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He was made a "Groom of the Chamber" of the Pope, which gave him status at court and an additional income, and also a knight of the Papal Order of the Golden Spur. Vasari claims that he had toyed with the ambition of becoming a cardinal, perhaps after some encouragement from Leo, which also may account for his delaying his marriage. |
Raphael died on Good Friday, April 6, 1520, which was possibly his 37th birthday. Vasari says that Raphael had also been born on a Good Friday, which in 1483 fell on March 28, and that the artist died from exhaustion brought on by unceasing romantic interests while he was working on the Loggia. Several other possibilities for his death have been raised by later historians and scientists, such as a combination of an infectious disease and bloodletting. In his acute illness, which lasted fifteen days, Raphael was composed enough to confess his sins, receive the last rites, and put his affairs in order. He dictated his will, in which he left sufficient funds for his mistress's care, entrusted to his loyal servant Baviera, and left most of his studio contents to Giulio Romano and Penni. At his request, Raphael was buried in the Pantheon. |
Raphael's funeral was extremely grand, attended by large crowds. According to a journal by Paris de Grassis, four cardinals dressed in purple carried his body, the hand of which was kissed by the Pope. The inscription on Raphael's marble sarcophagus, an elegiac distich written by Pietro Bembo, reads: "Here lies that famous Raphael by whom Nature feared to be conquered while he lived, and when he was dying, feared herself to die." |
Self-portraits |
Critical reception |
Raphael was highly admired by his contemporaries, although his influence on artistic style in his own century was less than that of Michelangelo. Mannerism, beginning at the time of his death, and later the Baroque, took art "in a direction totally opposed" to Raphael's qualities; "with Raphael's death, classic art—the High Renaissance—subsided", as Walter Friedländer put it. He was soon seen as the ideal model by those disliking the excesses of Mannerism:the opinion ...was generally held in the middle of the sixteenth century that Raphael was the ideal balanced painter, universal in his talent, satisfying all the absolute standards, and obeying all the rules which were supposed to govern the arts, whereas Michelangelo was the eccentric genius, more brilliant than any other artists in his particular field, the drawing of the male nude, but unbalanced and lacking in certain qualities, such as grace and restraint, essential to the great artist. Those, like Dolce and Aretino, who held this view were usually the survivors of Renaissance Humanism, unable to follow Michelangelo as he moved on into Mannerism. Vasari himself, despite his hero remaining Michelangelo, came to see his influence as harmful in some ways, and added passages to the second edition of the Lives expressing similar views. |
Raphael's compositions were always admired and studied, and became the cornerstone of the training of the Academies of art. His period of greatest influence was from the late 17th to late 19th centuries, when his perfect decorum and balance were greatly admired. He was seen as the best model for the history painting, regarded as the highest in the hierarchy of genres. Sir Joshua Reynolds in his Discourses praised his "simple, grave, and majestic dignity" and said he "stands in general foremost of the first [i.e., best] painters", especially for his frescoes (in which he included the "Raphael Cartoons"), whereas "Michael Angelo claims the next attention. He did not possess so many excellences as Raffaelle, but those he had were of the highest kind..." Echoing the sixteenth-century views above, Reynolds goes on to say of Raphael: |
The excellency of this extraordinary man lay in the propriety, beauty, and majesty of his characters, his judicious contrivance of his composition, correctness of drawing, purity of taste, and the skilful accommodation of other men's conceptions to his own purpose. Nobody excelled him in that judgment, with which he united to his own observations on nature the energy of Michael Angelo, and the beauty and simplicity of the antique. To the question, therefore, which ought to hold the first rank, Raffaelle or Michael Angelo, it must be answered, that if it is to be given to him who possessed a greater combination of the higher qualities of the art than any other man, there is no doubt but Raffaelle is the first. But if, according to Longinus, the sublime, being the highest excellence that human composition can attain to, abundantly compensates the absence of every other beauty, and atones for all other deficiencies, then Michael Angelo demands the preference. Reynolds was less enthusiastic about Raphael's panel paintings, but the slight sentimentality of these made them enormously popular in the 19th century: "We have been familiar with them from childhood onwards, through a far greater mass of reproductions than any other artist in the world has ever had..." wrote Wölfflin, who was born in 1862, of Raphael's Madonnas. |
In Germany, Raphael had an immense influence on religious art of the Nazarene movement and Düsseldorf school of painting in the 19th century. In contrast, in England the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood explicitly reacted against his influence (and that of his admirers such as Joshua Reynolds), seeking to return to styles that pre-dated what they saw as his baneful influence. According to a critic whose ideas greatly influenced them, John Ruskin: |
The doom of the arts of Europe went forth from that chamber [the Stanza della Segnatura], and it was brought about in great part by the very excellencies of the man who had thus marked the commencement of decline. The perfection of execution and the beauty of feature which were attained in his works, and in those of his great contemporaries, rendered finish of execution and beauty of form the chief objects of all artists; and thenceforward execution was looked for rather than thought, and beauty rather than veracity. |
And as I told you, these are the two secondary causes of the decline of art; the first being the loss of moral purpose. Pray note them clearly. In mediæval art, thought is the first thing, execution the second; in modern art execution is the first thing, and thought the second. And again, in mediæval art, truth is first, beauty second; in modern art, beauty is first, truth second. The mediæval principles led up to Raphael, and the modern principles lead down from him. |
By 1900, Raphael's popularity was surpassed by Michelangelo and Leonardo, perhaps as a reaction against the etiolated Raphaelism of 19th-century academic artists such as Bouguereau. Although art historian Bernard Berenson in 1952 termed Raphael the "most famous and most loved" master of the High Renaissance, art historians Leopold and Helen Ettlinger say that Raphael's lesser popularity in the 20th century is made obvious by "the contents of art library shelves ... In contrast to volume upon volume that reproduce yet again detailed photographs of the Sistine Ceiling or Leonardo's drawings, the literature on Raphael, particularly in English, is limited to only a few books". They conclude, nonetheless, that "of all the great Renaissance masters, Raphael's influence is the most continuous." |
See also |
List of paintings by Raphael |
Domenico Alfani, a close friend of Raphael whose paintings have often been mistaken for those of the better-known artist |
Renaissance in Urbino |
Notes |
Footnotes |
Citations |
References |
Blunt, Anthony, Artistic Theory in Italy, 1450–1660, 1940 (refs to 1985 edn), OUP, ISBN 0-19-881050-4 |
Gould, Cecil, The Sixteenth Century Italian Schools, National Gallery Catalogues, London 1975, ISBN 0-947645-22-5 |
Ettlinger, Leopold D., and Helen S. Ettlinger, Raphael, Oxford: Phaidon, 1987, ISBN 0714823031 |
Roger Jones and Nicholas Penny, Raphael, Yale, 1983, ISBN 0-300-03061-4 |
Landau, David in:David Landau & Peter Parshall, The Renaissance Print, Yale, 1996, ISBN 0-300-06883-2 |
Pon, Lisa, Raphael, Dürer, and Marcantonio Raimondi, Copying and the Italian Renaissance Print, 2004, Yale UP, ISBN 978-0-300-09680-4 |
Salmi, Mario; Becherucci, Luisa; Marabottini, Alessandro; Tempesti, Anna Forlani; Marchini, Giuseppe; Becatti, Giovanni; Castagnoli, Ferdinando; Golzio, Vincenzo (1969). The Complete Work of Raphael. New York: Reynal and Co., William Morrow and Company. |
Shearman, John; Raphael in Early Modern Sources 1483–1602, 2003, Yale University Press, ISBN 0-300-09918-5 |
Vasari, Life of Raphael from the Lives of the Artists, edition used: Artists of the Renaissance selected & ed Malcolm Bull, Penguin 1965 (page nos from BCA edn, 1979) |
Wölfflin, Heinrich; Classic Art; An Introduction to the Renaissance, 1952 in English (1968 edition), Phaidon, New York. |
Gigli, Laura (1992). Guide rionali di Roma (in Italian). Vol. Borgo (II). Roma: Fratelli Palombi Editori. ISSN 0393-2710. |
Further reading |
The standard source of biographical information is now: V. Golzio, Raffaello nei documenti nelle testimonianze dei contemporanei e nella letturatura del suo secolo, Vatican City and Westmead, 1971 |
The Cambridge Companion to Raphael, Marcia B. Hall, Cambridge University Press, 2005, ISBN 0-521-80809-X, |
New catalogue raisonné in several volumes, still being published, Jürg Meyer zur Capellen, Stefan B. Polter, Arcos, 2001–2008 |
Raphael. James H. Beck, Harry N. Abrams, 1976. LCCN 73-12198, ISBN 0-8109-0432-2 |
Raphael, Pier Luigi De Vecchi, Abbeville Press, 2003. ISBN 0789207702 |
Raphael, Bette Talvacchia, Phaidon Press, 2007. ISBN 9780714847863 |
Raphael, John Pope-Hennessy, New York University Press, 1970, ISBN 0-8147-0476-X |
Raphael: From Urbino to Rome; Hugo Chapman, Tom Henry, Carol Plazzotta, Arnold Nesselrath, Nicholas Penny, National Gallery Publications Limited, 2004, ISBN 1-85709-999-0 (exhibition catalogue) |
The Raphael Trail: The Secret History of One of the World's Most Precious Works of Art; Joanna Pitman, 2006. ISBN 0091901715 |
Raphael: A Critical Catalogue of his Pictures, Wall-Paintings and Tapestries, catalogue raisonné by Luitpold Dussler published in the United States by Phaidon Publishers, Inc., 1971, ISBN 0-7148-1469-5 (out of print, but an online version is here [1]) |
Raphael at the Metropolitan: The Colonna Altarpiece, Wolk-Simon, Linda. (2006). New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN 978-1588391889. |
Raphael and the Antique, Claudia La Malfa, Reaktion Books, 2020. ISBN 9781789141504 |
External links |
120 artworks by or after Raphael at the Art UK site |
Raphael Research Resource from the National Gallery, London |
V&A London online feature on the Raphael Cartoons |
Ten drawings and three paintings from the Royal Collection |
Web Gallery of Art |
Birthplace Museum of Raphael, Urbino, on the Artist's Studio Museum Network website |
Raphael Santi at ColourLex. |
Raphael at the National Gallery of Art |
Guide to the Raphael Spurious Letters undated at the University of Chicago Special Collections Research Center |
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn(, Dutch: [ˈrɛmbrɑnt ˈɦɑrmə(n)ˌsoːɱ vɑn ˈrɛin] ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker, and draughtsman. He is generally considered one of the greatest visual artists in the history of art. It is estimated Rembrandt produced a total of about three hundred paintings, three hundred etchings, and two thousand drawings. |
Unlike most Dutch painters of the 17th century, Rembrandt's works depict a wide range of styles and subject matter, from portraits and self-portraits to landscapes, genre scenes, allegorical and historical scenes, biblical and mythological themes and animal studies. His contributions to art came in a period that historians call the Dutch Golden Age. |
Rembrandt never went abroad but was considerably influenced by the work of the Italian Old Masters and Dutch and Flemish artists who had studied in Italy. After he achieved youthful success as a portrait painter, Rembrandt's later years were marked by personal tragedy and financial hardships. Yet his etchings and paintings were popular throughout his lifetime, his reputation as an artist remained high, and for twenty years he taught many important Dutch painters. Rembrandt's portraits of his contemporaries, self-portraits and illustrations of scenes from the Bible are regarded as his greatest creative triumphs. His approximately 40 self-portraits form an intimate autobiography. |
Early life and education |
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn was born on 15 July 1606 in Leiden, in the Dutch Republic, now the Netherlands. He was the ninth child born to Harmen Gerritszoon van Rijn and Neeltgen Willemsdochter van Zuijtbrouck. His family was quite well-to-do; his father was a miller and his mother was a baker's daughter. His mother was Catholic, and his father belonged to the Dutch Reformed Church. Religion is a central theme in Rembrandt's works and the religiously fraught period in which he lived makes his faith a matter of interest. |
As a boy, he attended a Latin school. In 1620, he was enrolled at the University of Leiden, although he had a greater inclination towards painting and was soon apprenticed to Jacob van Swanenburg, with whom he spent three years. After a brief but important apprenticeship of six months with the history painter Pieter Lastman in Amsterdam, Rembrandt stayed a few months with Jacob Pynas in 1625, though Simon van Leeuwen claimed that Rembrandt was taught by Joris van Schooten and then started his own workshop. |
Career |
In 1625, Rembrandt opened a studio in Leiden, which he shared with friend and colleague Jan Lievens. In 1627, Rembrandt began to accept students, among them Gerrit Dou and Isaac de Jouderville. Joan Huydecoper is mentioned as the first buyer of a Rembrandt painting in 1628. In 1629, Rembrandt was discovered by the statesman Constantijn Huygens who procured for Rembrandt important commissions from the court of The Hague. As a result of this connection, Prince Frederik Hendrik continued to purchase paintings from Rembrandt. |
At the end of 1631, Rembrandt moved to Amsterdam, a city rapidly expanding as the business and trade capital. He began to practice as a professional portraitist for the first time, with great success. He initially stayed with an art dealer, Hendrick van Uylenburgh, and in 1634, married Hendrick's cousin, Saskia van Uylenburgh. Saskia came from a respected family: her father Rombertus was a lawyer and had been burgomaster (mayor) of Leeuwarden. The couple married in the local church of St. Annaparochie without the presence of Rembrandt's relatives. In the same year, Rembrandt became a citizen of Amsterdam and a member of the local guild of painters. He also acquired a number of students, among them Ferdinand Bol and Govert Flinck. |
In 1635, Rembrandt and Saskia rented a fashionable lodging with a view of the river Amstel. In 1637, Rembrandt moved upriver to Vlooienburg, in a building on the previous site of the current Stopera. In May 1639 they moved to a recently modernized house in the upscale 'Breestraat' with artists and art dealers; Nicolaes Pickenoy, a portrait painter, was his neighbor. The mortgage to finance the 13,000 guilder purchase would be a cause for later financial difficulties. The neighborhood sheltered many immigrants and was becoming the Jewish quarter. It was there that Rembrandt frequently sought his Jewish neighbors to model for his Old Testament scenes. |
One of the great patrons at the early stages of his career was Amsterdam statesman Andries de Graeff. |
Although they were by now affluent, the couple suffered several personal setbacks; three children died within weeks of their births. Only their fourth child, Titus, who was born in 1641, survived into adulthood. Saskia died in 1642, probably from tuberculosis. Rembrandt's drawings of her on her sick and death bed are among his most moving works. After Saskia's illness, the widow Geertje Dircx was hired as Titus' caretaker and dry nurse; at some time, she also became Rembrandt's lover. In May 1649 she left and charged Rembrandt with breach of promise and asked to be awarded alimony. Rembrandt tried to settle the matter amicably, but to pay her lawyer she pawned the diamond ring he had given her that once belonged to Saskia. On 14 October they came to an agreement; the court particularly stated that Rembrandt had to pay a yearly maintenance allowance, provided that Titus remained her only heir and she sold none of Rembrandt's possessions. As Dircx broke her promise, Rembrandt and members of Dircx's own family had her committed to a women's house of correction at Gouda in August 1650. Rembrandt also took measures to ensure she stay in the house of correction for as long as possible. Rembrandt paid for the costs. |
In early 1649, Rembrandt began a relationship with the 23-year-old Hendrickje Stoffels, who had initially been his maid. She may have been the cause of Geertje's leaving. In that year he made no (dated) paintings or etchings at all. In 1654 Rembrandt produced a controversial nude Bathsheba at Her Bath. In June Hendrickje received three summonses from the Reformed Church to answer the charge "that she had committed the acts of a whore with Rembrandt the painter". In July she admitted her guilt and was banned from receiving communion. Rembrandt was not summoned to appear for the Church council. In October they had a daughter, Cornelia. Had he remarried he would have lost access to a trust set up for Titus in Saskia's will. |
Insolvency |
Rembrandt, despite his artistic success, found himself in financial turmoil. His penchant for acquiring art, prints, and rare items led him to live beyond his means. In January 1653 the sale of the property formally was finalized but Rembrandt still had to cover half of the remaining mortgage. Creditors began pressing for installments but Rembrandt, facing financial strain, sought a postponement. The house required repairs prompting Rembrandt to borrow money from friends, including Jan Six. |
In November 1655, amid a year overshadowed by plague and the drafting of wills, Rembrandt's 14-year-old son Titus took a significant step by drafting a will that designated his father as the sole heir, effectively sidelining his mother's family. In December Rembrandt orchestrated a sale of his paintings, yet the earnings failed to meet expectations. This tumultuous period deeply impacted the art industry, prompting Rembrandt to seek a high court arrangement known as cessio bonorum. Despite the financial difficulties, Rembrandt's bankruptcy wasn't forced. In July 1656, he declared his insolvency, taking stock and willingly surrendered his assets. Notably, he had already transferred the house to his son. Both the authorities and his creditors showed leniency, granting him ample time to settle his debts. Jacob J. Hinlopen allegedly played a role. |
In November 1657 another auction was held to sell his paintings, as well as a substantial number of etching plates and drawings, some by renowned artists such as Raphael, Mantegna and Giorgione. Remarkably, Rembrandt was permitted to retain his tools as a means of generating income. Rembrandt lost the guardianship of his son and thus control over his actions. A new guardian, Louis Crayers, claimed the house in settlement of Titus’s debt. |
The sale list comprising 363 items offers insight into Rembrandt's diverse collections, which, encompassed Old Master paintings, drawings, Roman emperors busts, Greek philosophers statues, books (a bible), two globes, bonnets, armor, and various objects from Asia (chinaware), as well as a collections of natural history specimens (two lion skins, a bird-of-paradise, corals and minerals). Unfortunately, the prices realized in the sale were disappointing. |
By February 1658, Rembrandt' house was sold at a foreclosure auction, and the family moved to more modest lodgings at Rozengracht. In 1660, he finished Ahasuerus and Haman at the feast of Esther which he sold to Jan J. Hinlopen. Early December 1660, the sale of the house was finalized but the proceeds went directly to Titus' guardian. |
Two weeks later, Hendrickje and Titus established a dummy corporation as art dealers, allowing Rembrandt, who had board and lodging, to continue his artistic pursuits. In 1661, they secured a contract for a major project at the newly completed town hall. The resulting work, The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis, was rejected by the mayors and returned to the painter within a few weeks; the surviving fragment (in Stockholm) is only a quarter of the original. |
Despite these setbacks, Rembrandt continued to receive significant portrait commissions and completed notable works, such as the Sampling Officials in 1662. It remains a challenge to gauge Rembrandt's wealth accurately as he may have overestimated the value of his art collection. Nonetheless, half of his assets were earmarked for Titus' inheritance. |
In March 1663, with Hendrickje's illness, Titus assumed a more prominent role. Isaac van Hertsbeeck, Rembrandt's primary creditor, went to the High Court and contested Titus' priority for payment, leading to legal battles that Titus ultimately won in 1665 when he came of age. During this time, Rembrandt worked on notable pieces like the Jewish Bride and his final self-portraits but struggled with rent arrears. Notably, Cosimo III de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, visited Rembrandt twice, and returned to Florence with one of the self-portraits. |
Rembrandt outlived both Hendrickje and Titus; he died on Friday 4 October 1669 and was buried four days later in a rented grave in the Westerkerk. His illegitimate child, Cornelia (1654–1684), eventually moved to Batavia in 1670 accompanied by an obscure painter and her mother's inheritance. Titus' considerable inheritance passed to his only child, Titia (1669-1715) who married her cousin and lived at Blauwburgwal. Rembrandt's life was marked by more than just artistic achievements; he navigated numerous legal and financial challenges, leaving a complex legacy. |
Works |
In a letter to Huygens, Rembrandt offered the only surviving explanation of what he sought to achieve through his art, writing that, "the greatest and most natural movement", translated from de meeste en de natuurlijkste beweegelijkheid. The word "beweegelijkheid" translates to "emotion" or "motive". Whether this refers to objectives, material, or something else, is not known but critics have drawn particular attention to the way Rembrandt seamlessly melded the earthly and spiritual. |
Earlier 20th century connoisseurs claimed Rembrandt had produced well over 600 paintings, nearly 400 etchings and 2,000 drawings. More recent scholarship, from the 1960s to the present day (led by the Rembrandt Research Project), often controversially, has winnowed his oeuvre to nearer 300 paintings. His prints, traditionally all called etchings, although many are produced in whole or part by engraving and sometimes drypoint, have a much more stable total of slightly under 300. It is likely Rembrandt made many more drawings in his lifetime than 2,000 but those extant are more rare than presumed. Two experts claim that the number of drawings whose autograph status can be regarded as effectively "certain" is no higher than about 75, although this is disputed. The list was to be unveiled at a scholarly meeting in February 2010. |
At one time, approximately 90 paintings were counted as Rembrandt self-portraits but it is now known that he had his students copy his own self-portraits as part of their training. Modern scholarship has reduced the autograph count to over forty paintings, as well as a few drawings and thirty-one etchings, which include many of the most remarkable images of the group. Some show him posing in quasi-historical fancy dress, or pulling faces at himself. His oil paintings trace the progress from an uncertain young man, through the dapper and very successful portrait-painter of the 1630s, to the troubled but massively powerful portraits of his old age. Together they give a remarkably clear picture of the man, his appearance and his psychological make-up, as revealed by his richly weathered face. |
In his portraits and self-portraits, he angles the sitter's face in such a way that the ridge of the nose nearly always forms the line of demarcation between brightly illuminated and shadowy areas. A Rembrandt face is a face partially eclipsed; and the nose, bright and obvious, thrusting into the riddle of halftones, serves to focus the viewer's attention upon, and to dramatize, the division between a flood of light—an overwhelming clarity—and a brooding duskiness. |
In a number of biblical works, including The Raising of the Cross, Joseph Telling His Dreams, and The Stoning of Saint Stephen, Rembrandt painted himself as a character in the crowd. Durham suggests that this was because the Bible was for Rembrandt "a kind of diary, an account of moments in his own life". |
Among the more prominent characteristics of Rembrandt's work are his use of chiaroscuro, the theatrical employment of light and shadow derived from Caravaggio, or, more likely, from the Dutch Caravaggisti but adapted for very personal means. Also notable are his dramatic and lively presentation of subjects, devoid of the rigid formality that his contemporaries often displayed, and a deeply felt compassion for mankind, irrespective of wealth and age. His immediate family—his wife Saskia, his son Titus and his common-law wife Hendrickje—often figured prominently in his paintings, many of which had mythical, biblical or historical themes. |
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