British 1836-1893 Atkinson Grimshaw Gallery Grimshaw's primary influence was the Pre-Raphaelites. True to the Pre-Raphaelite style, he put forth landscapes of accurate color and lighting, and vivid detail. He often painted landscapes that typified seasons or a type of weather; city and suburban street scenes and moonlit views of the docks in London, Leeds, Liverpool, and Glasgow also figured largely in his art. By applying his skill in lighting effects, and unusually careful attention to detail, he was often capable of intricately describing a scene, while strongly conveying its mood. His "paintings of dampened gas-lit streets and misty waterfronts conveyed an eerie warmth as well as alienation in the urban scene." Dulce Domum (1855), on whose reverse Grimshaw wrote, "mostly painted under great difficulties," captures the music portrayed in the piano player, entices the eye to meander through the richly decorated room, and to consider the still and silent young lady who is meanwhile listening. Grimshaw painted more interior scenes, especially in the 1870s, when he worked until the influence of James Tissot and the Aesthetic Movement. On Hampstead Hill is considered one of Grimshaw's finest, exemplifying his skill with a variety of light sources, in capturing the mood of the passing of twilight into the onset of night. In his later career this use of twilight, and urban scenes under yellow light were highly popular, especially with his middle-class patrons. His later work included imagined scenes from the Greek and Roman empires, and he also painted literary subjects from Longfellow and Tennyson ?? pictures including Elaine and The Lady of Shalott. (Grimshaw named all of his children after characters in Tennyson's poems.) In the 1880s, Grimshaw maintained a London studio in Chelsea, not far from the comparable facility of James Abbott McNeill Whistler. After visiting Grimshaw, Whistler remarked that "I considered myself the inventor of Nocturnes until I saw Grimmy's moonlit pictures."[9] Unlike Whistler's Impressionistic night scenes, however, Grimshaw worked in a realistic vein: "sharply focused, almost photographic," his pictures innovated in applying the tradition of rural moonlight images to the Victorian city, recording "the rain and mist, the puddles and smoky fog of late Victorian industrial England with great poetry." Some artists of Grimshaw's period, both famous and obscure, generated rich documentary records; Vincent Van Gogh and James Smetham are good examples. Others, like Edward Pritchett, left nothing. Grimshaw left behind him no letters, journals, or papers; scholars and critics have little material on which to base their understanding of his life and career. Grimshaw died 13 October 1893, and is buried in Woodhouse cemetery, Leeds. His reputation rested, and his legacy is probably based on, his townscapes. The second half of the twentieth century saw a major revival of interest in Grimshaw's work, with several important exhibits of his canon.  Related Paintings of Atkinson Grimshaw :. | Half-Tide | Nightfall down the Thames | Elaine | Leeds Bridge | Day Dreams |
Related Artists:
Anton Chladek
painted Portrait of Ienachita Vacarescu in 1794 - 1882
William Barak
Australian Aboriginal, ca.1824-1903 was the last traditional ngurungaeta (elder) of the Wurundjeri-willam clan, based around the area of present-day Melbourne, Australia. He became an influential spokesman for Aboriginal social justice and an important informant on Wurundjeri cultural lore. Barak was born in the early 1820s at Brushy Creek near present-day Croydon, in the country of the Wurundjeri people. His mother, Tooterrie, came from the Nourailum bulluk at Murchison, Victoria. His father, Bebejern, was an important member of the Wurundjeri clan. Beruk was said to have been present when John Batman met with the tribal elders to 'purchase' the Melbourne area in 1835. Before he died he described witnessing the signing of the treaty in a ceremony he called a tanderem. Ninggalobin, Poleorong and Billibellary were the leading song makers and principal Wurundjeri leaders in the Melbourne region. European colonisation had caused disruptions to initiation ceremonies. In response these three men gathered at South Yarra in the late 1830s and inducted the young William Barak into Aboriginal lore. This entailed formally presenting Barak with the symbols of manhood: strips of possumskin tied around his biceps; the gombert around his neck; given his ilbi-jerri, a sharp and narrow bone or nose-peg; and his branjep, the apron worn by men to cover their genitals. At the end of the ceremony Barack presented his uncle, Billibellary, a possumskin cloak. Beruk attended the government's Yarra Mission School from 1837 to 1839. When he joined the Native Mounted Police in 1844, he was given the name of William Barak. He was Police Trooper No.19. In early 1863, Barak moved to Coranderrk Station, near Healesville, Victoria with about thirty others. Upon the death of Simon Wonga in 1875, Barak became the Ngurungaeta of the clan. He worked tirelessly for his people and was a successful negotiator on their behalf. He was a highly respected man and leader, with standing amongst the Indigenous people and the European settlers. Figures in possum-skin cloaks, 1898 by William Barak.Barak is now best remembered for his artworks, which show both traditional Indigenous life and encounters with Europeans. Most of Barak's drawings were completed at Coranderrk during the 1880s and 1890s. They are now highly prized and exhibited in leading public galleries in Australia. His work is on permanent display in the National Gallery of Victoria Ian Potter Centre at Federation Square, Melbourne. Ceremony (1895) is housed at the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery. Barak died at Coranderrk in 1903 and is buried at the Coranderrk cemetery.
Pieter Codde
1599-1678 Dutch Pieter Codde Locations ), was a Dutch painter of genre works and portraits, also known to be a poet. He is said to have studied with Frans Hals, but it is more likely that his training was with a portrait painter, Barent van Someren (1572 ?C 1632) or possibly with Cornelis van der Voort (1576 ?C 1624). His earliest work is known to be a piece from 1626, Portrait of a Young Man, now in the Ashmolean. Most of his best remembered works were executed in Amsterdam and were small-scale paintings. They were distinctive in their silvery-gray tonalities, and many were musically themed, such as his first known genre work, Dancing Lesson (Louvre) from 1627, Musical Company of 1639, The Lute Player (Philadelphia Museum of Art) and, Concert, a piece now in the Uffizi Gallery. The other piece by Codde in the Uffizi is a genre work, Conversation. Codde also painted historical religious works, such as his Adoration of the Shepherds, from 1645, in the Rijksmuseum of Amsterdam. Though it is unknown whether he studied with Frans Hals, his style is undoubtedly similar in some respects. He was commissioned in 1637 to complete an unfinished work of Hals, Officers of the Company of the Amsterdam Crossbow Civic Guard Under Captain Reynier Reael and Lieutenant Cornelis Michielsz Blaeuw. While the choice of Codde to complete this work by Hals was not an obvious selection at the time, Codde work in the portrait matched the original so well that it is uncertain who painted what, although the Rijksmuseum, which now houses the work, states that Codde??s style is recognizable smoother.