John William Godward
English
1861-1922
Godward was a Victorian Neo-classicist, and therefore a follower in theory of Frederic Leighton. However, he is more closely allied stylistically to Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, with whom he shared a penchant for the rendering of Classical architecture, in particular, static landscape features constructed from marble.
The vast majority of Godward's extant images feature women in Classical dress, posed against these landscape features, though there are some semi-nude and fully nude figures included in his oeuvre (a notable example being In The Tepidarium (1913), a title shared with a controversial Alma-Tadema painting of the same subject that resides in the Lady Lever Art Gallery). The titles reflect Godward's source of inspiration: Classical civilisation, most notably that of Ancient Rome (again a subject binding Godward closely to Alma-Tadema artistically), though Ancient Greece sometimes features, thus providing artistic ties, albeit of a more limited extent, with Leighton.
Given that Classical scholarship was more widespread among the potential audience for his paintings during his lifetime than in the present day, meticulous research of detail was important in order to attain a standing as an artist in this genre. Alma-Tadema was, as well as a painter, an archaeologist who attended historical sites and collected artefacts that were later used in his paintings: Godward, too, studied such details as architecture and dress, in order to ensure that his works bore the stamp of authenticity. In addition, Godward painstakingly and meticulously rendered those other important features in his paintings, animal skins (the paintings Noon Day Rest (1910) and A Cool Retreat (1910) contain superb examples of such rendition) and wild flowers (Nerissa (1906), illustrated above, and Summer Flowers (1903) are again excellent examples of this).
The appearance of beautiful women in studied poses in so many of Godward's canvases causes many newcomers to his works to categorise him mistakenly as being Pre-Raphaelite, particularly as his palette is often a vibrantly colourful one. However, the choice of subject matter (ancient civilisation versus, for example, Arthurian legend) is more properly that of the Victorian Neoclassicist: however, it is appropriate to comment that in common with numerous painters contemporary with him, Godward was a 'High Victorian Dreamer', producing beautiful images of a world which, it must be said, was idealised and romanticised, and which in the case of both Godward and Alma-Tadema came to be criticised as a world-view of 'Victorians in togas'. Related Paintings of John William Godward :. | With Violets Wreathed and Robe of Saffron Hue | Campaspe | Study of Campaspe | Summer Flowers | By the Wayside | Related Artists: Frank Weston Benson (March 24, 1862 - November 15, 1951) was an American Impressionist artist, and a member of the Ten American Painters.
Benson was born in Salem, Massachusetts. In 1879, he began study at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston under Otto Grundmann, and later at the Acad??mie Julian in Paris. Upon return to America, he would become an instructor at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Some of his best known paintings (Eleanor, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Summer, Rhode Island School of Design Museum) depict his daughters outdoors at Benson's summer home on the island of North Haven, Maine. He also produced numerous paintings and etchings of wildfowl.
Born into a successful merchant family, Benson lived in Salem for most of his life. At the Boston Museum school he befriended Edmund Charles Tarbell and Robert Reid, at the same time teaching drawing classes in Salem and painting landscapes during the summer. In 1883 he began his studies in Paris, and in the summer of 1884 painted at Concarneau, along with Willard Metcalf and Edward Simmons. His early paintings were conventional landscapes. Bernhard Wiegandtpainted Sao Clemente Street, Rio de Janeiro in 1884 Cerano(1557/1633) Cerano (Novara), Painter/ Sculptor
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