Jan Steen
Dutch Baroque Era Painter, ca.1625-1679
Daily life was Jan Steen's main pictorial theme. Many of the genre scenes he portrayed are lively to the point of chaos and lustfulness, even so much that a Jan Steen household, meaning a messy scene, became a Dutch proverb (een huishouden van Jan Steen). Subtle hints in his paintings seem to suggest that Steen meant to warn the viewer rather than invite him to copy this behaviour. Many of Steen's paintings bear references to old Dutch proverbs or literature. He often used members of his family as models. Jan Steen painted also quite a few self-portraits, in which he showed no tendency of vanity.
Steen did not shy from other themes: he painted historical, mythological and religious scenes, portraits, still lifes and natural scenes. His portraits of children are famous. He is also well known for his mastery of light and attention to detail, most notably in textiles. Steen was prolific, producing about 800 paintings, of which roughly 350 survive.
Steen's work was valued much by contemporaries and as a result he was reasonably well paid for his work. He did not have any students, but his work proved a source of inspiration for many painters. Related Paintings of Jan Steen :. | The cheerful family | The Tric-trac players | Twelfth Night | The Feast of St Nicholas | Topsy-turvy world | Related Artists: Francis Swain Ward1734-1794 Ambrosius Bosschaert(Antwerp, January 18, 1573?CThe Hague, 1621) was a still life painter of the Dutch Golden Age.He started his career in Antwerp, but spend most of it in Middelburg (1593?C1613), where he became dean of the painters' guild. He later worked in Amsterdam (1614), Bergen op Zoom (1615?C1616), Utrecht (1616?C1619), and Breda (1619). He specialised in painting still lifes with flowers. In 1587, Ambrosius Bosschaert moved from Antwerp to Middelburg with his family because of the threat of religious persecution. At the age of twenty-one, he joined the cityes Guild of Saint Luke. Not long after, Bosschaert had established himself as a leading figure in the fashionable floral painting genre.
Gustave CaillebotteFrench Impressionist Painter, 1848-1894
Gustave Caillebotte was born on August 19, 1848 to an upper-class Parisian family. His father, Martial Caillebotte (1799-1874), was the inheritor of the family textile industry and was also a judge at the Seine Tribunal de Commerce. Caillebotte father had been twice widowed before marrying Caillebotte mother, C??leste Daufresne (1819-1878), who had two more sons after Gustave, Rene (1851-1876) and Martial (1853-1910).
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