Dutch 1664-1750 Rachel Ruysch (June 3, 1664 ?? Amsterdam, August 12, 1750) was a Dutch artist who specialized in still-life paintings of flowers. She was born in The Hague, but moved to Amsterdam when she was three. Her father Frederik Ruysch, a famous anatomist, and botanist, was appointed a professor there. He gathered a huge collection of rarities in his house. She assisted her father decorating the prepared specimen in a liquor balsamicum with flowers and lace. At fifteen Ruysch was apprenticed to Willem van Aelst, a prominent Delft painter, known for his flower paintings. In 1693, she married a portrait painter, Juriaen Pool (1666-1745), with whom she had ten children. Her sister Pieternel was married to Jan Munnicks, a young man who drew flowers in the Hortus Botanicus Amsterdam. In 1701 Ruysch was inducted into the painters' guild in The Hague. Several years later Ruysch was invited to work for the court in D??sseldorf and serve as court painter to Johann Wilhelm, Elector Palatine. She remained working for him and his wife from 1708 until the prince's death in 1716. Also Jan Weenix and Adriaen van der Werff were invited to deliver paintings, after Eglon van der Neer died. In 1723 she won the lottery. Ruysch kept painting for her prominent clients. Ruysch lived eighty-five years and her dated works establish that she painted from the time she was a young woman until she was an octogenarian. About a hundred paintings by her are known. The background of the paintings are usually dark. Ruysch was also noted for her paintings of detailed and realistic crystal vases.  Related Paintings of Rachel Ruysch :. | flowers and lnsects | Still life with flowers on a marble table top | Flower Still-Life | Basket of Flowers | Basket of Flowers |
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Alexander von Humboldt
Berlin 1769-1859 Berlin,was a German naturalist and explorer, and the younger brother of the Prussian minister, philosopher, and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767-1835). Humboldt's quantitative work on botanical geography was foundational to the field of biogeography. Between 1799 and 1804, Humboldt travelled to Latin America, exploring and describing it from a scientific point of view for the first time. His description of the journey was written up and published in an enormous set of volumes over 21 years. He was one of the first to propose that the lands bordering the Atlantic were once joined (South America and Africa in particular). Later, his five-volume work Kosmos (1845) attempted to unify the various branches of scientific knowledge.
Girolamo Mocetto
Italian Painter, ca.1470-1531,Italian engraver, painter and designer of stained glass. He was born into a family of glass painters, and, although there is no documentary evidence that he worked outside Venice, his early paintings and engravings show the influence of Domenico Morone and of Mantegna and his circle, which would suggest that Mocetto's training may not have been exclusively Venetian. His artistic evolution is most clearly seen in a comparison of early works still close to Morone, such as a series of three engravings of the Battle between Israel and the Amalekites (see Hind, nos 719-20) or the painting of the Battle (Pavia, Pin. Malaspina), to works of a few years later, such as the two small paintings of the Massacre of the Innocents (London, N.G.; see fig.) and the engravings of Pagan Sacrifices (H 726-7), the Metamorphosis of Amymone (H 728) and the Calumny of Apelles (H. 727), all datable to c. 1500. In the later works, whole passages or motifs are copied or adapted from drawings and engravings by Mantegna. Mocetto may have had direct contact with the court of Mantua (the Metamorphosis of Amymone is an allegory of the city of Mantua); two engravings dating from the first years of the 16th century, St John the Baptist (H 724) and Judith with the Head of Holofernes (H 725),
Hafiz i Abru
the period of 1465-1535