(November 25, 1508 - April 1556) was an Italian painter of the late-Renaissance or Mannerist period, active mainly in Florence and Tuscany. He was born in Borgo San Sepolcro and also called il Doceno dal Borgo. He was the pupil of the painter Raffaellino del Colle, in whose shop he encountered Rosso Fiorentino and Giorgio Vasari. He painted under Vasari's direction, the one assistant of Vasari's whom Sidney J. Freedberg singles out. In 1536 Vasari invited him to Florence to assist in producing the decorations for the ceremonial entry of Charles V into Florence. The following year, in the reaction after Duke Alessandro's death, Gherardi was among those banished from Florence, so his work for Vasari was confined to projects outside Florence, until his banishment was lifted in 1554 and he was permitted to return . In the long interval he had painted the Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth for the church of San Domenico in Citte di Castello, church decorations in San Sepolcro, and works for the Vitelli, who were long-term patrons. Gherardi, in the two years left to him, assisted Vasari in the Quartiere degli Elementi in Palazzo Vecchio. Vasari's main assistant after Gherardi's demise was Jan van der Straat, called Giovanni Stradano.   Related Paintings of Cristofano Gherardi :. | At the Piano | Portrait of Francois Marius Granet | Dragonman in Teheran | tjadertupp | Portrait de Philippe IV en costume de chasse (df02) |
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Albert Besnard
1849-1934 French Albert Besnard Art Locations (b Paris, 2 June 1849; d Paris, 4 Dec 1936). French painter, printmaker and designer. He was born to an artistic family and was precociously talented. In 1866 he entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, where he studied under Jean Franois Brmond (1807-68) and Alexandre Cabanel. His Salon dbut in 1868 and his subsequent entries were well received, and in 1874 he won the Prix de Rome with the Death of Timophanes, Tyrant of Corinth (Paris, Ecole N. Sup. B.-A.). Remaining in Italy for five years, Besnard worked in an academic style influenced by Pietro da Cortona and Michelangelo.
Luis Menendez
1716-1780. a Spanish painter was a Spanish painter. Although he received little acclaim during his lifetime and died in poverty, Melendez is recognized today as the greatest Spanish still-life painter of the eighteenth century. His mastery of composition and light, and his remarkable ability to convey the volume and texture of individual objects enabled him to transform the most mundane of kitchen fare into powerful images. Luis Egidio Melendez de Rivera Durazo y Santo Padre was born in Naples in 1716. His father, Francisco Melendez de Rivera Diaz (1682- after 1758), was a miniaturist painter from Oviedowho had moved to Madrid with his older brother, the portrait painter Miguel Jacinto Melendez (1679-1734) in pursuit of artistic instruction.Whereas Miguel remained in Madrid to study and became a painter in the court of Philip V, Francisco left for Italy in 1699 to seek greater artistic exposure. Francisco took a special interest in visiting the Italian academies and settled in Naples where he married Maria Josefa Durazo y Santo Padre Barrille.Luis was a year old when his father, who had been a soldier in a Spanish garrison and lived abroad for almost two decades, returned to Madrid with the family. Luis Egidio, his brother Jos' Agusten, and Ana, one of his sisters, began their careers under the tutelage of their father, who was appointed the King's Painter of Miniatures in 1725.After several years, in his words: painting royal portraits in jewels and bracelets to serve as gifts for envoys and ambassadors, he entered the workshop of Louis Michel van Loo (1707-1771), a Frenchman who had been made royal painter of Philip V of Spain. Between 1737 to 1742, Melendez worked as a part of a team of artist dedicated to copying van Loo's prototypes of royal portraits for the domestic and overseas market, but at least he had a foothold in the palace. He had his artistic sights on a distinguished career as a court painter. When the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando was provisionally inaugurated in 1744, his father, Francisco, was made an honorary director of painting and Luis was among the first students to be admitted, he achieved outstanding results in drawing. The Academy was progressive in that it not only tolerated but also encouraged the 'lesser' genres, including still life. At this time, he was already an accomplished painter as proved by his superb self-portrait at the Louvre signed in 1747. However, this opportunity was marred by a petty quarrel; Luis' father, Francisco, openly attacked the director of the Academy and claimed for himself the honor of being the founder. He had his son Luis personally delivered the inflammatory material to the Academy. Francisco was relieved of his teaching position and Luis was formally expelled from the Academy on June 15, 1748. Unlike his father, Luis professional status was precarious.
Francois Clouet
1510-1572 French Francois Clouet Locations The earliest reference to him is a document dated December 1541 (see Jean Clouet), in which the king renounces for the benefit of François his father estate, which had escheated to the crown as the estate of a foreigner. In this document, the younger Clouet is said to have followed his father very closely in his art. Like his father, he held the office of groom of the chamber and painter in ordinary to the king, and so far as salary is concerned, he started where his father left off. Many drawings are attributed to this artist, often without perfect certainty. There is, however, more to go upon than there is in the case of his father. As the praises of Francois Clouet were sung by the writers of the day, his name was carefully preserved from reign to reign, and there is an ancient and unbroken tradition in the attribution of many of his pictures. There are not, however, any original attestations of his works, nor are any documents known which would guarantee the ascriptions usually accepted. To him are attributed the portraits of Francis I at the Uffizi and at the Louvre, and various drawings relating to them. He probably also painted the portrait of Catherine de Medici at Versailles and other works, and in all probability a large number of the drawings ascribed to him were from his hand. One of his most remarkable portraits is that of Mary, queen of Scots, a drawing in chalks in the Bibliotheque Nationale, and of similar character are the two portraits of Charles IX and the one at Chantilly of Marguerite of France. Perhaps his masterpiece is the portrait of Elizabeth of Austria in the Louvre. This piece made an important impression on Claude Levi-Strauss. In particular it helped inspire his theory of the mod??le reduit, or of works of art as simplifications and scale models of the realities they represent, and other theories of artworks, in his book The Savage Mind. Clouet resided in Paris in the rue de Ste Avoye in the Temple quarter, close to the Hotel de Guise, and in 1568 is known to have been under the patronage of Claude Gouffier de Boisy, Seigneur d Oiron, and his wife Claude de Baune. Another ascertained fact concerning Francois Clouet is that in 1571 he was summoned to the office of the Court of the Mint, and his opinion was taken on the likeness to the king of a portrait struck by the mint. He prepared the death-mask of Henry II, as in 1547 he had taken a similar mask of the face and hands of Francis I., in order that the effigy to be used at the funeral might be prepared from his drawings; and on each of these occasions he executed the painting to be used in the decorations of the church and the banners for the great ceremony. Several miniatures are believed to be his work, one very remarkable portrait being the half-length figure of Henry II in the collection of J. Pierpont Morgan. Another of his portraits is that of Francois, duc d Alençon in the Jones collection at South Kensington, and certain representations of members of the royal family which were in the Hamilton Palace collection and the Magniac sale are usually ascribed to him. He died on the 22nd of December 1572, shortly after the massacre of St Bartholomew, and his will, mentioning his sister and his two illegitimate daughters, and dealing with the disposition of a considerable amount of property, is still in existence. His daughters subsequently became nuns. His work is remarkable for the extreme accuracy of the drawing, the elaborate finish of all the details, and the exquisite completeness of the whole portrait. He must have been a man of high intelligence, and of great penetration, intensely interested in his work, and with considerable ability to represent the character of his sitter in his portraits. His coloring is perhaps not specially remarkable, nor from the point of style can his pictures be considered especially beautiful, but in perfection of drawing he has hardly any equal.