Italian Rococo Era Painter, 1712-ca.1793 The records of his parish in Venice show that Francesco Guardi was baptized on Oct. 5, 1712. His father, Domenico, who died when Francesco was 4, had a workshop. Francesco and his elder brother, Gian Antonio, worked in a small studio, carrying out such orders as they could get for almost anything the client wanted:mythological pictures, genre, flower pieces, battle scenes, altarpieces, and even, on rare occasions, frescoes. They did not hesitate to copy compositions by other artists, but what they borrowed they always transformed into something more capricious, less stable, more fragmentary in the refraction of light. Francesco did not emerge as an independent personality until 1760, when his brother died. Then, 48 years old, he married, established his own studio, and devoted himself chiefly to painting views of Venice. For the most part he worked in obscurity, ignored by his contemporaries. He was not even admitted to the Venetian Academy until he was 72 years old. Guardi and Canaletto have always been compared to one another because the buildings they chose to paint were often the same. But the way each artist painted them is very different. Canaletto's world is constructed out of line. It provides solid, carefully drawn, three-dimensional objects that exist within logically constructed three-dimensional space. Guardi's world is constructed out of color and light. The objects in it become weightless in the light's shimmer and dissolve in a welter of brushstrokes; the space, like the forms in space, is suggested rather than described. Canaletto belonged essentially to the Renaissance tradition that began with Giotto and, as it grew progressively tighter and more controlled, pointed the way to neoclassicism. Guardi belonged to the new baroque tradition that grew out of the late style of Titian and, as it became progressively looser and freer, pointed the way toward impressionism. Such differences appear even in Guardi's early view paintings, where he was obviously trying to copy Canaletto, such as the Basin of San Marco. The famous buildings are there, but they are far in the background, insubstantial, seeming to float. In front is a fleet of fishing boats, their curving spars seeming to dance across the surface of the canvas. What is important for Guardi is not perspective but the changing clouds and the way the light falls on the lagoon. Guardi became increasingly fascinated by the water that surrounds Venice. In late works, such as the famous Lagoon with Gondola, buildings and people have been stripped away until there is nothing but the suggestion of a thin line of distant wharfs, a few strokes to indicate one man on a gondola, a long unbroken stretch of still water, and a cloudless sky. Guardi also painted the festivals that so delighted visitors to the city, such as the Marriage of Venice to the Sea. This was a symbolic ceremony in which the doge, in the great gilded galley of the head of state, surrounded by a thousand gondolas, appeared before all Venice, in Goethe's image, "raised up like the Host in a monstrance." Of all Guardi's paintings the most evocative are his caprices, the landscapes born out of his imagination though suggested by the ruined buildings on the lonely islands of the Venetian lagoon. A gentle melancholy clings to such scenes.   Related Paintings of GUARDI, Francesco :. | The Three-Arched Bridge at Cannaregio sdg | Il Ridotto (The Foyer) dgh | The Piazza San Marco towards the Basilica dfh | The Torre del-Orologio | Doge Alvise IV Mocenigo Appears to the People in St Mark's Basilica in 1763 |
Related Artists:
Max Uth
painted Landsitz in der Mark in 1900
johan krouthen
född 2 november 1858, död i december 1932, var en svensk idealistisk konstnär. Krouthen föddes i Linköping och var son till handlaren Conrad Krouthen och Hilda Åberg. Släkten Krouthen kom från Norrköping och flera generationer hade arbetat som tenngjutare. Familjenamnet Krut ändrades genom att varubeteckningen Krut-tenn förfranskades till Krouthen. Conrad Krouthen kom till Linköping 1850 och startade en manufakturaffär vid Stora torget. Affären gick bra och 1857 kunde han gifta sig med sömmerskan Hilda Åberg. Krouthen kunde växa upp i ett välmående hem och han fick börja skolan på läroverket i Linköping. Vid 14 års ålder slutade han skolan och började arbeta åt fotografen och målaren Svante Leonard Rydholm som hade en atelje vid St. Larsplan. Krouthen fick lära sig grunderna i både målning och fotografering och vid 16 års ålder började han på Konstakademiens principskola i Stockholm 1875. Den treåriga utbildningen innebar att eleverna fick lära sig att rita av klot och profiler, djur och växter. Efter de tre åren fick Krouthen fortsätta vid akademin. I kursen "Lägre antiken" fick eleverna rita av gipsmodeller, i "Högre antiken" teckna efter levande model och i "Landskapsskolan" fick eleverna måla landskap. Under studietiden sökte sig många elever utanför skolan och Krouthen lärde känna konstnären Edvard Perseus. Perseus var kritisk till utbildningen på akademin och tog med sina elever bland annat till Mariefred och Gripsholms slott för att måla av naturen.
Bernardus Accama
(1697, Burum? - 1756, Leeuwarden) was an eighteenth century Dutch historical and portrait painter, born in Friesland. Active in Leeuwarden.