French Painter, 1724-1780,Draughtsman, etcher and painter, brother of (1) Charles-Germain de Saint-Aubin. He studied with the painters Etienne Jeaurat and Hyacinthe Colin de Vermont, but failed three times to win the Prix de Rome (competition paintings, 1752-4; Paris, Louvre). He broke with the Academie Royale, preferring to support and exhibit at the Academie de St Luc. Although he continued to paint such pictures as a Street Show in Paris (c. 1760; London, N.G.; other examples in Rouen, Mus. B.-A.), he is best known as a draughtsman and etcher. He was a passionate and unconventional observer of the sights of the Paris streets and of the social scene. Dacier saw him as the 'man who drew at all times and in all places', and his contemporary Jean-Baptiste Greuze spoke of his 'priapism of draughtsmanship'. In his many drawings he combined pencil, black and red chalk, bistre, ink and watercolour to create dazzling spontaneous effects. He drew incidents that struck him as he wandered the streets, or entertainments that he attended. He recorded them, noting dates and times, in sketchbooks (e.g. Paris, Louvre and Stockholm, Nmus.) or sometimes in the margins and blank pages of printed books that he was carrying (such as a volume of the poems of Jean-Michel Sedaine, in the Mus. Cond?, Chantilly). These drawings of contemporary incidents include the Fire at the Foire Saint-Germain on the Night of 16-17 May 1762 (ex-David Weill priv. col.) and the Crowning of Voltaire at the Theetre-Franeais in 1778 (Paris, Louvre; see fig.). He went regularly to the Salon of the Academie Royale and to art sales, covering the margins and flyleaves of his sale catalogues and Salon livrets with tiny sketches of works of art and the passing scene. One hundred of these illustrated catalogues were among his effects when he died, and of these about a third survive. These include the livrets for the Salons of 1761, 1769 and 1777 (all Paris, Bib. N.), as well as the catalogues of the sales of Louis-Michel van Loo in 1772 and Charles Natoire in 1778 (both Paris, Bib. N.), and that of Pierre-Jean Mariette in 1775 (Boston, MA, Mus. F.A.). Together with his etchings and large watercolours (e.g. Paris, Louvre) of the Louvre's Salon Carre at the time of the exhibitions of 1753, 1767 and 1769,   Related Paintings of Gabriel Jacques de Saint-Aubin :. | Christian Charity | Portrait of Nikolaus Kratzer | Madme Recamier (mk08) | Virgin and Child | Saying Grace (mk35) |
Related Artists:
Maurice Brazil Prendergast
(October 10, 1858 - February 1, 1924) was a U.S. Post-Impressionist artist who worked in oil, watercolor, and monotype. Technically, he was a member of The Eight, but the delicacy of his compositions and mosaic-like beauty of his designs had little in common with the philosophy of the group. Prendergast was born in St. John's, a city in Newfoundland, Canada. With the failure of his father's subarctic trading post, the family moved to Boston.
Gerbrand van den Eeckhout
1621-1674 Dutch Gerbrand van den Eeckhout Location Dutch painter, draughtsman and etcher. He was the son of the goldsmith Jan Pietersz. van den Eeckhout and a great friend as well as a pupil of Rembrandt, according to Houbraken, who commented that van den Eeckhout painted in the style of his master throughout his career. This is certainly true of van den Eeckhout (biblical) history paintings, but less so of either his portraits, which gradually displayed more Flemish elegance, or his genre pieces (from 1650), in which he followed various trends; he adapted his style to suit his subject with sensitive versatility. He was also a gifted colourist and an artist of great imagination, superior in both these respects to such better-known Rembrandt pupils as Ferdinand Bol and Nicolaes Maes. Moreover, he was extremely productive, and there is at least one dated painting for virtually every year between 1641 and 1674. In addition, he created a large body of drawings comprising histories, figures, landscapes and genre scenes executed in various media, including watercolour. He also made several etchings, mostly studies of heads, such as the Self-portrait (1646; B. 66). He died a bachelor, aged 53.
Ellen Bernard Thompson
American , 1876-1936