Arts 1304 (Chapter 20)

Therefore, are the settings in Claude Lorrain's paintings a specific location or place?

***

Dutch art production during the Baroque period catered to what audience?

A middle-class audience

What is a still life?

A picture depicting an arrangement of inanimate objects.

Judith Leyster, Self-Portrait

A portrait of herself

Rembrandt van Rijn, Self-Portrait

A portrait of himself

What type of settings did Poussin represent in his landscapes?

A serene classical landscape beneath a sunny sky.

What is a camera obscura?

An ancestor of the modern camera based on passing light through a tiny pinhole or lens to project an image on a screen or the wall of a room.

Who was the most famous of Ruben's assistants who specialized in court portraiture and was also influential internationally?

Anthony Van Dyck

After succeeding in securing their independence from Spain, did the Dutch Republic produce a large amount of religious art? Why?

Artists produced relatively little religious art in the Dutch Republic at this time because the prevailing Calvinism demanded a puritanical rejection of art in churches.

As Dutch prosperity increased, what made subject matter their way into still-life paintings?

As Dutch prosperity increased, precious objects and luxury items made their way into still-life paintings.

Are Claude Lorrain's landscapes ideal classical landscapes?

Atmospheric and linear perspective reinforce each other to turn a vista into a typical Claudian vision, an ideal classical world bathed in sunlight in infinite space.

What artist rivaled Poussin in fame?

Claude Lorrain

Did Claude Lorrain formalize nature?

Claude's formalizing of nature with balanced groups of architectural masses, screens of trees, and sheets of water followed the great tradition of classical landscape.

What suggests that Vermeer was ahead of his time in the understanding of the science of color?

Colors so true to the optical facts and so subtly modulated.

Consequences of War is a commentary on what?

Consequences of War is a commentary on the Thirty Years' War.

How were Dutch landscape painters, such as Cuyp and Ruisdael, different in their depictions from the classical landscapes in many Italian Renaissance paintings?

Cuyp: Unlike the idealized classical landscapes, Cuyp's paintings portray a particular locale. The cows, shepherds, and milkmaid refer to the Dutch Republic's important dairy industry. Ruisdael: In View of Haarlem, Ruisdael not only captured the appearance of a specific locale but also succeeded in imbuing the work with a quiet serenity that is almost spiritual. The Dutch artists of that period infused the elements of their compositions with metaphorical meaning and made use of the visual impact of small figures in a vast landscape to express ideas on humanity and its relationship to almighty nature.

Rachel Ruysch was among the leading Dutch practitioners, with an international reputation, of what kind of still-life paintings?

Floral still life painting

Judith Leyster, who also had a thriving career, was a student of whom?

Frans Hals

What kind of portraiture did Frans Hals produce?

Frans Hals produced lively portraits that seem far more relaxed than traditional formulaic portraiture.

Do Poussin's two landscapes represent a specific time and space?

Greek Island of Patmos ***

What term is used to describe Arrival of Marie de' Medici at Marseilles?

Historical-allegorical

What was the challenge that he succeeded in solving in his group portraits?

PROBLEM: The Calvinists shunned ostentation, instead wearing subdued and dark clothing with little variation or decoration, and the traditional conventions became inappropriate and thus unusable. SOLUTION: Despite these difficulties, or perhaps because of them, Frans Hals produced lively portraits that seem far more relaxed than traditional formulaic portraiture.

Clara Peeters won renown for depictions of what?

Peeters won renown for her depictions of food and flowers together, and for still lifes featuring bread and fruit, known as breakfast pieces.

What did Rembrandt do differently in his use of light as opposed to using the dramatic effect of sharp chiaroscuro?

Showed gradations of light and dark. Rembrandt found that by manipulating the direction, intensity, and distance of light and shadow, and by varying the surface texture with tactile brushstrokes, he could render subtle nuances of character and mood, both in individuals and whole scenes, as in his touching portrayal of prodigal son's return.

Pieter Claesz, Vanitas Still Life

Still Life Painting

What close connections did 17th-century Flemish art retain with their artwork?

The Baroque art of Catholic Europe

Who is the subject of Louis XIV?

The Sun King is the unmistakable focal point of the image, and Rigaud placed him so that he seems to look down on the viewer.

What was the essential theme of Claude Lorrain's landscapes?

The beauty of a broad sky suffused with the golden light of dawn or sunset glowing through a hazy atmosphere and reflecting brilliantly off rippling water.

How did earlier group portraits contrast to Frans Hals' group portraits?

The earlier portraits of the Calvinist traditions shunned ostentation. The people in the portraits wore dark, subdued clothing. They were subdued. They were traditional and formulaic. Frans Hals' later group portraits defied this traditional convention. They were lively, contained spontaneity, the people had individuality. They were engaging. (See the contrast in Frans Hals' earlier group portrait called "The Women Regents of the Old Men's Home at Haarlem.") They are somber, no individualism, subdued.

What tempered Dutch pride in worldly goods?

The ever present morality and humility central to the Calvinist faith tempered Dutch pride in worldly goods

This misnomer is due to what reason?

The features dramatic lighting, but the painting's darkness is due to the varnish the artist used, which darkened considerably overtime. It was not the artist's intention to portray his subjects moving about at night.

What image does this portrait successfully convey?

The image of an absolute monarch.

What did the magnificence and splendor of Baroque imagery reinforce for patrons that it appealed to?

The magnificence and splendor of Baroque imagery reinforced the authority and right to rule of the highborn.

What kind of paintings reflected the pride that the prosperous Dutch had in their accomplishments?

The prosperous Dutch were justifiably proud of their accomplishments, and the popularity of still life paintings—particularly images of accumulated goods, such as Still Life with a Late Ming Ginger Jar—reflected this pride.

The meticulously crafted Dutch still lifes, just like Vermeer's interior scenes, possess what two characteristics?

They are meticulously crafted images both scientific in their optical accuracy and poetic in their beauty and lyricism.

What did Louis XIV and his principal advisor understand about the power of art?

They fully appreciated the power of art as propaganda and the value of visual imagery for cultivating a public persona, and they spared no expense to raise great monuments celebrating the king's absolute power.

Did Rubens have assistance in the practice of his art which he produced for an international clientele?

To produce a steady stream of paintings for a rich and powerful international clientele, Rubens employed scores of assistants.

How did the figures in Claude Lorraine's landscapes differ from those in Poussin's pictures?

Unlike the figures in Poussin's pictures, those in Claude's landscapes tell no dramatic story, point out no moral, praise no hero, and celebrate no saint.

What is characteristic of Ruben's human figures in his paintings?

Unusual poses, foreshortened anatomy, the human body in action, draped or undraped, male or female, remained the focus of his art.

What is a vanitas painting?

Vanitas is a term describing paintings (particularly 17th-century Dutch still lifes) that include references to death.

What did Vermeer realize about shadows, adjoining colors, and light?

Vermeer realized that shadows are not colorless and dark, that adjoining colors affect each other, and that light is composed of colors. Thus he painted reflections off of surfaces in colors modified by others nearby.

Are Poussin's landscapes classical?

Yes

Did this French artist—Louis Le Nain—pursue classicism?

No. The works of Louis Le Nain (ca. 1593-1648) have more in common with contemporaneous Dutch art than Renaissance or ancient art.

Rachel Ruysch, Flower Still Life

Oil on Canvas

Louis XIV (14th) and his principal advisor, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, strove to organize art and architecture for what purpose?

Louis and Colbert sought to regularize taste and establish the classical style as the preferred French manner.

Why is this more commonly known title a misnomer?

Because the painting is not a nocturnal scene, nor are the figures portrayed posted on a watch in defense of their city.

Such still lifes as Peeters' are known as what?

Breakfast pieces

Where is the self-portrait in this painting and what is the message, and what purpose does it serve?

Claesz emphasized this element of time (and demonstrated his technical virtuosity) by including a self-portrait reflected in the glass ball on the left side of the table. He appears to be painting this still life. But in an apparent challenge to the message of inevitable mortality that vanitas paintings convey, the portrait serves to immortalize the artist.

Who was the Flemish artist who was a pioneer of still-life painting?

Clara Peeters

Who was the patron of Peter Paul Ruben's Arrival of Marie de' Medici at Marseilles and what was its purpose?

Marie de' Medici was the patron of this painting. The purpose was to memorialize and glorify her career.

What objects are references to mortality or passages of time in this still life?

InVanitas Still Life, references to mortality include the skull, timepiece, tipped glass, and cracked walnut. all suggest the passage of time or someone or something that was here but now is gone.

Rembrandt van Rijn, Christ with the Sick around Him

Medium: Etching

Historians believe that Vermeer used what tools in his painting?

Mirrors and camera obscura

Who was the leading French proponent of classical painting during the 17th century?

Nicolas Pousin

The Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq, is better known as by what title?

Night Watch

What Dutch painter made his reputation as a painter of interior scenes?

Jan Vermeer

In this still-life painting by Willem Kalf, what item suggests that the work is a vanitas painting?

Kalf's inclusion of a watch suggests that this painting may be a vanitas still life

Who was the preeminent or major art patron of the 17th century in France?

King Louis XIV (14th)

What 17th-century French theory does this painting (Family of Country People) reflect, if not classical?

Reflects the thinking of 17th-century French social theorists who celebrated the natural virtue of peasants who worked the soil.

A younger contemporary of Frans Hals, who was the artist of great versatility and the greatest Dutch artist of his time?

Rembrandt van Rijin

Besides painting, Rembrandt was known for his virtuosity and mastery of what other art medium?

Rembrandt's virtuosity also extended to the graphic media, especially etching.

In contrast to the Renaissance artists, in general, Rembrandt's technique of using light is closer to what?

Rubens and Caravaggio ***

What innovations did Peter Paul Rubens build on to formulate the first truly European painting style?

Rubens built on the innovations of the Italian Renaissance and Baroque masters to formulate the first truly pan-European painting style.

Did the ostentation and spectacle of Baroque art appeal only to the Catholic Church?

Rubens's interaction with royalty and aristocracy provided the Flemish master with an understanding of the ostentation and spectacle of Baroque (particularly Italian) art that appealed to the wealthy and privileged.