Painting ID:: 63770
The Banquet of Cleopatra 1746-47 Fresco Palazzo Labia, Venice For the face of Anthony Tiepolo fell back on a type of portrait which he often used in other contexts, e. g. for the god of war, Mars. This section lets us see the detailed rendering of the ornamental decoration on the armor and helmet, thus demonstrating the importance Tiepolo assigned to such apparently insignificant details.Artist:TIEPOLO, Giovanni Battista Title: The Banquet of Cleopatra (detail) Painted in 1701-1750 , Italian - - painting : historical new21/Giovanni Battista Tiepolo-487632.jpg
Painting ID:: 63773
Glory of Spain 1762-66 Fresco, 2700 x 1000 cm Throne Room, Palacio Real, Madrid The sea-goddess Thetis hovers on a cloud, together with her spouse Oceanus, and holds aloft a shell filled with treasures. Tritons and Nereids, who are meant to symbolize the riches of the sea, accompany the scene. The attempt to bridge the austere Classical golden frame using the group of figures and the orange tree at the lower edge of the picture (possibly a personification of the Province of Aragon), and to create the typical connection between the fresco and the space occupied by the viewer does not succeed here.Artist:TIEPOLO, Giovanni Battista Title: Glory of Spain (detail) Painted in 1701-1750 , Italian - - painting : mythological new21/Giovanni Battista Tiepolo-375276.jpg
Painting ID:: 63830
The Pool 1592 Oil on canvas Collezione Molinari Pradelli, Castenaso St John's version (John 5:1-15) of the miracle of the healing of the paralytic lays the scene in Jerusalem at the pool of Bethesda. (According to Matthew, Mark and Luke it took place at Kapernaum.) The place was a resort of the sick since the waters were believed to have miraculous curative powers. It was said that from time to time an angel, traditionally the archangel Gabriel, came and disturbed the water and that the first person to enter it afterwards was healed. But the paralytic had never succeeded in being first. Christ came there and found him. He was ordered to take up his bed and walk and immediately found himself cured. John described it as 'a place with five colonnades', and therefore represented with some such architectural feature. Christ addressing the paralytic who lies at the edge of the pool. Others, sick and infirm crowd the scene. Palma's painting was clearly inspired by the great examples of sixteenth-century Venetian art and in particular by the works of Tintoretto. The composition is typical of Palma the Younger's mature style. Compositional flair, the employment of diagonal perspectives and rich colours almost obliterated by heavy shadow as well as the theatrical eloquence of the gestures and use of foreshortening are all typical characteristics of Palma the Younger's style of painting. When he managed to control all of them, as in this splendid example, he took post-Renaissance Venetian painting, generally considered a dismal period in art, to its highest degree of effectiveness and expression. When, on the other hand, the effects he used degenerated into repetitive formulas, seventeenth-century Venetian art very quickly became monotonous. This painting is a part of the Collezione Molinari Pradelli, the most extensive private collection of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century art in Italy.Artist:PALMA GIOVANE Title: The Pool Painted in 1551-1600 , Italian - - painting : religious new21/PALMA GIOVANE-954467.jpg
Painting ID:: 63834
St John the Evangelist 1486-90 Fresco Cappella Tornabuoni, Santa Maria Novella, Florence In the Gothic vaults of the Tornabuoni Chapel the four Evangelists are floating on clouds. St John the Evangelist is writing down God's words, which are being conveyed to him by his symbolic animal, the eagle, on a piece of paper.Artist:GHIRLANDAIO, Domenico Title: St John the Evangelist Painted in 1451-1500 , Italian - - painting : religious new21/GHIRLANDAIO, Domenico-428297.jpg
Painting ID:: 63837
Interior of the San Giovanni in Laterano in Rome Oil on canvas, 74 x 100 cm Pushkin Museum, MoscowArtist:PANNINI, Giovanni Paolo Title: Interior of the San Giovanni in Laterano in Rome Painted in 1701-1750 , Italian - - painting : interior new21/PANNINI, Giovanni Paolo-398638.jpg
Painting ID:: 63849
Lady Wearing a Gauze Headdress 1445 Oil on oak panel, 47 x 32 cm Staatliche Museen, Berlin Leaving aside the portraits of the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy (Philip the Good and Isabella of Portugal), which have been preserved only in copies (by anonymous masters, now in Berlin and Malibu), the only extant panel portrait from the period before about 1450 is the Portrait of a Young Woman. The young woman, with her expansive Flemish winged or horned coif of fine linen, through which the forehead remains visible, fills almost the entire panel. The 'nakedness' of the face and the softness of the features form an attractive contrast to the firm outlines of the stiffly folded linen and the dark background. The sitter's hands with beringed fingers are laid firmly on one another and rest on an invisible sill, support being provided visually by the frame. While in his twenties the artist married Elisabeth Goffaerts, a native of Brussels, and it has been generally assumed that she is the subject of the Berlin portrait. Although there is no real foundation for it, this is not an unreasonable assumption; the open, warmhearted expression seems to preclude an official portrait and to suggest someone close to the artist. It was undoubtedly this impression of intimacy created in this portrait - it occurs nowhere else in the painter's work - which seemed to call for some explanation. To portray the subject looking directly at the viewer was something quite new when this painting was executed; in the Netherlands this technique occurs for the first time in van Eyck's portraits. The resemblance to the portrait of a woman by the Master of Fl?malle (now in the National Gallery, London) is worth noting. The artist has modelled his subject with sympathy and sensitivity, while avoiding contact with the observer.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Lady Wearing a Gauze Headdress Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : portrait new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-947667.jpg
Painting ID:: 63854
Portrait of Philip the Good after 1450 Oil on wood, 31 x 23 cm Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna The Duchy of Burgundy had its heyday under Philip the Bold, John the Fearless, Philip the Good and Charles the Bold. Between them, they acquired countless new territories, through a cunning combination of astute marriages, timely purchase and the barely legal diversion of other people's inheritances. Rogier van der Weyden received many commissions from the Court of Burgundy. He excelled in portrait. He was not a realist, he did not seek to capture the particular characteristic of his model, but instead tried to create an ideal image. This approach was very popular with his contemporaries, and brought him considerable success in this genre. He was sought after by the grandest aristocrats and prelates, as well as by the wealthy bourgeoisie, who wanted him to record and embellish their features for posterity. Several writers have drawn attention to Van der Weyden's treatment of his sitter's hands, which he almost always painted joined together, discreetly, so as not to distract from their faces, yet quietly present, always serving to underline their serenity.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Portrait of Philip the Good Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : portrait new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-462245.jpg
Painting ID:: 63856
Portrait of a Man 1455-60 Oil on oak panel, 32 x 22,8 cm Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, Madrid The man, who is of middle age, has not been identified. The fashion in which his hair is cut corresponds roughly to the style worn by Francesco d'Este (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), which would suggest that the two pictures are close in date.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Portrait of a Man Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : portrait new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-575357.jpg
Painting ID:: 63858
The Last Judgment 1446-52 Oil on wood Mus?e de l'H?tel Dieu, Beaune The detail shows a group of the damned. In Van der Weyden's time it was believed that lunatics were possessed by demons. Here, the figures of the damned are tortured and deformed by hatred and their faces distorted by madness. Gripped by a collective hysteria, they are unable to weep, but instead scream and fight, as their folly draws them on towards eternal punishment.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: The Last Judgment (detail) Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-386822.jpg
Painting ID:: 63859
Diptych 1440 Oil on oak panel, 18,5 x 12 cm (each) Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna The two small panels, representing the Madonna and St Catherine of Alexandria, respectively, probably formed a diptych. The busts of prophets on the outside of the Ghent Altarpiece by Jan van Eyck were the model for the bust of God the Father at the top of the left panel. The figures of Adam and Eve were from the same source. The picture is usually regarded as an early work by Rogier himself from the years 1432-35, but the figure of the Madonna is probably after Jan van Eyck's Madonna of the Fountain, dated 1439, in Antwerp. The right panel is rather weaker, and is not by the same painter as the Madonna. As a king's daughter, Catherine has a crown, but she has taken it off, perhaps a sign of humility and reverence before the Madonna, and has placed it on the ground to lie there ignored. The wheel, her attribute, refers to the failure of the attempt to break her on the wheel; the martyr was finally beheaded with a sword.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Diptych Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-442328.jpg
Painting ID:: 63860
Portrait Diptych of Jean de Gros 1450s Oil on oak panel, 36 x 27 cm Mus?e des Beaux-Arts, Tournai Of the Madonnas in the portrait diptychs, the most interesting is the one accompanying the Portrait of Jean de Gros (Art Institute, Chicago). She represents one of the early types of half length figures of the Virgin, which were used in many pictures by Rogier's successors, and copied with what are often only very slight deviations. The head of Mary in particular recurs almost unchanged in many pictures from Rogier's workshop or by his close colleagues, and has come down to us, for instance, in a drawing that was intended as the model for a painting (Mus?e du Louvre, Paris). This panel of the Madonna formed a diptych with the portrait of Jean de Gros; both have the donor's motto and emblem on the back. The painting has suffered from its poor state of preservation, and may perhaps be by a workshop assistant.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Portrait Diptych of Jean de Gros (left wing) Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-459839.jpg
Painting ID:: 63861
St John Altarpiece 1455-60 Oil on oak panel, 77 x 48 cm Staatliche Museen, Berlin The left panel depicts the Naming of John the Baptist. Elisabeth lies in bed in the background after giving birth, while the pregnant Mary, the future mother of Jesus, brings the newborn child to his father Zacharias. Zacharias had been struck dumb for his doubts when an angel told him, during service in the temple, that he was to be the father of a son (this scene is shown in the lowest archivolt relief on the left). He therefore has to write down the name of the child. Mary, as the more important saint, is distinguished from Zacharias and Elisabeth by her aureole. The side panels of the St John Altarpiece do not merely show the beginning and end of the Baptist's earthly life. The parallels between the pictorial motifs also express moral conflict. On the left, the chaste Virgin Mary holds the newborn baby in her arms; she and Zacharias are looking at one another gravely, aware of the significance of the event.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: St John Altarpiece (left panel) Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-329299.jpg
Painting ID:: 63863
Portrait Diptych of Philippe de Croy 1460 Oil on oak panel, 49 x 30 cm Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp Philippe de Croy's coat of arms surmounted by a helmet is framed, above, by the name of the subject of the portrait, and below by his title "Seigneur de Sempy." He bore this title from around 1452, but resigned it again in 1461. The painting must therefore have been done within that period. On the left, a vertical board in the panel has been renovated.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Portrait Diptych of Philippe de Croy (reverse side) Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : other new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-845537.jpg
Painting ID:: 63864
St Joseph 1445 Oil on oak panel, 21 x 18,3 cm Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon This fragment was sawn out of the same large altarpiece as the Mary Magdalene in the National Gallery, London. The aged Joseph stood behind the Magdalene; the lower part of his body can still be seen in the fragment. The exterior of the building in which the scene took place was richly ornamented with Gothic decoration, like a church.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: St Joseph Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-828365.jpg
Painting ID:: 63865
Lamentation 1441 Wood, 32,2 x 47,2 cm Mus?es Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels The latest studies attribute this Lamentation directly to Rogier van der Weyden, a pupil of the Master of Fl?malle and one of the most important and influential of the Flemish Primitives. The style and pictorial qualities of the painting match those of other Van der Weyden panels that are documented by archival material. A few authors, however, believe this Lamentation to be by his workshop, because of the various versions that exist of this composition, some of which have definitely been produced by assistants. Van der Weyden had so much work that he left the reproduction of popular compositions like the Lamentation to the other painters in his workshop. Dendrochronological research - the dating of a wooden panel based on the growth rings - places this version at around 1441, i.e. relatively early in the painter's career. Depicted is the lamentation of Christ under the cross, a scene that does not appear as such in the Bible. To the left we see John the Evangelist, barefoot and robed in a red mantle. His right hand supports the Saviour's upper body, which is resting against the Virgin's knee. With his left hand he is comforting Mary. The Mother of God supports her Son's limp head and presses her cheek against his. At Christ's feet Mary Magdalen kneels in veneration, alongside her an ointment pot, her customary attribute. The skull in the foreground refers to the location, Golgotha, literally "place of the skull". Apocryphal texts frequently interpret this as the skull of Adam, whose fall brought death on the human race, and whose original sin Christ died to expiate. The withered trees to the left and right are also taken from medieval Passion stories, certain of which tell that all trees withered when the Saviour gave up the spirit. The emotional intensity of the Lamentation witnesses to the influence of 'devotio moderna', with this type of tableau intended to move the viewer to compassion. Closer contemplation of the Passion would then lead to the imitation of Christ, or place the viewer into the right frame of mind to receive communion.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Lamentation Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-369476.jpg
Painting ID:: 63866
Portrait of a Young Woman 1440 Silverpoint on prepared paper, 166 x 116 mm British Museum, London The finest of the drawings ascribed to Rogier is the Portrait of a Young Woman. In its freshness of observation and lively expression the drawing comes closest to the painted portrait of another young woman (Staatliche Museen, Berlin), although in contrast to that painting - probably the earliest of the independent portraits by Rogier still extant - the draftsman has modeled the face with much greater plasticity, using light and shade to make shapes like the eyelids appear more rounded and fleshier. This factor in turn links the drawing closely to a portrait of a woman ascribed to the Master of Fl?malle, now in the National Gallery, London, and to the faces in Rogier's earlier Deposition (Prado, Madrid). The strong, bright reflections on the shaded areas of the sitter's throat and cheeks also adopt a method frequently used by Jan van Eyck to heighten the sense of three-dimensionality. By comparison with the chiaroscuro and the powerful three-dimensional style of the drawing, the painted face of the young woman in the portrait appear generally more linear - paradoxically, one might almost say more like a drawing. The draftsman's intention of placing several strong contrasts of light and shade side by side also matches the effects in the Deposition. Like the shaded side of the head of the Virgin, the right-hand side of the portrait drawing shows the alternation of light and very dark areas, and the artist has even shaded the headdress heavily next to the area of reflected light on the sitter's jaw line just below her ear, though this effect is illogical, since if the head-dress is to reflect light it ought to be lit there itself. However, the darkness in the outer area of the drawing, emphasizing the fold at the back of the head-dress, is a genuinely distinctive feature, producing the effect of heavy shadow. There are no such heavy shadows in any painted portrait by Rogier; this pictorial device, creating a sense of space around the figure, first appears in painting around the middle of the century in works by the artist Petrus Christus, who was active in Bruges. Here the draftsman may have created the shadows before drawing the sitter herself, or he may have placed them there to make the back of the headdress retreat into the background - an effect that would also be achieved by the uniform dark ground of a painted portrait. The immediacy of this portrait gives the impression that it was drawn from life. Such an impression is further supported by the fact that only the head and the complicated head-dress are executed in detail, while the upper part of the sitter's body is only lightly indicated; her dress with its patterns of folds could be added later, and leaving it out while the woman herself was being portrayed would have spared her the tedium of sitting for the artist. Such details could easily enough be copied from a painting, but the visible part of the woman's body appears rather awkwardly executed. The right hand on the edge of the picture is particularly jarring, and does not quite connect up anatomically with her shoulder. It is complex in structure, but only half shown, and its clear outline does not make it look like a study from nature. Perhaps the artist completed the lower areas of the portrait later, using a work already in his stock, and experimenting with the composition of his planned painting. All Early Netherlandish portraits were certainly based on drawings from life, for the long process of painting would not have allowed the artist to work from a living model. The Portrait of a Young Woman, outstanding as both a drawing and a portrait, must be one of the very few examples of this genre to have been preserved. Since over and beyond these qualities, the drawing shows similarities with Rogier's painted portraits in its presentation, and with his Deposition in the manner of depicting a head, it could well be by his own hand. It was probably done quite close to the time of the great altarpiece for the Archers of Leuven, while the other (painted) Portrait of a Young Woman must have been executed rather later.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Portrait of a Young Woman Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - graphics : portrait new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-656378.jpg
Painting ID:: 63867
St Catherine 1445 Oil on oak panel, 21,7 x 18,6 cm Gulbenkian Foundation, Lisbon This fragment was sawn out of the same large altarpiece as the Mary Magdalene in the National Gallery, London. The face of the saint, probably painted by an assistant, shows weaknesses in the drawing.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: St Catherine Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-748694.jpg
Painting ID:: 63868
St Columba Altarpiece 1455 Oil on oak panel Alte Pinakothek, Munich The picture shows a detail of the Presentation in the Temple, the right panel of the altarpiece executed for the St Columba church in Cologne. According to Mosaic law, all firstborn sons had to be presented to God in the temple. When Mary and Joseph carried out this duty, the pious old Simeon recognized the child as the Redeemer whom, according to a prophecy, he was to see before he died. He thanks God with the words, "Lord, now lettest thou they servant depart in peace, according to thy word." The old prophetess Anna, who also recognizes the Christ, is standing behind Simeon. The servant behind Mary is holding two doves for the sacrifice of purification that followed childbirth. Traces of the late Romanesque church of St. Gereon in Cologne seem to have entered into the architecture of the temple on the right wing - the polygonal rotunda, the gallery, and the small buttresses on the outside.Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: St Columba Altarpiece (detail) Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-743877.jpg
Painting ID:: 63869
Entombment of Christ 1450 Oil on oak panel, 110 x 96 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence It is believed - but without absolute certainty - that this Entombment is the centre of a polyptych which was acquired by Leonello d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, for the Study at Belfiore, when the painter went in pilgrimage to Rome in 1449, the year before the Jubilee. It is however more probable that this work - which is also mentioned as being in the Medicean Villa at Careggi - was done in 1449-50 at Florence, because it derives its compositive formula from the Deposition by Fra Angelico which can be seen in the predella of the altarpiece of St Mark in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich. This painting, in a Renaissance frame decorated with pilasters, adorned the altar of the private chapel of the Medici villa in Careggi, near Florence. Cosimo de' Medici (1389 -1464) had built this country residence around the middle of the century, and there are good reasons to suppose that the Medici family, who must have owned Rogier's small panel of the Madonna (St?delsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt), also commissioned the larger painting. The work closely follows the Entombment of Christ which was part of an altarpiece by Fra Angelico, painted around 1440 for the Florentine monastery church of San Marco. Its influence is evident in the display of the dead man, shown almost standing, with Mary and John holding his arms one on each side, and more particularly in the hill with the tomb in the rock, which runs entirely counter to Northern European tradition. Fra Angelico's altarpiece, to which the picture of the Entombment, much imitated in Florence, also belonged, was itself an important donation by the Medici family. It is improbable that Rogier van der Weyden saw Fra Angelico's work by chance on his Italian journey, and then reworked it for his own Medici altarpiece - particularly as we do not know whether he passed through Florence at all on his way to Rome. The model was more probably prescribed for him by his patrons when the work was commissioned. Very likely they sent the master a sketch of the work they had donated, telling him to follow it. Such clear guidelines from Florence would also explain why the painting was executed in almost square format, unusual for Netherlandish works but common in Italy and suitable for the architectural Renaissance setting. The patrons who commissioned the work will have been as much struck by the fine, realistic detail of the painting of the Lamentation as by the intense emotion of the faces. These qualities, and the slight asymmetry that suited late Gothic taste, distinguish the picture in significant respects from the work of Fra Angelico. A two-dimensionality at least matching that of the St John Altarpiece (Staatliche Museen, Berlin), and not at all in line with the artistic ideals of the Renaissance, is particularly noticeable in the Magdalene kneeling at the front, her limbs compressed into the same plane. The painting can thus be associated with Rogier's late works coming after the St. Columba Altarpiece (Alte Pinakothek, Munich).Artist:WEYDEN, Rogier van der Title: Entombment of Christ Painted in 1401-1450 , Flemish - - painting : religious new21/WEYDEN, Rogier van der-379624.jpg