Flemish Baroque Era Painter, 1577-1640 Peter Paul Rubens (June 28, 1577 ?C May 30, 1640) was a prolific seventeenth-century Flemish Baroque painter, and a proponent of an exuberant Baroque style that emphasized movement, color, and sensuality. He is well-known for his Counter-Reformation altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects. In addition to running a large studio in Antwerp which produced paintings popular with nobility and art collectors throughout Europe, Rubens was a classically-educated humanist scholar, art collector, and diplomat who was knighted by both Philip IV, king of Spain, and Charles I, king of England. Rubens was a prolific artist. His commissioned works were mostly religious subjects, "history" paintings, which included mythological subjects, and hunt scenes. He painted portraits, especially of friends, and self-portraits, and in later life painted several landscapes. Rubens designed tapestries and prints, as well as his own house. He also oversaw the ephemeral decorations of the Joyous Entry into Antwerp by the Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand in 1635. His drawings are mostly extremely forceful but not detailed; he also made great use of oil sketches as preparatory studies. He was one of the last major artists to make consistent use of wooden panels as a support medium, even for very large works, but he used canvas as well, especially when the work needed to be sent a long distance. For altarpieces he sometimes painted on slate to reduce reflection problems. His fondness of painting full-figured women gave rise to the terms 'Rubensian' or 'Rubenesque' for plus-sized women. The term 'Rubensiaans' is also commonly used in Dutch to denote such women.  Related Paintings of Peter Paul Rubens :. | The Feast of Venus (mk01) | Arachne Punished by Minerva (mk27) | Portrait of Helene Fourment | Rubens, his wife Helena Fourment, and their son Peter Paul | The Road to Calvary |
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VIVARINI, Alvise
Italian Early Renaissance Painter , b. 1445/46, Venezia, d. 1503/5, Venezia
Hans Bollongier
(1600-idem, 1645) was a Dutch Golden Age still life flower painter. Bollongier was born in Haarlem. According to the RKD little is known of his early life. He became a member of the Haarlem Guild of St. Luke in 1623, and in 1675 his younger brother Horatio was named as his beneficiary. He was a specialist in bouquets of blooms. Paintings attributed to him that are not flower- or fruit still lifes are likely the work of his brother Horatio.He was an important influence on the later flower painters known as the monogrammist JF and Anthony Claesz II. He painted during a period of great productivity for Haarlem painters, during the decades after Karel van Mander published his Schilderboeck there. In Karel van Mander's book, there were a set of rules to follow to create good paintings and good drawings. Bollongier developed his own style and still observed all of these rules. His paintings were very popular, but his work was not regarded as such by contemporary Haarlem painters. As a genre, still life painting was considered inferior to historical allegories. His work today is considered part of the proof that Tulip Mania took place, although there is reason to believe that this is also just part of early Haarlem tourist propaganda. Even as early as the 17th century, gentry from Amsterdam, Leiden, and places farther away enjoyed visiting the tulip fields of Haarlem in the Spring, and paintings of tulips were as popular as the bulbs.
PALAMEDESZ, Antonie
Dutch Baroque Era Painter, 1601-1673