1734-97
English painter. He painted portraits, landscapes and subjects from literature, but his most original and enduringly celebrated works are a few which reflect the philosophical and technological preoccupations of the later 18th century and are characterized by striking effects of artificial light. He was the first major English painter to work outside the capital all his life: apart from spells in Liverpool (1768-71), Italy (1773-5) and Bath (1775-7), he lived and worked in his native Derby, though exhibiting in London at both the Society of Artists (1765-76, 1791) and the Royal Academy (1778-82, 1789-90, 1794). Related Paintings of Joseph wright of derby :. | Experiment iwth an Airpump | Joseph Wright of Derby. Matlock Tor | A Philosopher giving a Lecture on the Orrery | An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump | Portrait of Miss Frances Warren | Related Artists:
Abbott Handerson ThayerAmerican Painter, 1849-1921
American painter and naturalist. He spent his youth in rural New England, where his earliest paintings were wildlife subjects, reflecting his interest in hunting and fishing. While in his teens Thayer achieved some success doing portraits of family pets, which he continued after a move to New York. He attended classes at the Brooklyn Art School and National Academy of Design, but in 1875 he settled in Paris, studying under Henri Lehmann and Jean-L?on G?r?me at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. While abroad he produced landscapes in the Barbizon style and genre scenes, but on his return to New York in 1879
Francesco Solimena1657-1747
Italian
Francesco Solimena Gallery
Francesco Solimena was born in Canale di Serino, near Avellino.
He received early training from his father, Angelo Solimena, with whom he executed a Paradise for the cathedral of Nocera (place where he spend a big part of his life) and a Vision of St. Cyril of Alexandria for the church of San Domenico at Solofra.
He settled in Naples in 1674, there he worked in the studio of Francesco di Maria and later Giacomo del Po[1]. He apparently had taken the clerical orders, but was patronized early on, and encouraged to become an artist by Cardinal Vincenzo Orsini (later Pope Benedict XIII)[2]. By the 1680s, he had independent fresco commissions, and his active studio came to dominate Neapolitan painting from the 1690s through the first four decades of the 18th century. He modeled his art??for he was a highly conventional painter??after the Roman Baroque masters, Luca Giordano and Giovanni Lanfranco, and Mattia Preti, whose technique of warm brownish shadowing Solimena emulated. Solimena painted many frescoes in Naples, altarpieces, celebrations of weddings and courtly occasions, mythological subjects, characteristically chosen for their theatrical drama, and portraits. His settings are suggested with a few details??steps, archways, balustrades, columns??concentrating attention on figures and their draperies, caught in pools and shafts of light. Art historians take pleasure in identifying the models he imitated or adapted in his compositions. His numerous preparatory drawings often mix media, combining pen-and-ink, chalk and watercolor washes.
Francesco Solimena 'A study for the fresco cycle in the Sacristy of San Paolo Maggiore in Naples', Whitfield Fine Art.A typical example of the elaborately constructed allegorical "machines" of his early mature style, fully employing his mastery of chiaroscuro, is the Allegory of Rule (1690) from the Stroganoff collection, which has come to the State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg.
He apparently hoped to see his son Orazio follow a career in the law, for which he received a doctorate (de Domenici), but also became a painter.
His large, efficiently structured atelier became a virtual academy, at the heart of cultural life in Naples. Among his many pupils were Francesco de Mura (1696-1784) , Giuseppe Bonito (1707-89), Pietro Capelli, Gaspare Traversi, and most notably Corrado Giaquinto and Sebastiano Conca. The Scottish portraitist Allan Ramsay spent three years in Solimena's studio. Solimena amassed a fortune, was made a baron and lived in sumptuous style founded on his success.
Francesco Solimena died at Barra, near Naples, in 1747.
Cornelis Liestepainted Landscape with Crescent Moon in