Henri Regnault - Romantic Sensuality and Early Death

Henri Regnault
Study for Orpheus in Hell
(figure studies for the Fates)
ca. 1865
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Achilles with the Body of Patroclus
1865
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Study of Torso
before 1871
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Anatomical Studies of a Horse
(Automedon with the Horses of Achilles)
1868
drawing
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Henri Regnault
Figure Study for Automedon
(Automedon with the Horses of Achilles)
ca. 1868
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Figure Study for Automedon
(Automedon with the Horses of Achilles)
ca. 1868
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Automedon with the Horses of Achilles
1868
oil on canvas
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Henri Regnault
Drapery Study
before 1871
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Study of Draped Model
1865
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Studies of Arm
before 1871
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Summary Execution
under the Moorish Kings of Granada
1870
oil on canvas
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Court of the Ambassadors in the Alhambra, Granada
1868
watercolor
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Portrait of Madame Louvancour
1867
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Portrait Study of Madame Fouques-Duparc
ca. 1868
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Study for the Head of Salome
ca. 1870
oil on canvas
(bitumen-based pigment visibly degraded)
Brighton and Hove Museums and Art Galleries

"Henri Regnault was born in Paris in 1843 and killed in 1871 in one of the last battles of the Franco-Prussian war.  Yet the young man had already made a name for himself in the Paris art scene.  After winning the Prix de Rome in 1868, he was the first not to spend the three compulsory years in the Italian capital that went with the prize but obtained permission to discover other cultures.  He went to Spain . . . then briefly to North Africa, bringing back a number of astonishing canvases, flooded with light."

– from curator's notes at Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Henri Regnault
Study for Orpheus in Hell
(figure study for Mercury)
ca. 1865
drawing
Musée d'Orsay, Paris

Sofonisba Anguissola (ca. 1532-1625) - Portrait Specialist

Sofonisba Anguissola
Self Portrait
1554
oil on panel
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Sofonisba Anguissola
Self Portrait, painting a Devotional Panel
1556
oil on canvas
Łańcut Castle, Poland

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of a Canon of the Lateran
1556
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca Tosio Martinengo, Brescia

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Massimiliano Stampa
1557
oil on canvas
Walters Art Museum, Baltimore

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Alessandro Farnese,
later Duke of Parma and Piacenza
ca. 1560
oil on canvas
(painted in Spain, where Farnese was a hostage)
National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Joanna of Austria, Princess of Portugal
ca. 1560-70
oil on canvas
private collection

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Joanna of Austria
with a Little Girl
1561
oil on canvas
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of a Boy at the Spanish Court
ca. 1565-70
oil on canvas
San Diego Museum of Art

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Infantas Isabella Clara Eugenia and Catalina Micaela
1570
oil on canvas
Royal Collection, Great Britain

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Philip II of Spain
1573
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of a Young Lady
ca. 1580
oil on canvas
Museo Lázaro Galdiano, Madrid

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of a Boy and Girl of the Attavanti Family
ca. 1580-85
oil on panel
Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College, Ohio

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of a Man with his Daughter
ca. 1580-90
oil on canvas
National Museum, Warsaw

Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait of Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia
ca. 1597-98
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Sofonisba Anguissola
Marriage Portrait of Margaret of Savoy,
Duchess of Mantua
1604
oil on canvas
Galleria Sabauda, Turin

"Born to a noble family from Cremona, Sofonisba Anguissola learned painting alongside her five sisters.  Her first studies, from around 1545, were with Bernardino Campi.  Then, beginning in 1549, she continued with Bernardino Gatti.  After visiting her family, Vasari remarked on Anguissola's preparation in both painting and drawing.  . . .  It has been observed that her early works were influenced by her teach Campi, who was also an outstanding portrait painter.  And through him, Anguissola appears to have been influenced by Correggio, whose work held sway in Cremona over the course of that century.  . . .  In 1559 she was invited to Philip II's court in Madrid, thanks to the duke of Alba and to the duke of Sessa, who was then governor of Milan.  After moving to Madrid, she continued to paint portraits while engaged as one of the ladies in waiting to Queen Elizabeth of Valois.  Around 1571 Anguissola married  Fabrizio de Moncada, whose brother was Viceroy of Sicily, and moved to that island.  Following her first husband's death, she married the Genoese nobleman Orazio Lomellino, dividing her time between Genoa and Palermo, where Anthony van Dyck visited her in 1624.  While there, he captured her likeness in his travel notebook, adding that her age – she was by then past ninety – in no way weakened her insightful mind and her capacity to discuss painting."  

– from curator's notes at Museo del Prado, Madrid

Corrado Giaquinto (1703-1766) - Neapolitan Rococo

Corrado Giaquinto
The Holy Trinity
before 1766
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca della Città Metropolitana di Bari

Corrado Giaquinto
The Virgin presenting St Helena and Emperor Constantine to the Holy Trinity
1744
oil on canvas
(ceiling painting)
Basilica di Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, Rome

Corrado Giaquinto
Triumph of Joseph
before 1766
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca della Città Metropolitana di Bari

Corrado Giaquinto
Triumph of Joseph (detail)
before 1766
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca della Città Metropolitana di Bari

Corrado Giaquinto
A Sorceress
ca. 1752-54
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca Civica Fortunato Duranti, Montefortino

Corrado Giaquinto
Allegory of Peace and Justice
1753-54
oil on canvas
Indianapolis Museum of Art

Corrado Giaquinto
Autumn
ca. 1740-50
oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Corrado Giaquinto
St Nicholas of Bari
before 1766
oil on canvas
Musée Fesch, Ajaccio, Corsica

Corrado Giaquinto
Martyrdom of St Lawrence
before 1766
oil on canvas
Musée Fesch, Ajaccio, Corsica

Corrado Giaquinto
Emperor Theodosius repenting before St Ambrose
before 1766
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca della Città Metropolitana di Bari

Corrado Giaquinto
Descent from the Cross
ca. 1754
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Corrado Giaquinto
The Sudarium displayed by Cherubs
1754
oil on canvas
Biblioteca Museu Víctor Balaguer, Barcelona

Corrado Giaquinto
Rest on the Flight into Egypt
1764
oil on canvas
Detroit Institute of Arts

Corrado Giaquinto
Moses and the Serpent of Bronze
1743-44
oil on canvas
National Gallery, London

Corrado Giaquinto
Triumph of Galatea
ca. 1752
oil on canvas
Milwaukee Art Museum

"Born in Molfetta, near Bari, Giaquinto trained in Naples and was influenced by the work of Neapolitan painters Luca Giordano and Francesco Solimena.  In 1727 he left Naples for Rome, where his style became increasingly classicising.  Once his reputation was established, Giaquinto was invited twice to the Savoy court in Turin (in 1733 and 1735-39).  In 1740 he became a member of the Academy of Saint Luke in Rome and, having set up a studio he undertook a number of large decorative schemes.  In 1753 Giaquinto was summoned by the king of Spain, Ferdinand VI, to Madrid where he succeeded Jacopo Amigoni (1680/2-1752) as court painter.  Giaquinto's most significant commission in Madrid was the fresco decoration of the recently-built Royal Palace.  In 1762, after nine years at the Spanish court, Giaquinto moved back to Naples where he continued working for the Spanish monarchy until his death."

– from biographical notes at the National Gallery, London

Luca Giordano (1634-1705) - Abundant Emotions

Luca Giordano
Diana and Endymion
ca. 1675-80
oil on canvas
Museo di Castelvecchio, Verona

Luca Giordano
Armida and Rinaldo
(scene from Gerusalemme Liberata)
ca. 1675
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Luca Giordano
Armida and Rinaldo
(scene from Gerusalemme Liberata)
ca. 1672-74
oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon

Luca Giordano
The Goddess Flora
ca. 1697
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Luca Giordano
Perseus confronting Phineas with the Head of Medusa
ca. 1680-84
oil on canvas
National Gallery, London

"Until Pablo Picasso, Luca Giordano was the most prolific artist who ever lived.  In his birthplace of Naples he is said to have trained with Jusepe de Ribera, whose dark, dramatic manner deeply influenced him, but he also studied earlier art.  Giordano began to develop his light, airy, delicately colored style in the late 1650s, synthesizing Pietro da Cortona's Baroque decorations in Rome with the vibrant hues of Venetian art and Peter Paul Rubens.  From 1692 to 1702, he was Spain's court painter, where King Charles II said that only the facile Giordano could tackle the huge ceilings of his Escorial palace.  With his joyous spirit, Giordano anticipated the Rococo style."

– from curator's notes at the Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Luca Giordano
Venus presenting Arms to Aeneas
ca. 1680-82
oil on canvas
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Luca Giordano
Tarquin and Lucretia
1663
oil on canvas
Museo di Capodimonte, Naples

Luca Giordano
Triumph of Galatea,
with Acis transformed into a Fountain
ca. 1674-77
oil on canvas
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Luca Giordano
Fall of the Rebel Angels
ca. 1660-65
oil on canvas
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Luca Giordano
St Michael Archangel vanquishing Satan
ca. 1663
oil on canvas
Gemäldegalerie, Berlin

Luca Giordano
Esau and Jacob
1695-96
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Luca Giordano
Sacrifice of Isaac
1695-96
oil on canvas
Museo del Prado, Madrid

Luca Giordano
The Crossing of the Red Sea
1681
oil on canvas
Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore, Bergamo

follower of Luca Giordano
Martyrdom of St Lawrence
ca. 1710
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca della Città Metropolitana di Bari

follower of Luca Giordano
The Lamentation
ca. 1710
oil on canvas
Pinacoteca della Città Metropolitana di Bari