Greek-born Spanish Mannerist Painter, 1541-1614 Considered a representative of late Renaissance Spanish art, El Greco was actually born in Greece, on the island of Crete. After studying in Venice under Titian, El Greco settled in Toledo, Spain in 1577. At the time he was wildly popular, his emotionally religious paintings being just the ticket for the hometown of the Spanish Inquisition. After his death his work was largely ignored until the beginning of the 20th century; now he considered one of the inspired geniuses of Western art. His distinctive style features bold shapes and colors, with elongated and slightly distorted figures. In Toledo El Greco was in constant demand and liked living large: he maintained a private orchestra to accompany his meals.  Related Paintings of El Greco :. | Allegory of the Camaldoless Order | The Purification of the Temple | Nobleman with his Hand on his chest | The Agony in the Garden | View of Toledo |
Related Artists:
Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg
Danish Neoclassical Painter, 1783-1853 Danish painter and teacher. He has been called 'the father of Danish painting' because of the influence he exerted on Danish painters in the second quarter of the 19th century. With Christen K?bke he was the leading painter of the Danish 'Golden Age' (c. 1800-1850).
Joost Cornelisz Droochsloot
(1586, Utrecht (city) - May 14, 1666, Utrecht (city)), was a Dutch Golden Age painter. According to Houbraken his village scenes (Boerekermisstuk) were as popular as flower pieces by Bartholomeus Assteyn.Houbraken thought he was born in Gorinchem or Dordrecht, and claimed he worked for a long time in Dordrecht. He felt his work was always according to a set pattern, where cake sellers were portrayed in front of village houses with figures in a festive setting called a "farmer's circus". It is unclear why Houbraken would have thought he was from Dordrecht, especially since Houbraken's data on painters from Dordrecht was generally quite accurate. Droochsloot and his son were highly respected citizens of Utrecht with a large workshop. According to the RKD his monogram was "JCODS" and he became a member of the Utrecht Guild of Saint Luke in 1616. He later became deacon of the guild in 1623 and regent of the St. Jobs Gasthuis in 1638, deacon of the Dutch Reformed church, and in 1665 officer of the Utrecht schutterij. He was the father of the painter Cornelis Droochsloot (1630-1673) whose paintings are hard to distinguish from his own, and the teacher of Jacob Duck.
Phillips, Thomas
English, 1770-1845 From a respectable but impoverished family, he left school aged 13 to be apprenticed to Francis Eginton of Birmingham, a glass painter and early pioneer in reproduction by a 'photographic method'. The chiaroscuro effects of this process were a lasting influence on Phillips's style. In 1790 he moved to London to study at the Royal Academy and simultaneously assisted in Benjamin West's studio. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1794 to 1844 and was elected ARA in 1804, RA in 1808 and Professor of Painting in succession to Henry Fuseli from 1825 to 1832.