1725-1805 French Jean Baptiste Greuze Galleries French painter and draughtsman. He was named an associate member of the Academie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, Paris, in 1755 on the strength of a group of paintings that included genre scenes, portraits and studies of expressive heads (t?tes d'expression). These remained the essential subjects of his art for the next 50 years, except for a brief, concentrated and unsuccessful experiment with history painting in the late 1760s, which was to affect his later genre painting deeply. Though his art has often been compared with that of Jean-Simeon Chardin in particular and interpreted within the context of NEO-CLASSICISM in general, it stands so strikingly apart from the currents of its time that Greuze's accomplishments are best described, as they often were by the artist's contemporaries, as unique. He was greatly admired by connoisseurs, critics and the general public throughout most of his life. His pictures were in the collections of such noted connoisseurs as Ange-Laurent de La Live de Jully, Claude-Henri Watelet and Etienne-Francois, Duc de Choiseul. For a long period he was in particular favour with the critic Denis Diderot, who wrote about him in the Salon reviews that he published in Melchior Grimm's privately circulated Correspondance litteraire. His reputation declined towards the end of his life and through the early part of the 19th century, to be revived after 1850, when 18th-century painting returned to favour, by such critics as Th?ophile Thore, Arsene Houssaye and, most notably, Edmond and Jules de Goncourt in their book L'Art du dix-huiti?me siecle. By the end of the century Greuze's work, especially his many variations on the Head of a Girl, fetched record prices, and his Broken Pitcher (Paris, Louvre) was one of the most popular paintings in the Louvre. The advent of modernism in the early decades of the 20th century totally obliterated Greuze's reputation. It was only in the 1970s, with Brookner's monograph, Munhall's first comprehensive exhibition of the artist's work, increased sale prices, important museum acquisitions and fresh analyses of his art by young historians, that Greuze began to regain the important place that he merits in the history of French art of the 18th century.  Related Paintings of Jean Baptiste Greuze :. | The benefactress | Tournus | Septimius Severus and Caracalla | Portrait of Countess Ekaterina Shuvalova | A Young Man in a Hat |
Related Artists:
Niccolo Di ser Sozzo
Italian Painter, active ca.1350-1363
Orazio Gentileschi
1563-1639 Italian Orazio Gentileschi Galleries Tuscan painter, b. Pisa. His real surname was Lomi, but he adopted his uncle name. He studied in Rome, where he was associated with Agostino Tassi in the decoration of palace interiors. Influenced by Caravaggio, Gentileschi developed a more softly luminous light and a cooler, more lyrical style. He also painted frescoes in Santa Maria Maggiore and in the Lateran. After spending several years in Genoa and in France, he settled in England (1626) at the invitation of Charles I. Gentileschi principal works include The Annunciation (San Siro, Genoa); Flight into Egypt (Louvre); Sibyl (Hampton Court, England); and Moses Saved from the Waters (Prado). He also painted numerous portraits. Artemesia Gentileschi was his daughter.
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