Bee van p artist from holland. Great Dutch. Other Dutch artists

05.03.2020

Main trends, stages of development of painting and iconic painters of Holland.

Dutch painting

Introduction

Dutch painting XVII centuries are sometimes mistakenly considered art for the middle class, worshiping Flemish painting this period and calling it courtly, aristocratic. No less erroneous is the opinion that Dutch artists deal only with the depiction of the immediate human environment, using for this purpose the landscape, cities, sea, people's lives, while Flemish art is devoted historical painting, which in art theory is considered a more sublime genre. In contrast to this, for public buildings in Holland, which had to have an imposing appearance, as well as wealthy visitors, whatever their religious beliefs or background, required paintings with allegorical or mythological themes.

Any division of the Dutch school of painting into Flemish and Dutch branches until the beginning of the 17th century. due to the constant creative exchange between the areas, it would be artificial. For example, Peter Aertsen, born in Amsterdam, before returning to hometown in 1557 he worked in Antwerp, and his student and nephew Joachim Bukelaer spent his entire life in Antwerp. In connection with the signing of the Union of Utrecht and the separation of the seven northern provinces, many residents after 1579–1581. emigrated from the northern Netherlands to the Protestant part of the artificially divided country.

"Butcher shop". Artsen.

Development of art

The impetus for the independent development of Dutch painting came from Flemish artists. Bartholomeus Spranger, born in Antwerp and educated in Rome, became the founder of a virtuoso, courtly, artificial style, which, as a result of Spranger's temporary residence in Vienna and Prague, became an international "language". In 1583, the painter and art theorist Karel van Mander brought this style to Haarlem. One of the main masters of this Haarlem or Utrecht mannerism was Abraham Bloemaert.

Then Isaiah van de Velde, born in Holland into a family of emigrants from Flanders, and studied in a circle of painters, the center of which was Flemish artists David Vinkboons and Gillis Koninksloh, in their early paintings developed a realistic painting style that referred to Jan Brueghel the Elder, with vibrant color gradations artistic plans. Around 1630, a trend towards unification took hold in Holland artistic space and the merging of colors from different layers. Since then, the multifaceted nature of the things depicted gave way to a sense of space and an atmosphere of airy haze, which was conveyed with a gradually increasing monochrome use of color. Isaiah van de Velde embodied this stylistic revolution in art together with his student Jan van Goen.

Winter landscape. Velde.

One of the most monumental landscapes of the High Baroque, "The Great Forest", by Jacob van Ruisdael, belongs to the next period of development of Dutch painting. The viewer no longer has to experience the rather amorphous appearance of a sprawling space in gray-brown tones with a few striking motifs; henceforth the impression is made of a fixed, energetically accentuated structure.

Genre painting

Dutch genre painting, which, in fact, can hardly be called just a portrait Everyday life, often carrying a moralistic message, is represented in Vienna by the works of all its main masters. Its center was Leiden, where Gerard Doux, Rembrandt's first student, founded a school known as the Leiden School of Fine Painting (fijnschilders).

Figurative painting

Meeting of company officers. Frans Hals.

The three greatest Dutch masters of figurative painting, Frans Hals, Rembrandt and Johannes Vermeer of Delft, followed each other within an interval of almost a generation. Hals was born in Antwerp and worked in Haarlem mainly as a portrait painter. For many, he became the personification of the open, cheerful and spontaneous virtuoso painter, while the art of Rembrandt, a thinker - as the cliché goes - reveals the origins of human destiny. This is both fair and wrong. What immediately catches your eye when looking at a portrait or group portrait by Hals is the ability to convey a person who is overwhelmed with emotion in movement. To depict a fleeting moment, Hals uses open, noticeably irregular strokes, intersecting in zigzags or cross-hatching. This creates the effect of a constantly shimmering surface, like a sketch, which merges into a single image only when viewed from a certain distance. After the return of Rothschild's "gifts", an expressive portrait of a man in black was acquired for the collection of the Prince of Liechtenstein and thus returned to Vienna. The Kunsthistorisches Museum owns only one painting by Franz Hals, a portrait young man, which already appeared in the collection of Charles VI as one of the few examples of “Protestant” art in Holland. Portraits painted in the late period of Hals's work are closer to Rembrandt's works in terms of psychological penetration and lack of posing.

Thanks to subtle transitions of shades and areas of chiaroscuro, Rembrandt's chiaroscuro seems to envelop the figures in a resonant space in which mood, atmosphere, something intangible and even invisible reside. Rembrandt's work in Vienna art gallery is represented only by portraits, although "The Artist's Mother" and "The Artist's Son" can also be considered single-figure history paintings. In the so-called “Large Self-Portrait” of 1652, the artist appears before us in a brown blouse, with his face turned in three quarters. His gaze is self-confident and even defiant.

Vermeer

Vermeer's undramatic art, focused entirely on contemplation, was considered a reflection of the Dutch middle class, now independent and content with what it had. However, the simplicity of Vermeer's artistic concepts is deceptive. Their clarity and calm are the result of precise analysis, including the use of the latest technical inventions such as the camera obscura. "Allegory of Painting", created around 1665-1666, Vermeer's pinnacle work in terms of work with color, can be called his most ambitious painting. The process initiated by Jan van Eyck, a native of the northern Netherlands, passive, detached contemplation of the motionless world, has always remained main theme Dutch painting and in the works of Vermeer reached an allegorical and at the same time real apotheosis.

Dutch painting

updated: September 16, 2017 by: Gleb

06.05.2014

The life of Frans Hals was as bright and eventful as his paintings. To this day, the world knows stories about the drunken brawls of Khalsa, which he every now and then organized after major holidays. An artist with such a cheerful and violent character could not win respect in the country, state religion which contained Calvinism. Frans Hals was born in Antwerp in early 1582. However, his family left Antwerp. In 1591, the Khals arrived in Haarlem. France's younger brother was born here...

10.12.2012

Jan Steen is one of the most famous representatives Dutch school of painting mid-17th century century. In the works of this artist you will not find any monumental or elegant paintings, nor bright portraits of great people or religious images. In fact, Jan Steen is a master of everyday scenes filled with fun and sparkling humor of his era. His paintings depict children, drunkards, simple people, Gulen and many, many others. Jan was born in the southern province of Holland, the town of Leiden around 1626...

07.12.2012

The work of the famous Dutch artist Hieronymus Bosch is still perceived ambiguously by both critics and simply art lovers. What is depicted in Bosch’s paintings: demons of the underworld or simply people disfigured by sin? Who he really was Hieronymus Bosch: an obsessed psychopath, a sectarian, a seer, or just a great artist, a kind of ancient surrealist, like Salvador Dali, who drew ideas from the realm of the unconscious? Maybe his life path...

24.11.2012

Famous Dutch artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder created his own colorful style of writing, which significantly differed from other Renaissance painters. His paintings are images of a folk satirical epic, images of nature and village life. Some works fascinate with their composition - you want to look at them and look at them, arguing about what exactly the artist wanted to convey to the viewer. The peculiarity of Bruegel's writing and vision of the world are reminiscent of the work of the early surrealist Hieronymus Bosch...

26.11.2011

Han van Meegeren ( full name- Henricus Antonius van Meegeren) was born on May 3, 1889 in the family of a simple school teacher. All yours free time the boy accompanied his beloved teacher, whose name was Korteling, to the workshop. His father didn’t like it, but it was Korteling who managed to develop in the boy the taste and ability to imitate the style of writing of antiquity. Van Meegeren received a good education. He entered the Delft Institute of Technology, where he took a course in architecture, at the age of 18. At the same time, he studied at...

13.10.2011

The famous Dutch artist Johannes Jan Vermeer, known to us as Vermeer of Delft, is rightfully considered one of the brightest representatives of the Golden Age Dutch art. He was a master of genre portraits and so-called household painting. The future artist was born in October 1632 in the city of Delft. Jan was the second child in the family and the only son. His father sold art objects and was engaged in silk weaving. His parents were friends with the artist Leonart Breimer, who...

18.04.2010

The already hackneyed phrase that all geniuses are a little crazy simply fits perfectly with the fate of the great and brilliant post-impressionist artist Vincent Van Gogh. Having lived only 37 years, he left a rich heritage - about 1000 paintings and the same number of drawings. This figure is even more impressive when you learn that Van Gogh devoted less than 10 years of his life to painting. 1853 On March 30, a boy, Vincent, was born in the village of Grot-Zundert, located in the south of Holland. A year earlier, in the family of a priest into which he was born...

Until the end of the 16th century, Dutch painting was inseparably linked with Flemish painting and had common name"Dutch school" Both of them, being a branch of German painting, consider the van Eyck brothers to be their ancestors and have been moving in the same direction for a long time, developing the same technique, so that the artists of Holland are no different from their Flanders and Brabant brothers.

When the Dutch people got rid of Spanish oppression, Dutch painting acquires national character. Dutch artists are distinguished by their reproduction of nature with special love in all its simplicity and truth and a subtle sense of color.

The Dutch were the first to understand that even in inanimate nature everything breathes life, everything is attractive, everything is capable of evoking thought and exciting the movement of the heart.

Among landscape painters interpreting their domestic nature, are especially respected by Jan van Goyen (1595-1656), who, together with Ezaias van de Velde (c. 1590-1630) and Pieter Moleyn the Elder (1595-1661), is considered the founder of the Dutch landscape.

But the artists of Holland cannot be divided into schools. Expression " Dutch school painting" is very conditional. In Holland, there were organized societies of artists, which were free corporations that protected the rights of their members and did not influence creative activity.

The name of Rembrandt (1606-1669) shines especially brightly in history, in whose personality all best qualities Dutch painting and its influence was reflected in all its genres - in portraits, historical paintings, everyday scenes and landscape.

In the 17th century it developed successfully household painting, the first experiments of which were noted in the old Dutch school. In this genre, the most famous names are Cornelis Beg (1620-64), Richart Brackenburg (1650-1702), Cornelis Dusart (1660-1704) Henrik Roques, nicknamed Sorg (1621-82),

Artists who painted scenes of military life can be classified as genre painters. Chief Representative this branch of painting - the famous and unusually prolific Philips Wouwerman (1619-68)

In a special category we can single out masters who in their paintings combined landscapes with images of animals. The most famous among such painters of rural idyll is Paulus Potter (1625-54); Albert Cuyp (1620-91).

Dutch artists paid the greatest attention to the sea.

In the work of Willem van de Velde the Elder (1611 or 1612-93), his famous son Willem van de Velde the Younger (1633-1707), Ludolf Backhuisen (1631-1708), painting of sea views was their specialty.

In the field of still life, the most famous were Jan-Davids de Gem (1606-83), his son Cornelis (1631-95), Abraham Mignon (1640-79), Melchior de Gondecoeter (1636-95), Maria Osterwijk (1630-93) .

The brilliant period of Dutch painting did not last long - only one century.

Since the beginning of the 18th century. its decline is coming, the reason for this is the tastes and views of the pompous era Louis XIV. Instead of a direct relationship to nature, love of what is native and sincerity, the dominance of preconceived theories, convention, and imitation of the luminaries of the French school is established. The main propagator of this regrettable trend was the Flemish Gerard de Leresse (1641-1711), who settled in Amsterdam.

The decline of the school was also facilitated by the famous Adrian van de Werff (1659-1722), whose dull coloring of his paintings once seemed the height of perfection.

Foreign influence weighed heavily on Dutch painting until the twenties of the 19th century.

Subsequently, Dutch artists turned to their antiquity - to strict observation of nature.

The latest Dutch painting by landscape painters is especially rich. These include Andreas Schelfhout (1787-1870), Barent Koekkoek (1803-62), Anton Mauwe (1838-88), Jacob Maris (b. 1837), Johannes Weissenbruch (1822-1880) and others.

Among the newest marine painters in Holland, the palm belongs to Johannes Schotel (1787-1838).

He showed animals in painting great art Wouters Verschoor (1812-74).

You can buy reproductions of paintings by Dutch artists in our online store.

The Netherlands is a historical region occupying part of the vast lowlands on the northern European coast from the Gulf of Finland to the English Channel. Currently, this territory includes the states of the Netherlands (Holland), Belgium and Luxembourg.
After the collapse of the Roman Empire, the Netherlands became a motley collection of large and small semi-independent states. The most significant among them were the Duchy of Brabant, the counties of Flanders and Holland, and the Bishopric of Utrecht. In the north of the country, the population was mainly German - Frisians and Dutch; in the south, the descendants of the Gauls and Romans - the Flemings and Walloons - predominated.
The Dutch worked selflessly with their special talent of “doing the most boring things without boredom,” as the French historian Hippolyte Taine put it about these people, completely devoted to everyday life. They did not know sublime poetry, but they revered the simplest things all the more reverently: a clean, comfortable home, a warm hearth, modest but tasty food. The Dutchman is accustomed to looking at the world as huge house, in which he is called upon to maintain order and comfort.

Main features of Dutch Renaissance art

Common to the art of the Renaissance in Italy and in the countries of Central Europe is the desire for a realistic depiction of man and the world around him. But these problems were solved differently due to the differences in the nature of cultures.
For Italian artists The Renaissance was important to generalize and create an ideal, from the point of view of humanism, image of a person. Science played an important role for them - artists developed theories of perspective and the doctrine of proportions.
Dutch masters were attracted by the diversity of people's individual appearance and the richness of nature. They do not strive to create a generalized image, but convey what is characteristic and special. Artists do not use theories of perspective and others, but convey the impression of depth and space, optical effects and the complexity of light and shadow relationships through careful observation.
They are characterized by a love for their land and amazing attention to all the little things: to their native northern nature, to the peculiarities of everyday life, to the details of the interior, costumes, to the difference in materials and textures...
Dutch artists reproduce the smallest details with utmost care and recreate the sparkling richness of colors. These new pictorial problems could only be solved with the help of new technology. oil painting.
The discovery of oil painting is attributed to Jan van Eyck. From the mid-15th century, this new “Flemish manner” replaced the old tempera technique in Italy. It is no coincidence that on the Dutch altars, which are a reflection of the entire Universe, you can see everything that it consists of - every blade of grass and tree in the landscape, architectural details of cathedrals and city houses, stitches of embroidered ornaments on the robes of saints, as well as a host of other, very small, details.

The art of the 15th century is the golden age of Dutch painting.
Its brightest representative Jan Van Eyck. OK. 1400-1441.
The greatest master of European painting:
opened with his creativity new era Early Renaissance in Dutch art.
He was the court artist of the Burgundian Duke Philip the Good.
He was one of the first to master the plastic and expressive capabilities of oil painting, using thin transparent layers of paint placed one on top of the other (the so-called Flemish style of multi-layer transparent painting).

Van Eyck's largest work was the Ghent Altarpiece, which he executed together with his brother.
The Ghent Altarpiece is a grandiose multi-tiered polyptych. Its height in the central part is 3.5 m, width when opened is 5 m.
On the outside of the altar (when it is closed) is the daily cycle:
- in the bottom row the donors are depicted - townsman Jodok Veidt and his wife, praying in front of the statues of Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist, patrons of the church and chapel.
- above is the scene of the Annunciation, with the figures of the Mother of God and the Archangel Gabriel separated by the image of a window in which the city landscape emerges.

The festive cycle is depicted on the inside of the altar.
When the altar doors open, a truly stunning transformation takes place before the viewer’s eyes:
- the size of the polyptych is doubled,
- the picture of everyday life is instantly replaced by the spectacle of earthly paradise.
- the cramped and gloomy closets disappear, and the world seems to open up: the spacious landscape lights up with all the colors of the palette, bright and fresh.
The painting of the festive cycle is dedicated to a rare Christian fine arts the theme of the triumph of the transformed world, which should come after the Last Judgment, when evil will be finally defeated and truth and harmony will be established on earth.

In the top row:
- in the central part of the altar, God the Father is depicted sitting on a throne,
- the Mother of God and John the Baptist are seated to the left and right of the throne,
- then on both sides there are singing and playing music angels,
- the naked figures of Adam and Eve close the row.
The bottom row of paintings depicts a scene of worship of the Divine Lamb.
- in the middle of the meadow rises an altar, on it stands a white Lamb, blood flows from his pierced chest into a chalice
- closer to the viewer there is a well from which living water flows.

Hieronymus Bosch (1450 - 1516)
The connection of his art with folk traditions, folklore.
In his works he intricately combined the features of medieval fiction, folklore, philosophical parables and satire.
He created multi-figure religious and allegorical compositions, paintings on themes folk proverbs, sayings and parables.
Bosch's works are filled with numerous scenes and episodes, vivid and bizarre-fantastic images and details, full of irony and allegory.

Bosch's work had a huge influence on the development of realistic trends in Dutch painting of the 16th century.
Composition “Temptation of St. Anthony" is one of the artist’s most famous and mysterious works. The master’s masterpiece was the triptych “Garden of Delights,” an intricate allegory that received many different interpretations. During the same period, the triptychs " Last Judgment", "Adoration of the Magi", compositions "St. John on Patmos", "John the Baptist in the Wilderness".
The late period of Bosch’s work includes the triptych “Heaven and Hell”, the compositions “The Tramp”, “Carrying the Cross”.

Most of Bosch's paintings are mature and late period are bizarre grotesques containing deep philosophical overtones.

The large triptych “Hay Wagon”, highly appreciated by Philip II of Spain, belongs to the mature period of the artist’s work. The altar composition is probably based on an old Dutch proverb: “The world is a haystack, and everyone tries to grab as much as they can from it.”

Temptation of St. Antonia. Triptych. Central part Wood, oil. 131.5 x 119 cm (central part), 131.5 x 53 cm (leaf) National Museum ancient art, Lisbon
Garden of Delights. Triptych. Around 1485. Central part
Wood, oil. 220 x 195 cm (central part), 220 x 97 cm (leaf) Prado Museum, Madrid

Dutch art XVI century marked by the emergence of interest in antiquity and the activities of masters Italian Renaissance. At the beginning of the century, a movement based on imitation of Italian models emerged, called “Romanism” (from Roma, the Latin name for Rome).
The pinnacle of Dutch painting in the second half of the century was creativity Pieter Bruegel the Elder. 1525/30-1569. Nicknamed Muzhitsky.
He created a deeply national art based on Dutch traditions and local folklore.
Played a huge role in the formation of the peasant genre and the national landscape. In Bruegel's work, rough folk humor, lyricism and tragedy, realistic details and fantastic grotesque, interest in detailed storytelling and the desire for broad generalization are intricately intertwined.

In Bruegel's works there is a closeness to the moralizing performances of medieval folk theater.
The jester's duel between Maslenitsa and Lent is a common scene at fair performances held in the Netherlands during winter farewell days.
Everywhere life is in full swing: there are round dances, windows are washed here, some play dice, others trade, someone begs for alms, someone is being taken to be buried...

Proverbs. 1559. The painting is a kind of encyclopedia of Dutch folklore.
Bruegel's characters lead each other by the nose, sit between two chairs, bang their heads against the wall, hang between heaven and earth... The Dutch proverb “And there are cracks in the roof” is close in meaning to the Russian “And the walls have ears.” The Dutch “throw money into the water” means the same as the Russian “waste money”, “throw money down the drain”. The whole picture is dedicated to the waste of money, effort, and entire life - here they cover the roof with pancakes, shoot arrows into the void, shear pigs, warm themselves with the flames of a burning house and confess to the devil.

The whole earth had one language and one dialect. Moving from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to each other: “Let’s make bricks and burn them with fire.” And they used bricks instead of stones, and earthen tar instead of lime. And they said: “Let us build ourselves a city and a tower whose height reaches to heaven, and make a name for ourselves before we are scattered over the face of the earth. And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men were building. And the Lord said: “Behold, there is one people, and they all have one language, and this is what they began to do, and they will not give up on what they have planned to do. Let us go down and confuse their language there, so that one does not understand the speech of the other.” And the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth; and they stopped building the city and the tower. Therefore, the name was given to it: Babylon, for there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth, and from there the Lord scattered them throughout the whole earth (Genesis, chapter 11). Unlike the motley bustle early works Bruegel, this painting amazes the viewer with its calm. The tower depicted in the picture resembles the Roman amphitheater Colosseum, which the artist saw in Italy, and at the same time - an anthill. On all floors of the huge structure, tireless work is in full swing: blocks are rotating, ladders are thrown, figures of workers are scurrying about. It is noticeable that the connection between the builders has already been lost, probably due to the “mixing of languages” that has begun: somewhere construction is underway full swing, and somewhere the tower has already turned into ruins.

After Jesus was handed over to be crucified, the soldiers put a heavy cross on Him and led him to death. frontal place, called Golgotha. On the way, they captured Simon of Cyrene, who was returning home from the field, and forced him to bear the cross for Jesus. Many people followed Jesus, among them were women who wept and lamented for Him. “Carrying the Cross” is a religious, Christian picture, but it is no longer a church picture. Bruegel correlated the truths of Holy Scripture with personal experience, reflected on biblical texts, gave them his own interpretation, i.e. openly violated the imperial decree of 1550 in force at that time, which, on pain of death, prohibited self-study Bible.

Bruegel creates a series of landscapes “The Months”. “Hunters in the Snow” is December-January.
For a master, each season is, first of all, a unique state of the earth and sky.

A crowd of peasants, captivated by the rapid rhythm of the dance.

Fruit and fly

Artist Jan Van Huysum, great artist and master Dutch still life, lived at the end of the seventeenth - beginning of the eighteenth century, and was extremely popular among his contemporaries.

Very little is known about the life and work of Jan van Huysum. He was born into the family of the artist Justus van Huysum Sr., his three brothers were also artists. In 1704 Jan Van Huysum married Margaret Schouten.

Portrait of Jan van Huysum by Arnold Bonen, circa 1720

The artist very quickly became famous artist and a recognized master of Dutch still life. Crowned heads decorated their chambers and state rooms with paintings by the master. Jan Van Huysum's works were not available to the rest of the public. The fact is that the master worked on each painting for a very long time. And his works were very expensive - tens of times more expensive than paintings by Rembrandt, Jan Steen and Albert Cuyp.
Each painting consists of dozens of layers of transparent paint and meticulously painted details: layer by layer and stroke by stroke. Thus, over the course of several years, this master’s still life was born.

Jan van Huysum's brushes include several quite interesting landscapes, but the artist's main theme is still lifes. Experts divide Jan Van Huysum's still lifes into two groups: still lifes on a light background and still lifes on a dark background. “Light still lifes” require more “mature” skill from the artist - experience and talent are needed for competent light modeling. However, these are already details.

Better look at these works. They are truly wonderful.