08-22T06:39:00.000-07:00

Verrocchio' s workshop was the first one in Florence where oil-painting was systematically carried on. He also guided Florence landscape painting into new paths. In contrast to the earlier Florentines, who had lost themselves in elaborate detail and caused the most distant objects...more here

Lazzaro Bastiani

2008-08-22T06:06:00.000-07:00

Lazzaro Bastiani is best known for his charismatic, expressive holy figures that seem to glide in ethereal atmospheres. The newly emerging painting techniques......more here

The Hidden Symbolism of brooms, mirrors, keys and other every day objects found in art

2008-08-21T08:57:00.000-07:00

The Hidden Symbolic Meaning of Everyday Household Objects in Western Painting...A knife in a loaf of bread, a glowing candle, a dirty window, a Childs toy on a shelf, a clock, an hourglass—all are enchantingly decorative to the average onlooker. For painters of the Gothic, Early Renaissance and High Renaissance periods, everyday household items were part of a powerful visual language. a list of objects

The Meaning of Sacred Symbols in Byzantine, Gothic and Renaissance Painting

2008-08-21T08:51:00.000-07:00

Byzantine, Gothic and Renaissance Art are rich in philosophical and Christian symbolism. Narrative paintings, with their layer upon layers of readily understood symbolic meaning, provided instruction to the uneducated commoners that yearned for scriptural understanding. Paintings were used as guides that helped illuminate the divine mysteries of Church doctrine. Most prominently featured symbols and their meaning: listed here

The Greatest Artists of the High Renaissance

2008-08-21T08:47:00.000-07:00

Andrea del Sarto
Mariotto Albertinelli
Fra Bartolommeo
Jacopo Bassano
Giovanni Bellini
Domenico Brusasorci
Giulio Campi
Domenico Di Michelino
Lorenzo Costa
Dosso Dossi
Francesco Francia
Garofalo
Ridolfo Ghirlandaio
Giorgione
Leonardo da Vinci
Lorenzo Lotto
Bernardino Luini
Michelangelo Buonarroti
Baldassare Peruzzi
Piero di Cosimo
Jacob Tintoretto
Marcantonio Raimondi
Raphael
Titian
Ercole de’Roberti

The High Renaissance

2008-08-21T08:42:00.000-07:00

Artists were elevated in social standing and their art was looked upon not as simple crafts, but as divinely inspired creations. Renaissance historian, Walter Pater, wrote "There is a spirit of general elevation and enlightenment in which all alike communicate. The unity of this spirit gives...more here

Bartolommeo di Pagholo del Fattorillo

2008-08-21T08:39:00.000-07:00

Even as a small boy Fra Bartolommeo loved to draw and paint. While the other village boys were playing in the olive groves, young Bartolommeo could be found by the river sketching wild flowers. He was apprenticed to the studio of Renaissance master Cosimo Rosselli as a young age but was..... more here

ANDREA DEL SARTO

2008-08-21T08:35:00.000-07:00

Andrea grew up in a family of tailors and cobblers. His name "Andrea del Sarto", literally means "the tailor's Andrew", sarto is the Italian word for tailor. Andrea Del Sarto's rose quickly in the ranks of Florentine painters and was in high demand while still a young painter. His reputation was so great that the King of France...more here

How the Black Death Affected Painters and Art History

2008-08-21T08:32:00.000-07:00

The plague fist showed up in Italy in the late 1340s and returned with regular outbreaks for the next five hundred years. Many of Italy's greatest painters died of plague, including the great Sienese geniuses, Ambrogio Lorenzetti and Pietro Lorenzetti, who died in the first out break of 1348. Later plague epidemics took the lives of Andrea del Sarto, Titian, Dosso Dossi, and the greatest Venetian genius of all time, Giorgione . The horrors of the black death pervaded all aspects of European culture, especially art. The effects were lasting, bringing a somber darkness to visual art, literature, and music. more here

The Early Renaissance

2008-08-21T08:30:00.000-07:00

Until the middle ages men regarded themselves as following the Good Shep herd, and art consequently did not recognize the individual in particular. Classical humanism, an itellectula movement based upon the texts of Roman and Greek orators and philosophers, was a crucial part of the Italian Renaissance. This philosophical movement was based on the idea that every persons life had value and dignity. Francesco Petrarch , 1304-1374, called the Father of Humanism, Italian Intellectual, Poet, and Humanist, wrote "Love is the crowning grace of humanity, the holiest right of the soul more here

My Favorite Medieval Italian Artists

2008-08-21T08:28:00.000-07:00

Duccio di Buoninsegna
Coppo di Marcovaldo
Barna da Siena
Pietro Lorenzetti
Ambrogio Lorenzetti
Giotto di Bondone
Lippo Memmi
Segna di Buonaventure
Simone Martini
Taddeo di Bartolo
Bartolo di Fredi
Spinello Aretino
Andrea Vanni

Coppo di Marcovaldo

2008-08-21T08:23:00.000-07:00

Coppo di Marcovaldo was the Michelangelo of his day. Famous for his Christian-themed painted icons with ecclesiastical figures often hover above the Virgin Mary. Coppo di Marcovaldo started life.. more here

Lippo Memmi

2008-08-21T08:21:00.000-07:00

Lippo Memmi was part of devoted circle of artists who flocked around the illustrious Simone Martini. Martini's use of form had a enormously influential effect on the young painters who surrounded him. more here,

The Byzantine Style

2008-08-21T08:14:00.000-07:00

The Byzantine is a very easy style to identify, because of the stylized, rigid formality of the figures as well as the symmetrical folds of the draperies, which often show a sort of antiquated charm. The Byzantine style is not so much accurate representation but as a suggestion and symbolism. According to "It is noticeable in these Byzantine pictures that while the figure-painting is often really excellent, the design skilful, and the pose natural, the landscape, trees, etc., are quite symbolic and fanciful. The painters seem to have been utterly ignorant of perspective. Buildings, too, without any regard to relative proportion, are coloured merely as parts of a colour scheme. They are pink, pale green, yellow, violet, blue, just to please the eye. That the painter had a system of colour-harmony is plain, but he paid no regard to the facts of city life, unless, indeed, it was the practice of the mediæval Byzantines to paint the outside of their houses in this truly brilliant style. "more about Byzantine art

Giotto Di Bondone the Architect

2008-08-21T08:10:00.000-07:00

Giotto's Bell Tower was started in 1334 and finished in 1357. The 85-metre high Bell Tower stands in the Piazza San Giovanni, Florence, Italy. This magnificent structure was the creation of three great architects; Giotto, father of the Italian Renaissance, designed the tower and died during its construction. In 1348, Andrea Pisano continued Giotto great work. The last three levels were built by Florentine architect Francesco Talenti. The Bell-tower's unique facade consists of three distinctive colors of local Italian marbles. more.

Early Christian Art

2008-08-21T08:07:00.000-07:00

Christian art began as a language of symbols, the Good Shepherd, fish, anchor, birds, and the cross, served as a kind of hieroglyphic writing, opening the history of Christian art. Art was forced to go underground, literally, via the Catacombs. This era was called the Period of Persecution and lasted from 1 - 313 AD. The Catacombs served as an underground cemetery as well as a church for services and secreting Christians fugitives.
The history of Christian painting may perhaps be conceived as a great compromise with Hellenism. With the collapse of the classical world, the most subtly refined civilization that the world has ever seen came to an end. By its spiritual tendencies and its denial of the earthly, Christianity placed almost insuperable barriers to art. "Great Pan was Dead"
Religion with the Greeks had been a joyous cult of the senses teaching men to enjoy life in the here and now; it now became a belief in the other world, which regarded earthly existence as only a sad preparation for the life to come. True, the spring still came; men loved, the flowers bloomed, the birds sang, and the meadows were green. But all this was a delusion of Hell intended to lead the believer astray and to fill his soul with sinful thoughts. The world beyond his home, the present world only a Golgotha, where the skull lay and Christ hung crucified.

Alesso Baldovinetti

2008-08-21T07:32:00.000-07:00

Alesso Baldovinetti lived during troubled and restless times. The world was in transition. The outdated feudal order imposed by the Church was buckling under the expansion of towns, the rise of the merchant class, the emergence of national states, the spread of religious more here