From being staffage in landscapes, shepherds and their flocks became motifs in their own right, with the social realist of Millet, even Henri Regnault.
Poussin
Two masterworks: Botticelli’s Primavera (Spring) and Poussin’s Empire of Flora, telling stories from Ovid. And they paintings they influenced.
In 1660, he co-founded the Gobelins factory which became the leading maker of tapestries. He also set what became ‘Louis XIV Style’ in furniture.
His talent was spotted early, and he was taken to Rome to study under Poussin in his workshop. He returned to Paris and became the king’s ‘greatest French artist of all time’.
Nine of his brilliant oil sketches made in front of the motif in the Roman Campagna between 1782-85, which helped change the history of art.
Almost a century after its publication, Pissarro still recommended Valenciennes’ textbook on landscape painting. Here’s why.
Modern landscape painting, since before the Impressionists, relies on oil sketches made in front of the motif. Was it Vernet who advised Valenciennes to adopt this practice?
Review of paintings and related articles published here in the second half of 2018, starring Tintoretto, Gérôme. Bonnard, Schiele, and Poussin.
A whirlwind trip through the history of compositional chiaroscuro, from the Renaissance, through Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentileschi, to Rembrandt.
Twenty cantos summarised with the very best of their paintings by Delacroix, Teniers the Younger, Domenico Tintoretto, Poussin, Tiepolo, and others.
The Eclectic Light Company 