French Baroque Era Painter, 1594-1665 French painter and draughtsman, active in Italy. His supreme achievement as a painter lies in his unrivalled but hard-won capacity to subordinate dramatic narrative and the expression of extreme states of human passions to the formal harmony of designs based on the beauty and precision of abstract forms. The development of his art towards this end was focused on the search for a point of equilibrium and synthesis between the forces of the Classical and the Baroque around which most critical debate in Rome was concentrated during the 1630s. Poussin did not aspire to the classicism of Raphael's idealized human forms or Michelangelo's re-embodiment of the physical splendours of the antique world, nor did he attempt to vie with the bravura and energy of Annibale Carracci's treatment of Classical mythology in the Galleria of the Palazzo Farnese in Rome. Equally he was not concerned with the illusionistic effects and heightened emotionalism of Baroque artists such as Pietro da Cortona and Lanfranco. He was concerned above all with interpreting his subject-matter, whether Classical or religious, and telling a story with the greatest possible concentration of emotional response,  Related Paintings of POUSSIN, Nicolas :. | The Death of Germanicus af | Pan and Syrinx fh | St Cecilia af | Moise changeant en serpent la verge d'Aaron | The Triumph of Pan sg |
Related Artists:
Filippo Napoletano
(c. 1587 - November 1629) was an Italian artist, with a peculiar output, mainly landscape and genre scenes and also drawings or etchings of diverse, often particular, items such as exotic soldiers, skeletons of animals, or cityscapes. He began his career in his native city, Naples (1600-1613) and moved to Rome in 1614-1617), where he appears to have encountered and felt influenced by the successful Flemish landscape painters such as Paul Bril, Goffredo Wals, and Adam Elsheimer. In 1617 Cosimo II dee Medici summoned him to Florence, where he worked closely with Jacques Callot. From notebooks, Filippo is known to have made hundreds of sketches of Tuscan landscapes and towns. Starting in 1620 he reproduced in etchings part of his collection of animal skeletons owned by Johann Faber, a Bavarian physician-naturalist residing in Rome and a member of the scientific Accademia dei Lincei. In 1622, Napoletano published twelve etchings of caprices (capprici) and military uniforms (which he signed as signed Teodor Filippo de Liagno). He is described by Giovanni Baglione as possessing a collection, a Wunderkammer of bellissime bizzarrie ("beautiful bizarre objects"), including among the objects exotic weaponry; fossilized plants; tiger, lion, and turtle skulls; oriental porcelain and sculpted crockery; a vest made of human skin; a harness for dragging whales on ice; a three-legged flea, Persian uniforms, and antiquities such as Roman coins, bronze lamps, and a few statuettes. After Napoletano death at Rome in 1628, bidding for such material was made by collectors such as Cardinal Ippolito Aldobrandini (future Clement VIII) and Cassiano dal Pozzo.
villelm melbye
Danish, 1824-1882 The brother of Anton and Fritz, both Danish artists, Vilhelm Knut Frederik Melbye was born in Denmark and would finish his career as a Professor in the Copenhagen Academy, appointed in 1880. His years between would see him work out of the important venues of Dusseldorf, Venice, Paris and London. His paintings may almost be used as a travelogue to his career. Working in the Netherlands and paintings scenes of the North and Black Seas through the late 1840s, he exhibited regularly at Charlottenborg in Copenhagen. Melbye lands in London by the early 1850s and ??anglicizes?? his signature to Wilhelm Melby. Paintings by him of Gibraltar and the Italian Mediterranean are in prominent public collections with dates from 1854-62. British subjects reappear in the 1860s, and in 1878, he exhibits at the Parisian Academies. Some later works are signed with initials or his given name once again. The heart of all his paintings is his obvious attraction to the coastal harbors and marine settings of Europe. They dominate his output, and are compositions full of realistic and dramatic elements emphasizing humanity??s maritime efforts. Cool light, layered shadows and a talent for translating visual depth are noticeable elements in his paintings.
Clifford Warren Ashley
Author, Sailor, and Artist American 1881-1947 was an American author, sailor, and artist. He is perhaps most famous for The Ashley Book of Knots, an encyclopedic reference manual with directions for and illustrations of thousands of knots. He invented the Ashley's stopper knot. Ashley also wrote The Yankee Whaler, a study of sperm whale hunters in New England in the late 18th century and early 19th century. He was born in New Bedford,