German-born American Hudson River School Painter, 1830-1902 Bierstadt was born in Solingen, Germany. His family moved to New Bedford, Massachusetts, in 1833. He studied painting with the members of the D??sseldorf School in D??sseldorf, Germany from 1853 to 1857. He taught drawing and painting briefly before devoting himself to painting. Bierstadt began making paintings in New England and upstate New York. In 1859, he traveled westward in the company of a Land Surveyor for the U.S. government, returning with sketches that would result in numerous finished paintings. In 1863 he returned west again, in the company of the author Fitz Hugh Ludlow, whose wife he would later marry. He continued to visit the American West throughout his career. Though his paintings sold for princely sums, Bierstadt was not held in particularly high esteem by critics of his day. His use of uncommonly large canvases was thought to be an egotistical indulgence, as his paintings would invariably dwarf those of his contemporaries when they were displayed together. The romanticism evident in his choices of subject and in his use of light was felt to be excessive by contemporary critics. His paintings emphasized atmospheric elements like fog, clouds and mist to accentuate and complement the feel of his work. Bierstadt sometimes changed details of the landscape to inspire awe. The colors he used are also not always true. He painted what he believed is the way things should be: water is ultramarine, vegetation is lush and green, etc. The shift from foreground to background was very dramatic and there was almost no middle distance Nonetheless, his paintings remain popular. He was a prolific artist, having completed over 500 (possibly as many as 4000) paintings during his lifetime, most of which have survived. Many are scattered through museums around the United States. Prints are available commercially for many. Original paintings themselves do occasionally come up for sale, at ever increasing prices.  Related Paintings of Albert Bierstadt :. | Yosemite Falls | The Arch of Octavius | Rhone Valley | Mirror Lake, Yosemite Valley | Deer at Sunset |
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Camille Pissarro
Caribbean-born French Pointillist/Impressionist Painter, ca.1830-1903 .Painter and printmaker. He was the only painter to exhibit in all eight of the Impressionist exhibitions held between 1874 and 1886, and he is often regarded as the 'father' of the movement. He was by no means narrow in outlook, however, and throughout his life remained as radical in artistic matters as he was in politics. Thad?e Natanson wrote in 1948: 'Nothing of novelty or of excellence appeared that Pissarro had not been among the first, if not the very first, to discern and to defend.' The significance of Pissarro's work is in the balance maintained between tradition and the avant-garde. Octave Mirbeau commented: 'M. Camille Pissarro has shown himself to be a revolutionary by renewing the art of painting in a purely working sense;
Emil Barentzen
Emilius Ditlev Bærentzen, usually known as Emil Barentzen, (30 October 1799, Copenhagen - 14 February 1868, Copenhagen) was a Danish portrait painter and lithographer, active during the Golden Age of Danish Painting. Born in Copenhagen on 30 October 1799, Barentzen served an apprenticeship at the pharmacy in Nykobing Sjælland but then travelled to Christiansted on the then Danish island of St. Croix in the West Indies where he worked in one of the government offices. Five years later he returned to Denmark and, after qualifying as a lawyer, moved into painting which until then he had practiced as a hobby. In 1821, he entered the Danish Academy where he studied under Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg. He was awarded the little silver medal in 1826 and the large silver medal the following year. He soon became one of Copenhagen's most popular portrait painters. His paintings were characterized by an elegant but sober style, free of psychological trimmings in accordance with contemporary practice. One of his most successful works is the portrait of Soren Kirkegaard's fiancee Regine Olsen (1840). In 1837, he began to specialize in lithography with H.L. Danschell who managed his deceased father-in-law's oilcloth factory where stones were used to colour the fabric. This led to the founding of a lithographic company, Emilius Bärentzen & Co.s litografiske Institut, which later became Hoffensberg, Jespersen & Fr. Trap. Bærentzen made lithographs of many of the period's most important figures. He continued to work both as a lithographer and artist until 1866 when he painted the portraint of Cosmus Bræstrup for the Freemasons lodge in Helsingor. He died on 14 February 1868.
DOMENICO DA TOLMEZZO
Italian painter, Venetian school (b. ca. 1448, Friuli, d. 1507, Friuli)