Bonaventura Peeters: Marine Painter

Bonaventura Peeters - Ships Near a Pier - 1630s - Oil on panel, 37 x 69 cm - Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (click photo for larger image)Bonaventura Peeters the Elder (1614-1652) was a Flemish marine painter and satirical poet. He was virtually the only noteworthy practitioner in that genre in his country. Seascapes were much more a Dutch than a Flemish speciality in the 17th century.

In his early works, Peeters was influenced by the Dutch masters. Later, he introduced more elaborate motifs and brighter colors into his paintings. Peeters became a master of the Antwerp Guild of St Luke in 1634.

Peeters's most characteristic work (such as the one featured here) typically includes an atmospheric view painted in a grey-blue monotone of the wide estuary of the Scheldt and the coast of Flanders. This seascape shows different types of small ships and rowing boats in strong winds at a pier. On the left, we see a mill and a church on the shore.

Fra Filippo Lippi: A Painter of Genius

Filippo Lippi - Adoration of the Child with Saints - c. 1463 - Tempera on wood, 140 x 130 cm - Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence (click photo for larger image)Legend and tradition surround the life of Italian Renaissance painter Filippo Lippi (c. 1406-1469). He was born into a very large and poor family in Florence. After the death of both his father and mother, the young Filippo was raised by an aunt for some years; later she placed him with his brother in the convent of Carmelite monks at Santa Maria del Carmine, in Florence. 

At that time, the Brancacci chapel of the monastery was being decorated with frescoes by Masaccio, the most explicit phenomenon of the Renaissance. These frescoes, which were to be among the most glorious and influential paintings of the Renaissance, became known as “the school of the world”. Artists traveled from all over to see them. They were Lippi’s first important contact with art, along with the frescoes of Fra Angelico (a rare and perfect talent” (Vasari). 

In 1432 Lippi left the monastery, after having painted some frescoes in the church and in the cloister. He traveled widely, returning to Florence in 1437. Under the protection of the powerful Medici family, he was commissioned to execute several works for convents and churches.

Despite the undoubted influences of his older contemporaries, Lippi developed a distinctive clarity of expression. He was constantly seeking the techniques to realize his artistic vision and his own new ideas made him one of the most appreciated artists of his time. 20th century critic Bernard Berenson maintained that Lippi’s true place as an artist was among the “painters of genius”. 

From the mid-1450s through the mid-1460s, Lippi evolved a new presentation of the Virgin and Child that became popular in the second half of the Quattrocento in Florence. Fra Filippo transformed the subject into a distinct devotional image set within an elaborated forested landscape with a rich imagery of sylvan flora, geological features, and atmosphere, which functioned as visual metaphors for the Incarnation, penitence, and eremitical religious devotion.

Quote of the Day

"To my mind a picture should be something pleasant, cheerful and pretty. There are too many unpleasant things in life as it is, without creating still more of them." -  Pierre-Auguste Renoir

Segna di Buonaventura: Sienese Painter

Segna di Buonaventura - Saint John the Evangelist - ca. 1320 - Tempera on wood, gold ground - painted surface painted surface 27 1/4 x 16 1/2 in. (69.2 x 41.9 cm) - Metropolitan Museum of Art, New YorkSegna di Buonaventura (1280-1331) was an Italian painter of the Sienese School. He was active from about 1298 to 1331. Very little is known about his life.

The work featured here is described as follows: “This is the best-preserved panel of a signed altarpiece by Segna of which three other panels are also in the Metropolitan Museum. Although Segna’s art is dependent on the work of Duccio, his figures have a regal, hieratic formality. His ascetic, harshly featured saints consciously evoke a more archaic art, and he notably retained the Byzantine use of gold striations on draperies—emblematic of the sacred world of icons.” (Metropolitan Museum of Art”)

Pietro Lorenzetti: Introducing Naturalism

Pietro Lorenzetti - “Beata Umiltà Heals a Sick Nun” - c. 1341 - Panel, 45 x 55 cm - Staatliche Museen, Berlin (click photo for larger image)Sienese painter Pietro Lorenzetti (c. 1280/90-c. 1348) was an Italian Gothic artist who, with his brother Ambrogio, was the principal exponent of Sienese secular art in the years before the Black Death and also created numerous religious works. It’s possible that he was a student of Duccio. He advanced that master’s achievements by imbuing his work with greater intimacy and emotion, and by introducing naturalism into Sienese art.

The image featured here is from a panel that is part of a dismembered polyptych representing scenes of the life of Beata Umiltà (Blessed Humility). The altarpiece was in the Convent of the Donne di Faenza in Florence. It was signed and dated, however, the repainted date has been variously read as 1316 and 1341. The latter interpretation is most widely accepted since the calmness of the narration points towards the later activity of the master.