Netherlandish Northern Renaissance Painter, ca.1435-1494 Born in Seligenstadt, near Frankfurt in the Middle Rhein region, it is believed that Memling served his apprenticeship at Mainz or Cologne, and later worked in the Netherlands under Rogier van der Weyden (c. 1455?C1460). He then went to Bruges around 1465. There is an apocryphical story that he was a wounded at the Battle of Nancy, sheltered and cured by the Hospitallers at Bruges, and that to show his gratitude he refused payment for a picture he had painted for them. Memling did indeed paint for the Hospitallers, but he painted several pictures for them, in 1479 and 1480, and it is likely that he was known to his patrons of St John, prior to the Battle of Nancy. Memling is connected with military operations only in a distant sense. His name appears on a list of subscribers to the loan which was raised by Maximilian I of Austria, to defend against hostilities towards France in 1480. In 1477, when he was incorrectly claimed to have been killed, he was under contract to create an altarpiece for the gild-chapel of the booksellers of Bruges. This altarpiece, under the name of the Seven Griefs of Mary, is now in the Gallery of Turin. It is one of the fine creations of his more mature period. It is not inferior in any way to those of 1479 in the hospital of St. John, which for their part are hardly less interesting as illustrative of the master's power than The Last Judgment which can be found since the 1470s in the St. Mary's Church, Gda??sk. Critical opinion has been unanimous in assigning this altarpiece to Memling. This affirms that Memling was a resident and a skilled artist at Bruges in 1473; for the Last Judgment was undoubtedly painted and sold to a merchant at Bruges, who shipped it there on board of a vessel bound to the Mediterranean, which was captured by Danzig privateer Paul Beneke in that very year. This purchase of his pictures by an agent of the Medici demonstrates that he had a considerable reputation.  Related Paintings of Hans Memling :. | Triptych of Jan Floreins | The donor Adriaan Reins in front of Saint Adrian on the left panel of the Triptych of Adriaan Reins | adam | The Presentation in the Temple | Christ Giving His Blessing |
Related Artists:
Tommaso Minardi
1787-1871 Italian painter, draughtsman, teacher and theorist. He studied drawing with the engraver Giuseppe Zauli (1763-1822) who imbued Minardi with his enthusiasm for 15th-century Italian art and introduced him to his large collection of engravings after the work of Flemish artists such as Adriaen van Ostade. However, Minardi was strongly influenced by the Neo-classical painter Felice Giani, who ran a large workshop in Faenza, and whose frescoes of mythological scenes (1804-5) at the Palazzo Milzetti he saw being painted. In 1803 he went to Rome on an annual stipend provided by Count Virgilio Cavina of Faenza (1731-1808), and he received (1803-8) additional financial assistance from the Congregazione di S Gregorio. He was given the use of Giani's studio and through him met Vincenzo Camuccini who, with Canova, dominated the artistic establishment in Rome at that time. Although Minardi learnt the precepts of Neo-classicism from Camuccini, he did not share his interest in heroic art. His first works done in Rome show his interest in the theme of master and acolyte. In Socrates and Alcibiades (1807; Faenza, Pin. Com.), for example, he has included himself among a group of elderly philosophers and young students who are placed on either side of a portrait bust of Zauli. He sent this drawing to his patrons, the Congregazione di S Gregorio, no doubt to reassure them of his aptitude and moral correctness. Supper at Emmaus (c. 1807; Faenza, Pin. Com.) was another painting destined for the same patrons. The confined pictorial space, with a single source of light entering through a small window, and the casual poses of the figures are reminiscent of Flemish art and of the works of the northern Caravaggisti, familiar to the artist through engravings.
Louis Michel van Loo
Louis-Michel van Loo (2 March 1707-20 March 1771) was a French painter. He studied under his father, the painter Jean-Baptiste van Loo, at Turin and Rome, and he won a prize at the Academie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in Paris in 1725. With his uncle, the painter Charles-Andre van Loo, he went to Rome in 1727 - 1732, and in 1736 he became court painter to Philip V of Spain at Madrid, where he was a founder-member of the Academy in 1752. He returned to Paris in 1753, and painted many portraits of Louis XV of France. In 1765 he succeeded Charles-Andre as director of the special school of the French academy known as the Ecole Royale des Eleves Proteges. In 1766 he made the portrait of the Portuguese statesman Sebastiao de Melo, Marquis of Pombal. Among his brothers were the painters Francois van Loo (1708 - 1732) and Charles-Amedee-Philippe van Loo (1719 - 1795).
El Greco
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.