1599-1660,Spanish painter. He was apprenticed to Francisco Herrera the Elder before being trained by Francisco Pacheco. His early works were mostly religious or genre scenes. After arriving in Madrid in 1623, he painted a portrait of Philip IV that won him immediate success and an appointment as court painter. His position gave him access to the royal collections, including works by Titian, who exerted the greatest influence on his style. In his portraits from this period, only the faces and hands of the figures are accentuated, and the dark figures stand out against a light background. A visit to Italy (1629 ?C 31) further developed his style, and on his return to Madrid he entered his most productive period. Velazquez created a new type of informal royal portrait for Philip hunting lodge, and his portraits of court dwarfs display the same discerning eye as those of his royal subjects. On a second visit to Rome (1649 ?C 51) he painted a portrait of Pope Innocent X. The powerful head, brilliant combinations of crimson of the curtain, chair, and cope are painted with fluent technique and almost imperceptible brushstrokes that go far beyond the late manner of Titian and announce the last stage in Velazquez development. This portrait was copied innumerable times and won him immediate and lasting renown in Italy. In his last years he created his masterpiece, Las Meninas (The Maids of Honour, 1656). In this casual scene, the artist is shown painting the king and queen in the presence of the infanta Margarita and her attendants; the nearly life size figures are painted in more or less detail according to their relation to the central figure of the infanta and to the source of light, creating a remarkable illusion of reality never surpassed by Velazquez or any other artist of his age. He is universally acknowledged as one of the giants of Western art.   Related Paintings of Velasquez :. | St. Thomas s confusing | Princess Marian | Bishop Maximilian | Female Textile | Jacob give Joseph a coat of blood |
Related Artists:
Orchardson, Sir William Quiller
English, 1832-1910
Giovanni di Pietro called lo Spagna
ca 1450-Spoleto 1528
Giovanni Mansueti
Italian Early Renaissance Painter, active 1484-ca.1526, was an Italian painter. Also known as Giovanni Mansueti. Known by a few paintings. Little is known of his biography. He was active in Venice from 1485 to 1526. Pupil of Gentile Bellini and worked in the antique style in the Miracles of the Cross painted in 1494- c. 1502 for the Scuola di san Giovanni Evangelista and now in the Gallerie dell'Accademia. In style he resembles Cima da Conegliano and Vittore Carpaccio. One of his paintings resides in a church near Bagni di Luca, Italy.