This school probably had no so-called founder(SPANISH PAINTING)

THE CASTILIAN SCHOOL: This school probably had no so-called founder. It was a growth from early art traditions at Toledo, and afterward became the chief school of the kingdom owing to the patronage of Philip II. and Philip IV. at Madrid. The first painter of importance in the school seems to have been Antonio Rincon (1446?-1500?). He is sometimes spoken of as the father of Spanish painting, and as having studied in Italy with Castagno and Ghirlandajo, but there is little foundation for either statement. He painted chiefly at Toledo,canvas paintings for sale, painted portraits of Ferdinand and Isabella, and had some skill in hard drawing. Berruguete (1480?-1561) studied with Michael Angelo, and is supposed to have helped him in the Vatican. He afterward returned to Spain, painted many altar-pieces, and was patronized as painter, sculptor, and architect by Charles V. and Philip II. He was probably the first to introduce pure Italian methods into Spain, with some coldness and dryness of coloring and handling. Becerra (1520?-1570) was born in Andalusia, but worked in Castile, and was a man of Italian training similar to Berruguete. He was an exceptional man, perhaps, in his use of mythological themes and nude figures. reproduction oil paintings for sale
There is not a great deal known about Morales (1509?-1586), called "the Divine," except that he was allied to the Castilian school, and painted devotional heads of Christ with the crown of thorns, and many afflicted and weeping madonnas. There was Florentine drawing in his work, great regard for finish, and something of Correggio's softness in shadows pitched in a browner key. His sentiment was rather exaggerated. Sanchez-Coello (1513?-1590) was painter and courtier to Philip II., and achieved reputation as a portrait-painter,cheap oil paintings for sale, though also doing some altar-pieces. It is doubtful whether he ever studied in Italy, but in Spain he was for a time with Antonio Moro, and probably learned from him something of rich costumes, ermines, embroideries, and jewels, for which his portraits were remarkable. Navarette(1526?-1579), called "El Mudo" (the dumb one), certainly was in Italy for something like twenty years, and was there a disciple of Titian, from whom he doubtless learned much of color and the free flow of draperies. He was one of the best of the middle-period painters.Theotocopuli (1548?-1625), called "El Greco" (the Greek), was another Venetian-influenced painter, with enough Spanish originality about him to make most of his pictures striking in color and drawing. Tristan(1586-1640) was his best follower. modern abstract oil painting

FIG. 71.—RIBERA. ST. AGNES. DRESDEN.

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Velasquez (1599-1660) is the greatest name in the history of Spanish painting. With him Spanish art took upon itself a decidedly naturalistic and national stamp. Before his time Italy had been freely imitated; but though Velasquez[178] himself was in Italy for quite a long time, and intimately acquainted with great Italian art, he never seemed to have been led away from his own individual way of seeing and doing. He was a pupil of Herrera,modern abstract art oil painting, afterward with Pacheco, and learned much from Ribera and Tristan, but more from a direct study of nature than from all the others. He was in a broad sense a realist—a man who recorded the material and the actual without emendation or transposition. He has never been surpassed in giving the solidity and substance of form and the placing of objects in atmosphere. And this, not in a small, finical way, but with a breadth of view and of treatment which are to-day the despair of painters. There was nothing of the ethereal, the spiritual, the pietistic, or the pathetic about him. He never for a moment left the firm basis of reality. Standing upon earth he recorded the truths of the earth, but in their largest, fullest, most universal forms. frames for oil paintings

Technically his was a master-hand, doing all things with ease, giving exact relations of colors and lights, and placing everything so perfectly that no addition or alteration is thought of. With the brush he was light, easy, sure. The surface looks as though touched once, no more. It is the perfection of handling through its simplicity and certainty, and has not the slightest trace of affectation or mannerism. He was one of the few Spanish painters who were enabled to shake off the yoke of the Church. Few of his canvases are religious in subject. Under royal patronage he passed almost all of his life in painting portraits of the royal family,reproduction oil paintings uk, ministers of state, and great dignitaries. As a portrait-painter he is more widely known than as a figure-painter. Nevertheless he did many canvases like The Tapestry Weavers and The Surrender at Breda, which attest his remarkable genius in that field; and even in landscape, in genre, in animal painting, he was a very superior man. In fact Velasquez is one of the few great painters in European history for whom there is nothing but praise. He was the full-rounded complete painter, intensely individual and self-assertive, and yet in his art recording in a broad way the Spanish type and life. He was the climax of Spanish painting, and after him there was a rather swift decline, as had been the case in the Italian schools. original oil paintings wholesale