beside the easel

L'Atelier du peintre, ca.1740 Born November 25, 1699 in Southern France, Pierre Subleyras was a late-Baroque painter. At the age of 29 he won a scholarship to study in Rome and remained there for the rest of his life painting mainly alterpieces and portraiture. Subleyras had a unique eye for composition, color and figure arrangement, along with an astute sense of perception and presence in his portraits that is distinctively his own. One can see the heavy Italian influence yet there is also a clear French pride in his work, and most often he is an eclectic blend of the two, which makes him very interesting to study as a truly underrated and brilliant painter who had an amazing range. In the painting above in his studio, we see a self-reflexivity that is almost Post-Modern, showing himself painting some of his most famous works as if some kind of greatest hits album cover or something. He is poking fun of himself as an artist carelessly mass-producing work as if in a factory...

Childhood of Christ, ca 1620 Born on 4 November, 1592 Gerard van Honthorst , sometimes written as Gerrit , was a prolific Dutch Baroque painter from Utrecht who typified the chiaroscuro of tenebrism in the Netherlands. Having spent four years in Italy absorbing the styles of Caravaggio, Manfredi and others he developed his own brand of powerful realism that earned him the nickname "Gherardo Delle Notti", or Gerard of the Nights . Interestingly, he did paint a few scenes and portraits that were not at night and with deep chiaroscuro—many of them quite amusing—but as he was known for painting in his usual dark manner they were not immediately recognizable as his own. Honthorst was unique from his tenebrist contemporaries in that he not only painted religious scenes but genre painting, with characters from everyday life, especially musicians. Compared to his French contemporary Georges de La Tour , whose style was much darker, painting common people in similar scenes to H...

David with the Head of Goliath, ca.1620 Born in Rome in the year 1589, Domenico Fetti was a Baroque painter whose poetry and realism of the figure would leave a deep impression over the centuries. A contemporary of Strozzi and Liss , Fetti would help to influence Venetian art with the boldness of Baroque chiaroscuro and strong figures. His work has the rare quality of lingering in the mind long after viewing it; his portraiture has uncanny powers of unmasking the person behind the character, effortlessly. In Fetti's David with the Head of Goliath we see a Venetian influence of color, contrasting warm against cool, with the sky as a prominent element of the composition. This theme of David conquering Goliath, a force larger than himself, has been painted and sculpted by countless artists throughout history and here Fetti portrays him as a boy who became a man by conquering his fear, ready to embrace his destiny as king. The body language of David sitting on a rock uses dynam...

There is nothing in all the world more beautiful or significant of the laws of the universe than the nude human body. Robert Henri Charles Louis Müller , A Standing Female Nude Leaning Against an Arch, ca.1864 Once again I decided to talk about some Old Master drawings and delve into the thinking behind how these drawings may have been created and the knowledge of the artist. In the above drawing by Müller, done in sanguine with white chalk highlights, the figure is drawn from a low view-point, with her body twisting toward her left side while resting on one knee. Note how Müller alternates the bent right leg with the bent left arm to create dynamic contrast. The right arm is also foreshortened and partially in shadow. Expressing power and femininity, this is a study that is Renaissance in spirit, even Mannerist, revealing the female nude as sculptural yet always graceful. Anton Raphael Mengs , Seated male nude viewed from the back, 1755 One of several Academic nu...

Hercules and Omphale, 1724 Born in Paris, 1688, François Lemoyne was a Rococo painter with flowing compositions, dramatic light, beautiful colors and graceful figures. A busy artist who was one of the many First Painters to the King of France, his tenure at Versailles (1736–1737) earned him the nickname of "new Lebrun". After his grievous death in 1737, the position as Premier peintre du Roi (Painter to the King) would be vacant for nine years before being replaced by Charles-Antoine Coypel. Lemoyne's legacy to the Rococo is his strong ties to the Baroque while embracing the sensuality of a new art movement that was unequivocally French. In Hercules and Omphale , Lemoyne uses body language and symbolic objects to tell the story here. Omphale is standing yet leaning to the right to depict domination while Hercules is seated, his powerful legs apart and at angles that point directly to her. Note the sumptuous skin tones. In the myth, Hercules is punished for killing...

The Soothsayer, 1740 Born on February 13, 1682 in Venice, Giovanni Battista Piazzetta was a Rococo painter. He studied with Crespi while in Bologna and quickly evolved into his own style of Venetian Neo-Baroque Rococo with dark colors and graceful figures. Although a contemporary of Ricci and Tiepolo, Piazzetta remains a unique artist for his use of light and figures that seems to defy the lighter Rococo era of his time. A teacher and co-founder of the Venetian Academy of Fine Arts Scuola di Nudo (I would love to attend a school like that!) Piazzetta would prove to leave a lasting legacy of Rococo genius, even if under-appreciated today. His drawings reveal an understanding of character and charm in the human face, especially in his studies of children, that is unmistakably Piazzetta. In The Soothsayer above, Piazzetta melds warm and cool together with distinctive warm light and deep shadows. Note how he achieves the darks in the background with deep browns that transition into...

The Resurrection of Christ by Paolo Veronese, ca.1570 Beside the Easel is now over a year old, and having written about and analysed well over 80 Old Masters from the Renaissance to Academic, I will continue to focus on techniques and methods of great artists but with more comparison and observation. Up until now I have focused on celebrating artist birthdays and their work, but moving forward I will be also writing about art books, color palettes and color, and interesting blogs to showcase some current ideas and methods.

Self portrait Born March 8, 1869 in London, George Spencer Watson was an English Realist portrait and figure artist. Watson was a member of the prestigious Royal Institute of Oil Painters and the Royal Society of Portrait Painters , whose famous alumni include artists such as Lawrence Alma-Tadema, Henri Fantin-Latour, John Singer Sargent, James Whistler and Auguste Rodin. By the time his career was in full-swing the 20th century changed art in a way that punished Realist painters and Watson's talents were not appreciated as much as they could have been had he been born a mere fifty years earlier. Although obscure considering the company he was in, Watson had a uniquely modern eye for the portrait and especially the female nude that is definitely worth looking at. In his Self-Portrait above, Watson portrays himself as an artist with uncanny self-awareness, studying himself with cautious scrutiny by the way he leans forward. Note how tightly rendered his head is, and how the...