Swiss 1827-1901 Arnold Bocklin Locations Arnold Bocklin was born on Oct. 16, 1827, in Basel. He attended the Dusseldorf Academy (1845-1847). At this time he painted scenes of the Swiss Alps, using light effects and dramatic views subjectively to project emotional moods into the landscape. In 1848 this romantic introspection gave way to plein air (open-air) objectivity after he was influenced by Camille Corot, Eugene Delacroix, and the painters of the Barbizon school while on a trip to Paris. But after the February and June revolutions Bocklin returned to Basel with a lasting hatred and disgust for contemporary France, and he resumed painting gloomy mountain scenes. In 1850 Bocklin found his mecca in Rome, and immediately his paintings were flooded by the warm Italian sunlight. He populated the lush southern vegetation, the bright light of the Roman Campagna, and the ancient ruins with lonely shepherds, cavorting nymphs, and lusty centaurs. These mythological figures rather than the landscapes became Bocklins primary concern, and he used such themes as Pan Pursuing Syrinx (1857) to express the polarities of life: warm sunshine contrasts with cool, moist shade, and the brightness of womans spirituality contrasts with mans dark sensuality. When Bocklin returned to Basel with his Italian wife, he completed the painting which brought him fame when the king of Bavaria purchased it in 1858: Pan among the Reeds, a depiction of the Greek phallic god with whom the artist identified. He taught at the Academy of Art in Weimar from 1860 to 1862, when he returned to Rome. Called to Basel in 1866, he painted the frescoes and modeled the grotesque masks for the facade of the Basel Museum. Bocklin resided in Florence from 1874 until 1885, and this was his most active period. He continued to explore the male-female antithesis and painted religious scenes, allegories of Natures powers, and moody studies of mans fate. He ceased working with oils and began experimenting with tempera and other media to obtain a pictorial surface free of brushstrokes. Bocklin spent the next 7 years mostly in Switzerland, with occasional trips to Italy; he devoted much of his energy to designing an airplane. Following a stroke in 1892, he returned to Italy, bought a villa in Fiesole, and died there on Jan. 16, 1901. Many of his late works depict nightmares of war, plague, and death.  Related Paintings of Arnold Bocklin :. | Playing in the Waves | Sirenen | The Waves | The Isle of the Dead | Das Spiel der Najaden |
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Jean-Paul Laurens
1838-1921 French Jean Paul Laurens Gallery was a French painter and sculptor, and one of the last major exponents of the French Academic style. Born in Fourquevaux, he was a pupil of L??on Cogniet and Alexandre Bida. Strongly anti-clerical and republican, his work was often on historical and religious themes, through which he sought to convey a message of opposition to monarchical and clerical oppression. His erudition and technical mastery were much admired in his time, but in later years his hyper-realistic technique, coupled to a highly theatrical mise-en-sc??ne, came to be regarded as overly didactic and even involuntarily comical. Laurens was commissioned to paint numerous public works by the French Third Republic, including the steel vault of the Paris city hall, the monumental series on the life of Saint Genevieve in the apse of the Panth??on, the decorated ceiling of the Od??on Theater, and the hall of distinguished citizens at the Toulouse capitol. He also provided illustrations for Augustin Thierry's R??cits des temps m??rovingiens ("Accounts of Merovingian Times"). Laurens was a professor at the École nationale sup??rieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he taught Andr?? Dunoyer de Segonzac and George Barbier. Two of his sons, Paul Albert Laurens (1870-1934) and Jean-Pierre Laurens (1875-1932), became painters and teachers at the Acad??mie Julian. He died in Paris in 1921.
Henri Gascar
Henri Gascar, Portrait of Barbara Palmer, 1st Duchess of Cleveland James II of England, then Duke of York (1660s)Henri Gascar (1635 -1 Jan 1701) was a French-born portrait painter who achieved artistic success in England during the reign of Charles II. He painted many leading ladies at court, including several of the King's mistresses. Gascar was born in Paris, the son of Pierre Gascar, a minor painter and sculptor. Gascar came to England about 1674, probably at the behest of Louise de Keroualle, Duchess of Portsmouth, Charles II's favourite mistress. Gascar (or Gascard, as he seems to have spelt his name at first) was already known as a skillful portrait-painter; among the portraits already painted by him was that of Nicolas de Lafond, author of the "Gazette of Holland", painted in 1667, and engraved by Peter Lombart. The patronage of the Duchess of Portsmouth insured Gascar a rapid success in England. His flamboyant style, contrasting with the stolid English approach, seemed to suit the frivolity of the time and he painted many of the ladies of Charles II's court. His lack of attention to detail in the likeness he made up for by the sumptuous draperies and tawdry adornments around the subject. For a short time he became fashionable, and is said to have amassed a fortune of over £10,000. Among the portraits painted by him during his time in England were Charles II (engraved by Peter Vanderbank); Louise, Duchess of Portsmouth (twice - once engraved by Étienne Baudet); Barbara, Duchess of Cleveland (nee Villiers), and her daughter, Barbara Fitzroy; Charles Lennox, 1st Duke of Richmond; Frances Stewart, Duchess of Richmond; George FitzRoy, 1st Duke of Northumberland; Nell Gwyn; Sophia Bulkeley (engraved by Robert Dunkarton); Edmund Verney; and Philip Herbert, 7th Earl of Pembroke. It is stated that the last-named portrait was done surreptitiously for Louise, Duchess of Portsmouth. A portrait by Gascar of James II as Duke of York was in that king's collection.
Joseph Anton Koch
1768-1839 Austrian Joseph Anton Koch Galleries was an Austrian painter of the German Romantic movement. The Tyrolese painter left academic training in the Karlsschule Stuttgart, a strict military academy, and traveled through France and Switzerland. He arrived in Rome in 1795. Koch was close to the painter Asmus Jacob Carstens and carried on Carstens' 'heroic' art, at first in a literal manner. After 1800 Koch developed as a landscape painter. In Rome he espoused a new type of 'heroic' landscape, revising the classical compositions of Poussin and Lorrain with a more rugged, mountainous scenery. He left Rome in 1812 and stayed in Vienna until 1815, in protest of the French invasion. During this period he incorporated more non-classical themes in his work. In Vienna he was influenced by Friedrich Schlegel and enthusiasts of old German art. In response, his style became harsher, and this new approach had a wide influence on German landscape painters who visited Rome.