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 :. | Moat Mountain Intervale New Hampshire | Seals on the Rocks, Farallon Islands | Bridal Veil Falls. Yosemite | Sunset in the Rockies | Sunset on the Coast |
Related Artists:
Anna Munthe-Norstedt
painted Still Life with Spring Flowers in 1892
William Romeyn
Haarlem circa 1624-circa 1694
Adriaen Isenbrant
(between 1480 and 1490 - Bruges, July 1551), was a Flemish Northern Renaissance painter, who from documentary evidence was clearly a significant artist of his period, but to whom no specific works can be clearly documented. As hypothesised by art historians, he ran a large workshop specializing in religious subjects and devotional paintings, painting conservatively in the tradition of Early Netherlandish painting. He is believed by some to be the anonymous Master of the Seven Sorrows of the Virgin. Other art historians doubt that any works can be reliably attributed to him, and the number of paintings attributed to him by major museums has been in decline for many decades. There are only a few documentary records of his life, and some mentions in literature from his lifetime or soon after, but he cannot be documented as the creator of any surviving work; everything else consists of hypothesis. It is possible that he was born in Haarlem or even in Antwerp about 1490. It is not known where or with which painter he served his apprenticeship. He is named for the first time in 1510, when he came to Bruges and bought his burghership. In November of the same year he already became master in the painterse Guild of St. Luke and the goldsmithse guild of St. Elooi. He was later elected nine time a deacon (in Old Dutch : vinder) and twice the governor (in Old Dutch : gouverneur = treasurer) of the guild. Soon he had an important workshop, probably in the Korte Vlaminckstraat in Bruges. This was close to the workshop of Gerard David, at the Vlamijncbrugghe and the former workshop of Hans Memling. Bruges, at that time, was one of the richest towns in Europe. Rich traders and merchants ordered diptychs and portraits for personal use. Isenbrandt painted mainly for private clients. However, there were some paintings that were created without any particular commission. He had enough work to even put out work to other painters in Bruges, as a legal suit from 1534 by Isenbrandt against Jan van Eyck (not the famous one) for non-delivery of paintings he had ordered, demonstrates. He was also appointed the agent in Bruges of the painter Adriaan Provoost (son of Jan Provoost), who had moved to Antwerp in 1530. Contemporary sources therefore mention Isenbrandt as a famous and well-to-do painter. He married twice, the first time with Maria Grandeel, daughter of the painter Peter Grandeel. They had one child. After her death in 1537, he married again in 1547 with Clementine de Haerne. This second marriage resulted in two daughters and a son. He also had an extramarital daughter with the innkeeper Katelijne van Brandenburch (who was at the same the mistress of his friend Ambrosius Benson). When he died in 1551, he was buried alongside his first wife at the cemetery of the St. Jacob church in Bruges; his children inherited no less than four houses with surrounding property.