Vincent Van Gogh Biography

A key figure in the world of Post-impressionism Vincent Van Gogh also helped lay the foundations of modern art. A troubled man, he experienced many uncertainties and rejections in his early life, particularly where female love interests were concerned. Religion played a huge role in van Gogh´s life and many of his paintings carry religious undertones. Van Gogh did not experience great success during his lifetime, selling just one painting but after his death his work was revealed to the world and he is now regarded as one of the greatest artists that ever lived.Vinc&egravzzz;nt van Gogh was born in Holland in 1853 and was one of six children born to Anna Cornelia Carbentus and Reverend Theodorus van Gogh, a protestant minister.

A quiet and serious child, van Gogh showed no real interest in art. At the age of 16, he found a job at the Hague gallery, run by French art dealers Goupil et Cie. After several transfers that took him to London and Paris, he lost interest in becoming a professional art dealer, despite the fact that three of his brothers had entered into the profession. With a growing interest in religion van Gogh decided to follow in his father's footsteps and found a job as a missionary in a small Belgium Province, where he worked with a group of miners.This period in his life was very important as van Gogh could relate to the miners of Borinage and their way of life and this experience, together with pressure from his brother Theo, convinced van Gogh that he wanted to make an impression on the world and so he set out to become an artist. Van Goghs brother Theo was a highly influential figure throughout his life, supporting him both emotionally and financially. In his lifetime, Vincent van Gogh wrote over 800 letters and most of these were to Theo, his brother and closest friend.

By the end of 1881 van Gogh was taking lessons from Anton Mauve, his cousin by marriage. He also started a relationship with Sien Hoomik, a pregnant prostitute, which Mauve disapproved of and this led to the two falling out. However, van Gogh continued to master the skills of drawing and Hoomik posed for him whenever possible.Becoming increasingly frustrated, Vincent ended his relationship with Hoomik and feeling uninspired, he moved back in with his parents to continue practicing his art. It was then that he was introduced to the paintings of Jean-Franqois Millet and he imitated Millets style a lot in his early works.
Van Gogh had the desire to paint figures and in 1885 he completedThe Potato Eaters which proved a success at the time. Believing he needed focused training in art techniques, van Gogh enrolled at The Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and was impressed by the works of Rubens and various Japanese artists, and such influences would impact greatly on van Gogh's individual style.
In 1886 Vincent van Gogh relocated to Paris and immersed himself in the world of Impressionism and Post-impressionism. He adopted brighter, more vibrant colors and began experimenting with his technique. He also spent time researching the styles found in the Japanese artwork he had discovered a year earlier.

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Paris exposed van Gogh to artists such as Gauguin, Pissarro, Monet, and Bernard. He befriended Paul Gauguin and moved to Arles in 1888 and Gauguin joined him later. Van Gogh started to paint sunflowers to decorate Gauguin's bedroom and this work of art would later become one of his most accomplished pieces, Sunflowers.It was towards the end of 1888 that van Gogh's mental illness began to worsen and in one outburst he pursued Gauguin with a knife and threatened him. Later that day at home, Vincent cut off part of his own ear then offered it to a prostitute as a gift, and he was temporarily hospitalized. Upon returning home he found Gauguin leaving Arles, and thus his dream of setting up an art school was crushed.
Van Gogh committed himself to an asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence at the end of 1888 and his paintings from his time there were brimming with activity. It was in the asylum that he paintedStarry Night which became his most popular work and is one of the most influential pieces in history.
Van Gogh left Saint-Rémy-de-Provence in 1890 and continued painting, producing a number of works - nearly one painting per day. Despite his creative achievements, the artist thought of his life as terribly wasted, and a personal failure. On July 27, 1890 he attempted suicide by shooting himself in the chest and died two days later from the wound, aged 37.
Van Goghs dear brother Theo was devastated by his loss and died six months later. Theos widow took Vincent van Goghs works to Holland and published them, and he was an instant success. His work went on to influence Modernist art and today, Vincent van Gogh is regarded as one of history's greatest painters.

Tiziano Vecellio Biography

No one is sure of the exact date of Titian's birth; when he was an old man he claimed to have been born in 1477 in a letter to Philip II, but this seems most unlikely. Other writers contemporary to his old age give figures for his age which would equate to birth-dates between 1473 to after 1482, but most modern scholars believe a date nearer 1490 is more likely. He was the eldest of a family of four and son of Gregorio Vecelli, a distinguished councillor and soldier, and of his wife Lucia. His father was superintendent of the castle of Pieve di Cadore and also managed local mines for their owners. Many relatives, including Titian's grandfather, were notaries, and the family were well-established in the area, which was ruled by Venice.
At the age of about ten to twelve he and his brother Francesco (who perhaps followed later) were sent to an uncle in Venice to find an apprenticeship with a painter. The minor painter, Sebastian Zuccato, whose sons became well-known mosaicists, and who may have been a family friend, arranged for the brothers to enter the studio of the elderly Gentile Bellini, from which they later transferred to that of his brother Giovanni Bellini. At that time the Bellinis, especially Giovanni, were the leading artists in the city. There he found a group of young men about his own age, among them Giovanni Palma da Serinalta, Lorenzo Lotto, Sebastiano Luciani, and Giorgio da Castelfranco, nicknamed Giorgione. Francesco Vecellio, his younger brother, later became a painter of some note in Venice.
A fresco of Hercules on the Morosini Palace is said to have been one of his earliest works; others were the Virgin and Child (the Bellini-esque so-called Gypsy Madonna), in Vienna, and the Visitation of Mary and Elizabeth (from the convent of S. Andrea), now in the Accademia, Venice.
Titian joined Giorgione as an assistant, but many contemporary critics already found his work more impressive, for example in the exterior frescoes (now almost totally destroyed) that they did for the Fondacio dei Tedeschi, and their relationship evidently had a significant element of rivalry. Distinguishing between their work at this period remains a subject of scholarly controversy, and there has been a substantial movement of attributions from Giorgione to Titian in the 20th century, with little traffic the other way. One of the earliest known works of Titian, the little Ecce Homo of the Scuola di San Rocco, was long regarded as the work of Giorgione.
The two young masters were likewise recognized as the two leaders of their new school of "arte moderna", that is of painting made more flexible, freed from symmetry and the remnants of hieratic conventions still to be found in the works of Giovanni Bellini.
Growth

 Assumption (Assunta) - Tiziano Vecellio
Assumption (Assunta)
Giorgione died in 1510 and the aged Giovanni Bellini in 1516, leaving Titian unrivaled in the Venetian School. For sixty years he was to be the undisputed master of Venetian painting, and as it were, the painter laureate of the Republic Serenissime. As early as 1516 he succeeded his master Giovanni Bellini in receiving a pension from the Senate.
During this period (1516-1530), which may be called the period of his mastery and maturity, the artist moved on from his early Giorgionesque style, undertook larger and more complex subjects and for the first time attempted a monumental style.
In 1518 he produced for the high altar of the church of the Frari, his famous masterpiece, the Assumption of the Virgin, still in situ. This extraordinary piece of colorism, executed on a grand scale rarely before seen in Italy, created a sensation. The Signoria took note, and observed that Titian was neglecting his work in the hall of the great council.
The pictorial structure of the Assumption - that of uniting in the same composition two or three scenes superimposed on different levels, earth and heaven, the temporal and the infinite - was continued in a series of works such as the retable of San Domenico at Ancona (1520), the retable of Brescia (1522), and the retable of San Niccolo (1523), in the Vatican Museum), each time attaining to a higher and more perfect conception, finally reaching a classic formula in the Pesaro Madonna, (better known as the Madonna di Ca' Pesaro) (c. 1519-1526), at Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari in Venice. This perhaps is his most studied work, whose patiently developed plan is set forth with supreme display of order and freedom, originality and style. Here Titian gave a new conception of the traditional groups of donors and holy persons moving in aerial space, the plans and different degrees set in an architectural framework.
Titian was now at the height of his fame, and towards 1521, following the production of a figure of St. Sebastian for the papal legate in Brescia (a work of which there are numerous replicas), purchasers pessed for his work.
To this period belongs a more extraordinary work, The Death of St. Peter Martyr (1530), formerly in the Dominican Church of San Zanipolo, and destroyed by an Austrian shell in 1867. Only copies and engravings of this proto-Baroque picture remain; it combined extreme violence and a landscape, mostly consisting of a great tree, that pressed into the scene and seems to accentuate the drama in a way that looks forward to the Baroque.
Violante (or La Bella Gatta) - Tiziano Vecellio
Violante (or La Bella Gatta)
During the next period (1530-1550), Titian developed the style introduced by his dramatic Death of St. Peter Martyr. The Venetian government, dissatisfied with Titian's neglect of the work for the ducal palace, ordered him in 1538 to refund the money which he had received, and Pordenone, his rival of recent years, was installed in his place. However, at the end of a year Pordenone died, and Titian, who meanwhile applied himself diligently to painting in the hall the Battle of Cadore, was reinstated. This major battle scene, was lost along with so many other major works by Venetian artists by the great fire which destroyed all the old pictures in the great chambers of the Doge's Palace in 1577. It represented in life-size the moment at which the Venetian general, D'Alviano attacked the enemy with horses and men crashing down into a stream, and was the artist's most important attempt at a tumultuous and heroic scene of movement to rival Raphael's Battle of Constantine and the equally ill-fated Battle of Cascina of Michelangelo and The Battle of Anghiari of Leonardo (both unfinished). There remains only a poor, incomplete copy at the Uffizi, and a mediocre engraving by Fontana. The Speech of the Marquis del Vasto (Madrid, 1541) was also partly destroyed by fire. But this period of the master's work is still represented by the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin (Venice, 1539), one of his most popular canvasses, and by the Ecce Homo (Vienna, 1541). Despite its loss, the painting had a great influence on Bolognese art and Rubens, both in the handling of details and the general effect of horses, soldiers, lictors, powerful stirrings of crowds at the foot of a stairway, lit by torches with the flapping of banners against the sky.
Less successful were the pendentives of the cupola at Sta. Maria della Salute (Death of Abel, Sacrifice of Abraham, David and Goliath). These violent scenes viewed in perspective from below - like the famous pendentives of the Sistine Chapel - were by their very nature in unfavorable situations. They were nevertheless much admired and imitated, Rubens among others applying this system to his forty ceilings (the sketches only remain) of the Jesuit church at Antwerp.
At this time also, the time of his visit to Rome, the artist began his series of reclining Venuses (The Venus of Urbino of the Uffizi, Venus and Love at the same museum, Venus and the Organ-Player, Madrid), in which is recognized the effect or the direct reflection of the impression produced on the master by contact with ancient sculpture. Giorgione had already dealt with the subject in his Dresden picture, finished by Titian, but here a purple drapery substituted for a landscape background changed, by its harmonious coloring, the whole meaning of the scene.
Titian had from the beginning of his career shown himself to be a masterful portrait-painter, in works like La Bella (Eleanora de Gonzaga, Duchess of Urbino, at the Pitti Palace). He painted the likenesses of princes, or Doges, cardinals or monks, and artists or writers. "...no other painter was so successful in extracting from each physiognomy so many traits at once characteristic and beautiful", according to the Catholic Encyclopedia. Among portrait-painters Titian is compared to Rembrandt and Velazquez, with the interior life of the former, and the clearness, certainty, and obviousness of the latter.
Titian himself never attempted engraving, but he was very conscious of the importance of printmaking as a means of further expanding his reputation. In the period 1517-1520 he designed a number of woodcuts, including an enormous and impressive one of The Crossing of the Red Sea, and collaborated with Domenico Campagnola and others, who produced further prints based on his paintings and drawings. Much later he provided drawings based on his paintings to Cornelius Cort from the Netherlands, who brilliantly engraved them.
Few of the pupils and assistants of Titian became well-known in their own right; for some being his assistant was probably a lifetime career. Paris Bordone and Bonifazio Veronese were two of superior excellence. El Greco (or Dominikos Theotokopoulos) was said (by Giulio Clovio) to have been employed by the master in his last years. (From wikipedia)

Sandro Botticelli Biography

Alessandro de Mariano di Vanni Filipepi is best known by his nickname, Sandro Botticelli, and by his works, which only long after his death were considered to be some of the greatest of the Renaissance, particularly by groups such as the Pre-Raphaelites.

Botticelli's life, for the most part, was personified by success, the height of which saw him paint some of the wall frescoes in the Sistine Chapel. Botticelli is most fondly remembered for his works The Birth of Venus, Primavera and Venus and Mars.

Despite a considerable amount of fame and recognition, Botticelli's working career is blighted by its conclusion, which was undermined by the new artistic movement of the High Renaissance.
Details about Botticelli's personal life are sparse, but his prolific professional career is well documented due to the stunning heights of his fame.

Botticelli's career started at age 14, where he was apprenticed to Fra Filippo Lippi who had a noticeable effect on his painting style and many historians are keen to note that he adopted Lippi's intimate and detailed artistic technique. Such delicate expressions on the faces of Botticelli's models in addition to his decorative approach led to his growing notoriety as an artist.

Botticelli's rising talent meant that by the age of 15 he was able to open a workshop of his own. Such a development of talent led to a distinctive artistic style, which was epitomized by life-like figures with a sad or melancholic style. Perhaps one of the most striking aspects of his work that definitely lent to his popularity at the time was his incorporation of Neo-Platonism. The method meant that he could appeal to many tastes by including Christianity and paganism in his works.

Many historians note that Botticelli suffered from unrequited love towards the model of his Birth of Venus painting. Despite this popular claim the artist was at one point in his life charged with sodomy and the summary of the charge noted that "Botticelli keeps a boy".
The defining point of Botticelli's career was the contacts, money and increased fame that grew in abundance at the bequest of the Medici family. The Medici's were a prominent and wealthy family in Florence and as Botticelli's fame rose, the family sought him to depict its key members.

The Medici influence propelled Botticelli's fame to meteoric proportions and as a direct result he was asked by the Papacy to travel to Rome to paint parts of the Sistine Chapel. Such an honor was shared by some of the Renaissance's greatest artists, such as Ghirlandaio, Perugino and even Michelangelo. Botticelli's work in Rome included three large pieces and several portraits in the Sistine Chapel itself.

During Botticelli's era the Papacy was the most respected of art critics. Papal sanction was the ultimate endorsement for any burgeoning artist and an opportunity to paint one of Rome's greatest monuments, The Sistine Chapel, was the highest of honors.
Botticelli's later career was marked by the influence of one charismatic monk in Florence by the name of Savonarola. At Savonarola's peak of popularity, he burned many works of art and books which he deemed to be ungodly. Among such works were some of Botticelli's pieces and even after Savonarola's popular decline and eventual death Botticelli's paintings remained deeply religious.

Botticelli remained in Florence despite pressures to flee after Savonarola's downfall and made a name for himself as one of the best painters of altarpieces.

Despite such success, however, Botticelli's later career was blighted by a time of great change in Florence and it was to lead to troubling times for the artist. In an effort to keep up with constantly changing styles and techniques Botticelli accepted difficult commissions, which other artists would not. Botticelli's decline was cemented by the onset of the High Renaissance, in which his artistic style seemed outdated in comparison. Contemporary artists such as Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo further pushed Botticelli from the artistic spotlight.

After having left Florence once in his entire life, Botticelli died in his hometown on May 17th 1510.

Rembrandt Biography

Rembrandt was a 17th century painter and etcher whose work came to dominate what has since been named the Dutch Golden Age. One of the most revered 

artists of all time, Rembrandt's greatest creative triumphs are seen in his portraits of his contemporaries, illustrations of biblical scenes and 

self-portraits as well as his innovative etchings and use of shadow and light.

Born in Leiden, Netherlands in 1606, Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn attended elementary school from 1612 to 1616 and then attended the Latin School in 

Leiden, where he partook in biblical studies and lessons on the classics. It is unclear whether Rembrandt completed his studies at the Latin School, 

but one account claims that he was removed from school early and sent to be trained as a painter at his own request.

From 1620 to either 1624 or 1625, Rembrandt trained as an artist under two masters. His first was painter Jacob van Swanenburgh (1571–1638), with whom 

he studied for about three years. Under van Swanenburgh, Rembrandt would have learned basic artistic skills. Van Swanenburgh specialized in scenes of 

hell and the underworld, and his ability to paint fire and the way its light reflects on surrounding objects was likely an influence on Rembrandt’s 

later work. Rembrandt's second teacher was Amsterdam’s Pieter Lastman (1583–1633), who was a well-known history painter and likely helped Rembrandt 

master the genre, which included placing figures from biblical, historical and allegorical scenes in complex settings

In 1625, Rembrandt settled back in Leiden, now a master in his own right, and over the next six years he laid the foundations for his life's work. It 

was during this time that Lastman's influence was most noticeable, as in several instances Rembrandt deconstructed his former master's compositions and 

reassembled them into his own, a practice carried on by Rembrandt's own pupils later on. Rembrandt’s paintings created at this time were generally 

small but rich in detail; religious and allegorical themes were prominent. Rembrandt also worked on his first etchings (1626) in Leiden, and his 

eventual international fame would rely on the widespread dissemination of these works. Diverging from his contemporaries, Rembrandt endowed his 

etchings with a painterly quality achieved through suggestive handling of light and dark.

Rembrandt's style soon took an innovative turn involving his use of light. His new style left large areas of his paintings obscured in shadow; through 

his interpretation, illumination grew rapidly weaker as it extended into the painting, creating spots of brightness and pockets of deep darkness. In 

this vein, in 1629 Rembrandt completed Judas Repentant and Returning the Pieces of Silver, among others, works that further evidence his interest in 

the handling of light. Another example is his Peter and Paul Disputing (1628), in which the painting’s lighted elements are clustered together and 

surrounded by clusters of darker tones, drawing the viewer's eye to a general focal point before moving in to observe the details within.

Starting in 1628, Rembrandt took on students, and over the years his fame attracted many young artists seeking to learn at his side. Only an estimate 

of the number of his pupils can be made, since official registers of trainees have been lost, but it is believed that over the course of his career he 

had fifty or so students.

The First Amsterdam Period (1631–1636)

Rembrandt began to do business in 1631 with Hendrick Uylenburgh, an Amsterdam entrepreneur who had a workshop that created portraits and restored 

paintings, among other activities. Rembrandt either commuted from Leiden to Amsterdam or moved to Amsterdam at this stage. He began to paint dramatic, 

large-scale biblical and mythological scenes using his high-contrast method of light and dark, such as The Blinding of Samson (1636) and Danaë (1636). 

(Despite his predilection for biblical imagery, it is unknown if Rembrandt belonged to any religious community.)

In Amsterdam, he also painted numerous commissioned portraits with the help of various assistants in Uylenburgh’s shop. Rembrandt produced much more 

energetic works than those created by the portrait artists so prevalent in Amsterdam at the time, and he received numerous commissions despite his 

questionable ability to capture the likeness of his subject. To this point, Constantijn Huygens, a Dutch diplomat, mocked a portrait Rembrandt had done 

of one of his friends for its lack of verisimilitude, and Rembrandt's self-portraitures contained noticeable physiognomic differences from one image to 

the next.

The Third Amsterdam Period (1643–1658)

In the 10 years following the unveiling of The Night Watch, Rembrandt's overall artistic output diminished drastically and he produced no painted 

portraits; either he received no portrait commissions or he stopped accepting such commissions. Speculation about what happened after The Night Watch 

has contributed to the "Rembrandt myth," according to which the artist became largely misunderstood and was ignored. Often blamed for Rembrandt's 

supposed downfall are the death of his wife and the supposed rejection of The Night Watch by those who commissioned it. But modern research has found 

no evidence that the painting was rejected or that Rembrandt experienced deep devastation upon his wife's death. There is also no evidence that he was 

ever "ignored," although he was often the target of his contemporary critics' barbs.

It has been put forth that Rembrandt's crisis may have been an artistic one, that he had seen his methods stretched to their practical limits. And the 

variations in his few paintings from 1642 to 1652—the period that marks the beginning of what is usually referred to 

Pablo Picasso Biography

recognized figures of the 20th century, thanks to the work he created during his career. Born in Malaga, Spain, in October of 1881, he was the first 

child born in the family. His father worked as an artist, and was also a professor at the school of fine arts; he also worked as a curator for the 

museum in Malaga.

Early life

Pablo Picasso studied under his father for one year, then went to the Academy of Arts for one year, prior to moving to Paris. In 1901 he went to Paris, 

which he found as the ideal place to practice new styles, and experiment with a variety of art forms. It was during these initial visits, which he 

began his work in surrealism and cubism style, which he was the founder of, and created many distinct pieces which were influenced by these art forms.

Updates in style

During his stay in Paris, Pablo Picasso was constantly updating his style; he did work from the blue period, the rose period, African influenced style, 

to cubism, surrealism, and realism. Not only did he master these styles, he was a pioneer in each of these movements, and influenced the styles to 

follow throughout the 20th century, from the initial works he created. In addition to the styles he introduced to the art world, he also worked through 

the many different styles which appeared, while working in Paris. Not only did he continually improve his style, and the works he created, he is well 

known because of the fact that he had the ability to create in any style which was prominent during the time.

Russian ballet

In 1917, Pablo Picasso joined the Russian Ballet, which toured in Rome; during this time he met Olga Khoklova, who was a ballerina; the couple 

eventually wed in 1918, upon returning to Paris. The couple eventually separated in 1935; Olga came from nobility, and an upper class lifestyle, while 

Pablo Picasso led a bohemian lifestyle, which conflicted. Although the couple separated, they remained officially married, until Olga's death, in 1954. 

In addition to works he created of Olga, many of his later pieces also took a centralized focus on his two other love interests, Marie Theresa Walter 

and Dora Maar. Pablo Picasso remarried Jacqueline Roque in 1961; the couple remained married until his death 12 years later, in 1973.

Work as a pacifist

Pablo Picasso was a pacifist, and large scale paintings he created, showcased this cry for peace, and change during the time. A 1937 piece he created, 

after the German bombing of Guernica, was one such influential piece of the time. Not only did this become his most famous piece of art work, but the 

piece which showed the brutality of war, and death, also made him a prominent political figure of the time. To sell his work, and the message he 

believed in, art, politics, and eccentricity, were among his main selling points.

Conflicting with social views

Many things Pablo Picasso did during the 1950s, conflicted with the general public. Viciousness towards his children, exaggerated virility towards 

women, and joining the Communist party, were some of the many scandals which he was involved in during his lifetime. Although most of the things he did 

were viewed negatively by a minority of the general public, admirers of Pablo Picasso turned a blind eye, and still accepted him as a prominent figure 

in their society. Following the end of WWII, Pablo Picasso turned back towards his classic style of work, and he created the "Dove of Peace." Even 

though he became a member of the Communist party, and supported Stalin and his political views and rule, Pablo Picasso could do no wrong. In the eyes 

of his admirers and supporters, he was still a prominent figure, and one which they would follow, regardless of what wrongs he did. He was not only an 

influence because of the works he created, but he was also an influential figure in the political realm.

Influence outside of art

Although Pablo Picasso is mainly known for his influence to the art world, he was an extremely prominent figure during his time, and to the 20th 

entury in general. He spread his influences to the art world, but also to many aspects of the cultural realm of life as well. He played several roles 

in film, where he always portrayed himself; he also followed a bohemian lifestyle, and seemed to take liberties as he chose, even during the later 

stages of his life. He even died in style, while hosting a dinner party in his home.

Collection of work

Pablo Picasso is recognized as the world's most prolific painter. His career spanned over a 78 year period, in which he created: 13,500 paintings, 

100,000 prints and engravings, and 34,000 illustrations which were used in books. He also produced 300 sculptures and ceramic pieces during this 

expansive career. It is also estimated that over 350 pieces which he created during his career, have been stolen; this is a figure that is far higher 

than any other artist throughout history.

Sale of his worksPablo Picasso has also sold more pieces, and his works have brought in higher profit margins, than any other artist of his time. His 

pieces rank among the most expensive art works to be created; with a price tag of $104 million, Garson a la Pipe, was sold in 2004. 

Although he had a conflicting lifestyle, Pablo Picasso was admired by many, and was one of the most influential figures of his time. Not only during 

his life, but also after his death, he is still one of the most well known artists, and political figures, of his time. With thousands of pieces to his 

name, and art works which have been seen by millions, around the world, he has been a great influence to society, he has influenced the art world, and 

he introduced many new styles of art, which helped shape modern art, and modern styles artists follow today.

Amedeo Clemente Modigliani

Amedeo Clemente Modigliani was born into a Jewish family at Livorno, in Tuscany. Livorno was still a relatively new city, by Italian standards, in the 

late 19th century. The Livorno that Modigliani knew was a bustling centre of commerce focused upon seafaring and shipwrighting, but its cultural 

history lay in being a refuge for those persecuted for their religion. His own maternal great-great-grandfather was one Solomon Garsin, a Jew who had 

immigrated to Livorno in the eighteenth century as a religious refugee.

Modigliani was the fourth child of Flaminio Modigliani and his wife, Eugenia Garsin. His father was in the money-changing business, but when the 

business went bankrupt, the family lived in dire poverty. In fact, Amedeo's birth saved the family from certain ruin, as, according to an ancient law, 

creditors could not seize the bed of a pregnant woman or a mother with a newborn child. When bailiffs entered the family home, just as Eugenia went 

into labour, the family protected their most valuable assets by piling them on top of the expectant mother.

Modigliani had a particularly close relationship with his mother, who taught her son at home until he was ten. Beset with health problems after an 

attack of pleurisy when he was about eleven, a few years later he developed a case of typhoid fever. When he was roughly sixteen he was taken ill with 

pleurisy again, and it was then that he contracted the tuberculosis which was to eventually claim his life. Each time it was his mother Eugenia's 

intensive care of him which pulled him through. After Modigliani had recovered from the second bout of pleurisy, his mother took him on a tour of 

southern Italy: Naples, Capri, Rome and Amalfi, then back north to Florence and Venice.

His mother was, in many ways, instrumental in his ability to pursue art as a vocation. When he was eleven years of age, she had noted in her diary:

"The child's character is still so unformed that I cannot say what I think of it. He behaves like a spoiled child, but he does not lack intelligence. 

We shall have to wait and see what is inside this chrysalis. Perhaps an artist?"

Art student years

Modigliani is known to have drawn and painted from a very early age, and thought himself "already a painter", his mother wrote, even before beginning 

formal studies. Despite her misgivings that launching him on a course of studying art would impinge upon his other studies, his mother indulged the 

young Modigliani's passion for the subject.

At the age of fourteen, while sick with the typhoid fever, he raved in his delirium that he wanted, above all else, to see the paintings in the Palazzo 

Pitti and the Uffizi in Florence. As Livorno's local museum only housed a sparse few paintings by the Italian Renaissance masters, the tales he had 

heard about the great works held in Florence intrigued him, and it was a source of considerable despair to him, in his sickened state, that he might 

never get the chance to view them in person. His mother promised that she would take him to Florence herself, the moment he was recovered. Not only did 

she fulfil this promise, but she also undertook to enroll him with the best painting master in Livorno, Guglielmo Micheli.

Micheli and the Macchiaioli

Head Of A Woman With A Hat - Amedeo Modigliani

Head Of A Woman With A Hat 

Modigliani worked in Micheli's Art School from 1898 to 1900. Here his earliest formal artistic instruction took place in an atmosphere deeply steeped 

in a study of the styles and themes of nineteenth-century Italian art. In his earliest Parisian work, traces of this influence, and that of his studies 

of Renaissance art, can still be seen: artists such as Giovanni Boldini figure just as much in this nascent work as do those of Toulouse-Lautrec.

Modigliani showed great promise while with Micheli, and only ceased his studies when he was forced to, by the onset of tuberculosis.

In 1901, whilst in Rome, Modigliani admired the work of Domenico Morelli, a painter of melodramatic Biblical studies and scenes from great literature. 

It is ironic that he should be so struck by Morelli, as this painter had served as an inspiration for a group of iconoclasts who went known by the 

title "the Macchiaioli" (from macchia -"dash of colour", or, more derogatively, "stain"), and Modigliani had already been exposed to the influences of 

the Macchiaioli. This minor, localized art movement was possessed of a need to react against the bourgeois stylings of the academic genre painters. 

While sympathetically connected to (and actually pre-dating) the French Impressionists, the Macchiaioli did not make the same impact upon international 

art culture as did the followers of Monet, and are today largely forgotten outside of Italy.

Modigliani's connection with the movement was through Guglielmo Micheli, his first art teacher. Micheli was not only a Macchiaiolo himself, but had 

been a pupil of the famous Giovanni Fattori, a founder of the movement. Micheli's work, however, was so fashionable and the genre so commonplace that 

the young Modigliani reacted against it, preferring to ignore the obsession with landscape that, as with French Impressionism, characterized the 

movement. Micheli also tried to encourage his pupils to paint en plein air, but Modigliani never really got a taste for this style of working, 

sketching in cafes, but preferring to paint indoors, and especially in his own studio. Even when compelled to paint landscapes (three are known to 

exist), Modigliani chose a proto-Cubist palette more akin to Cezanne than to the Macchiaioli.

While with Micheli, Modigliani not only studied landscape, but also portraiture, still-life, and the nude. His fellow students recall that the latter 

was where he displayed his greatest talent, and apparently this was not an entirely academic pursuit for the teenager: when not painting nudes, he was 

occupied with seducing the household maid.

Despite his rejection of the Macchiaioli approach, Modigliani nonetheless found favour with his teacher, who referred to him as "Superman", a pet name 

reflecting the fact that Modigliani was not only quite adept at his art, but also that he regularly quoted from Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra. 

Fattori himself would often visit the studio, and approved of the young artist's innovations.

In 1902, Modigliani continued what was to be a life-long infatuation with life drawing, enrolling in the Accademia di Belle Arti (Scuola Libera di 

Nudo, or "Free School of Nude Studies") in Florence. A year later while still suffering from tuberculosis, he moved to Venice, where he registered to 

study at the Istituto di Belle Arti.

It is in Venice that he first smoked hashish and, rather than studying, began to spend time frequenting disreputable parts of the city. The impact of 

these lifestyle choices upon his developing artistic style is open to conjecture, although these choices do seem to be more than simple teenage 

rebellion, or the cliched hedonism and bohemianism that was almost expected of artists of the time; his pursuit of the seedier side of life appears to 

have roots in his appreciation of radical philosophies, such as those of Nietzsche.

Early literary influences

Reclining Nude I - Amedeo Modigliani

Head Of A Woman With A Hat 

Having been exposed to erudite philosophical literature as a young boy under the tutelage of Isaco Garsin, his maternal grandfather, he continued to read and be influenced through his art studies by the writings of Nietzsche, Baudelaire, Carducci, Comte de Lautreamont, and others, and developed the 

belief that the only route to true creativity was through defiance and disorder.

Letters that he wrote from his 'sabbatical' in Capri in 1901 clearly indicate that he is being more and more influenced by the thinking of Nietzsche. 

In these letters, he advised friend Oscar Ghiglia,

"(hold sacred all) which can exalt and excite your intelligence... (and) ... seek to provoke ... and to perpetuate ... these fertile stimuli, because 

they can push the intelligence to its maximum creative power."

The work of Lautreamont was equally influential at this time. This doomed poet's Les Chants de Maldoror became the seminal work for the Parisian 

Surrealists of Modigliani's generation, and the book became Modigliani's favourite to the extent that he learnt it by heart. The poetry of Lautreamont 

is characterized by the juxtaposition of fantastical elements, and by sadistic imagery; the fact that Modigliani was so taken by this text in his early 

teens gives a good indication of his developing tastes. Baudelaire and D'Annunzio similarly appealed to the young artist, with their interest in 

orrupted beauty, and the expression of that insight through Symbolist imagery.

Modigliani wrote to Ghiglia extensively from Capri, where his mother had taken him to assist in his recovery from the tuberculosis. These letters are a 

sounding board for the developing ideas brewing in Modigliani's mind. Ghiglia was seven years Modigliani's senior, and it is likely that it was he who 

showed the young man the limits of his horizons in Livorno. Like all precocious teenagers, Modigliani preferred the company of older companions, and 

Ghiglia's role in his adolescence was to be a sympathetic ear as he worked himself out, principally in the convoluted letters that he regularly sent, 

and which survive today.

" Dear friend

I write to pour myself out to you and to affirm myself to myself.

I am the prey of great powers that surge forth and then disintegrate...

A bourgeois told me today - insulted me - that I or at least my brain was lazy. It did me good. I should like such a warning every morning upon 

awakening: but they cannot understand us nor can they understand life..."

Paris

Portrait of Maude Abrantes -  Amedeo Modigliani

Portrait of Maude Abrantes 

Arrival

In 1906 Modigliani moved to Paris, then the focal point of the avant-garde. In fact, his arrival at the centre of artistic experimentation coincided 

with the arrival of two other foreigners who were also to leave their marks upon the art world: Gino Severini and Juan Gris.

He settled in Le Bateau-Lavoir, a commune for penniless artists in Montmartre, renting himself a studio in Rue Caulaincourt. Even though this artists' 

quarter of Montmartre was characterized by generalized poverty, Modigliani himself presented-initially, at least-as one would expect the son of a 

family trying to maintain the appearances of its lost financial standing to present: his wardrobe was dapper without ostentation, and the studio he 

rented was appointed in a style appropriate to someone with a finely attuned taste in plush drapery and Renaissance reproductions. He soon made efforts 

to assume the guise of the bohemian artist, but, even in his brown corduroys, scarlet scarf and large black hat, he continued to appear as if he were 

slumming it, having fallen upon harder times.

When he first arrived in Paris, he wrote home regularly to his mother, he sketched his nudes at the Colarossi school, and he drank wine in moderation. 

He was at that time considered by those who knew him as a bit reserved, verging on the asocial. He is noted to have commented, upon meeting Picasso 

who, at the time, was wearing his trademark workmen's clothes, that even though the man was a genius, that did not excuse his uncouth appearance.

Transformation

Within a year of arriving in Paris, however, his demeanour and reputation had changed dramatically. He transformed himself from a dapper academician 

artist into a sort of prince of vagabonds.

The poet and journalist Louis Latourette, upon visiting the artist's previously well-appointed studio after his transformation, discovered the place in 

upheaval, the Renaissance reproductions discarded from the walls, the plush drapes in disarray. Modigliani was already an alcoholic and a drug addict 

by this time, and his studio reflected this. Modigliani's behaviour at this time sheds some light upon his developing style as an artist, in that the 

studio had become almost a sacrificial effigy for all that he resented about the academic art that had marked his life and his training up to that 

point.

Not only did he remove all the trappings of his bourgeois heritage from his studio, but he also set about destroying practically all of his own early 

work. He explained this extraordinary course of actions to his astonished neighbours thus:

"Childish baubles, done when I was a dirty bourgeois."

The motivation for this violent rejection of his earlier self is the subject of considerable speculation. The self-destructive tendencies may have 

stemmed from his tuberculosis and the knowledge (or presumption) that the disease had essentially marked him for an early death; within the artists' 

quarter, many faced the same sentence, and the typical response was to set about enjoying life while it lasted, principally by indulging in self-

destructive actions. For Modigliani such behavior may have been a response to a lack of recognition; he sought the company of artists such as Utrillo 

and Soutine, seeking acceptance and validation for his work from his colleagues.

Modigliani's behavior stood out even in these Bohemian surroundings: he carried on frequent affairs, drank heavily, and used absinthe and hashish. 

While drunk, he would sometimes strip himself naked at social gatherings. He became the epitome of the tragic artist, creating a posthumous legend 

almost as well-known as that of Vincent van Gogh.

During the 1920s, in the wake of Modigliani's career and spurred on by comments by Andre Salmon crediting hashish and absinthe with the genesis of 

Modigliani's style, many hopefuls tried to emulate his "success" by embarking on a path of substance abuse and bohemian excess. Salmon claimed-

erroneously-that whereas Modigliani was a totally pedestrian artist when sober,

"...from the day that he abandoned himself to certain forms of debauchery, an unexpected light came upon him, transforming his art. From that day on, 

he became one who must be counted among the masters of living art."

While this propaganda served as a rallying cry to those with a romantic longing to be a tragic, doomed artist, these strategies did not produce unique 

artistic insights or techniques in those who did not already have them.

In fact, art historians suggest that it is entirely possible for Modigliani to have achieved even greater artistic heights had he not been immured in, 

and destroyed by, his own self-indulgences. We can only speculate what he might have accomplished had he emerged intact from his self-destructive 

explorations.

Output

Portrait Of Anna Zborovska - Amedeo Modigliani

Portrait Of Anna Zborovska 

During his early years in Paris, Modigliani worked at a furious pace. He was constantly sketching, making as many as a hundred drawings a day. However, 

many of his works were lost-destroyed by him as inferior, left behind in his frequent changes of address, or given to girlfriends who did not keep 

hem.

He was first influenced by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, but around 1907 he became fascinated with the work of Paul Cezanne. Eventually he developed his 

own unique style, one that cannot be adequately categorized with other artists.

He met the first serious love of his life, Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, in 1910, when he was 26. They had studios in the same building, and although 

21-year-old Anna was recently married, they began an affair.[ citation needed ] Tall (Modigliani was only 5 foot 5 inches) with dark hair (like 

Modigliani's), pale skin and grey-green eyes, she embodied Modigliani's aesthetic ideal and the pair became engrossed in each other. After a year, 

however, Anna returned to her husband.

Sculpture

In 1909, Modigliani returned home to Livorno, sickly and tired from his wild lifestyle. Soon he was back in Paris, this time renting a studio in 

Montparnasse. He originally saw himself as a sculptor rather than a painter, and was encouraged to continue after Paul Guillaume, an ambitious young 

art dealer, took an interest in his work and introduced him to sculptor Constantin Brancusi.

Although a series of Modigliani's sculptures were exhibited in the Salon d'Automne of 1912, by 1914 he abandoned sculpting and focused solely on his 

painting, a move precipitated by the difficulty in acquiring stone, and by Modigliani's physical buterne moved to Nice, she became pregnant and on November 29, 1918 gave birth to a daughter whom they named Jeanne (1918-1984).

Nice

During a trip to Nice, conceived and organized by Leopold Zborovski, Modigliani, Foujita and other artists tried to sell their works to rich tourists. 

Modigliani managed to sell a few pictures but only for a few francs each. Despite this, during this time he produced most of the paintings that later 

became his most popular and valued works.

During his lifetime he sold a number of his works, but never for any great amount of money. What funds he did receive soon vanished for his habits.

In May 1919 he returned to Paris, where, with Hebuterne and their daughter, he rented an apartment in the rue de la Grande Chaumiere. While there, both 

Jeanne Hebuterne and Amedeo Modigliani painted portraits of each other, and of themselves.

Death

In 1920, after not hearing from him for several days, his downstairs neighbor checked on the family and found Modigliani in bed delirious and holding 

onto Hebuterne who was nearly nine months pregnant. They summoned a doctor, but little could be done because Modigliani was dying of the then-incurable 

disease tubercular meningitis.Although he continued to paint, Modigliani's health was deteriorating rapidly, and his alcohol-induced blackouts became 

more frequent.

Modigliani died penniless and destitute-managing only one solo exhibition in his life and giving his work away in exchange for meals in restaurants. 

Since his death his reputation has soared. Nine novels, a play, a documentary and three feature films have been devoted to his life. (From Wikipedia)

Leonardo Da Vinci

Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452, "at the third hour of the night" in the Tuscan hill town of Vinci, in the lower valley of the Arno River in the territory of Florence. He was the illegitimate son of Messer Piero Fruosino di Antonio da Vinci, a Florentine notary, and Caterina, a peasant who may have been a slave from the Middle East. Leonardo had no surname in the modern sense, "da Vinci" simply meaning "of Vinci": his full birth name was "Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci", meaning "Leonardo, son of (Mes)ser Piero from Vinci."
Little is known about Leonardo's early life. He spent his first five years in the hamlet of Anchiano, then lived in the household of his father, grandparents and uncle, Francesco, in the small town of Vinci. His father had married a sixteen-year-old girl named Albiera, who loved Leonardo but died young. In later life, Leonardo only recorded two childhood incidents. One, which he regarded as an omen, was when a kite dropped from the sky and hovered over his cradle, its tail feathers brushing his face. The second occurred while exploring in the mountains. He discovered a cave and was both terrified that some great monster might lurk there, and driven by curiosity to find out what was inside.
Leonardo's early life has been the subject of historical conjecture. Vasari, the 16th century biographer of Renaissance painters tells of how a local peasant requested that Ser Piero ask his talented son to paint a picture on a round plaque. Leonardo responded with a painting of snakes spitting fire which was so terrifying that Ser Piero sold it to a Florentine art dealer, who sold it to the Duke of Milan. Meanwhile, having made a profit, Ser Piero bought a plaque decorated with a heart pierced by an arrow, which he gave to the peasant.
Verrocchio's workshop, 1466–1476
The Baptism of Christ - Leonardo Da Vinci
The Baptism of Christ [Detail]
In 1466, at the age of fourteen, Leonardo was apprenticed to one of the most successful artists of his day, Andrea di Cione, known as Verrocchio. Verrocchio's workshop was at the centre of the intellectual currents of Florence, assuring the young Leonardo of an education in the humanities. Other famous painters apprenticed or associated with the workshop include Ghirlandaio, Perugino, Botticelli, and Lorenzo di Credi. Leonardo would have been exposed to a vast range of technical skills and had the opportunity to learn drafting, chemistry, metallurgy, metal working, plaster casting, leather working, mechanics and carpentry as well as the artistic skills of drawing, painting, sculpting and modeling.
Much of the painted production of Verrocchio's workshop was done by his employees. According to Vasari, Leonardo collaborated with Verrocchio on his Baptism of Christ, painting the young angel holding Jesus’ robe in a manner that was so far superior to his master's that Verrocchio put down his brush and never painted again. This is probably an exaggeration. On close examination, the painting reveals much that has been painted or touched up over the tempera using the new technique of oil paint, the landscape, the rocks that can be seen through the brown mountain stream and much of the figure of Jesus bearing witness to the hand of Leonardo.
Leonardo himself may have been the model for two works by Verrocchio, including the bronze statue of David in the Bargello and the Archangel Michael in Tobias and the Angel.
By 1472, at the age of twenty, Leonardo qualified as a master in the Guild of St Luke, the guild of artists and doctors of medicine, but even after his father set him up in his own workshop, his attachment to Verrocchio was such that he continued to collaborate with him. Leonardo's earliest known dated work is a drawing in pen and ink of the Arno valley, drawn on 5 August 1473.
Professional life, 1476–1513
Adoration of the Magi - Leonardo Da Vinci
Adoration of the Magi
Court records of 1476 show that Leonardo and three other young men were charged with sodomy, and acquitted. From that date until 1478 there is no record of his work or even of his whereabouts, although it is assumed that Leonardo had his own workshop in Florence between 1476 and 1481. He was commissioned to paint an altarpiece in 1478 for the Chapel of St Bernard and The Adoration of the Magi in 1481 for the Monks of San Donato a Scopeto.
In 1482 Leonardo helped secure peace between Lorenzo de' Medici and Ludovico il Moro, Duke of Milan. Leonardo wrote a letter to Ludovico, describing his engineering and painting skill. He created a silver lyre in the shape of a horse's head, with which he was sent to Milan.
Leonardo continued work in Milan between 1482 and 1499. He was commissioned to paint the Virgin of the Rocks for the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception, and The Last Supper for the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie. While living in Milan between 1493 and 1495 Leonardo listed a woman called Caterina among his dependents in his taxation documents. When she died in 1495, her list of funeral expenditure suggests that she was his mother.
His work for Ludovico included floats and pageants for special occasions, designs for a dome for Milan Cathedral and a model for a huge equestrian monument to Francesco Sforza, Ludovico's predecessor. Leonardo modelled a huge horse in clay, which became known as the "Gran Cavallo", and surpassed in size the two large equestrian statues of the Renaissance. Seventy tons of bronze were set aside for casting it. The monument remained unfinished for several years, which was not unusual for Leonardo. In 1492 the model was completed, and Leonardo was making detailed plans for its casting. Michelangelo rudely implied that Leonardo was unable to cast it. In November 1494 Ludovico gave the bronze to be used for cannons to defend the city from invasion by Charles VIII.
At the start of the Second Italian War in 1499, the invading French troops used the life-size clay model for the "Gran Cavallo" for target practice. With Ludovico Sforza overthrown, Leonardo, with his assistant Salai and friend, the mathematician Luca Pacioli, fled Milan for Venice, where he was employed as a military architect and engineer, devising methods to defend the city from naval attack.

 The Virgin and Child with St Anne c. 1510 - Leonardo Da Vinci
The Virgin and Child with St Anne
On his return to Florence in 1500, he and his household were guests of the Servite monks at the monastery of Santissima Annunziata and were provided with a workshop where, according to Vasari, Leonardo created the cartoon of The Virgin and Child with St. Anne and St. John the Baptist, a work that won such admiration that "men and women, young and old" flocked to see it "as if they were attending a great festival". In 1502 Leonardo entered the service of Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander VI, acting as a military architect and engineer and travelling throughout Italy with his patron. He returned to Florence where he rejoined the Guild of St Luke on 18 October 1503, and spent two years designing and painting a great mural of The Battle of Anghiari for the Signoria, with Michelangelo designing its companion piece, The Battle of Cascina. In Florence in 1504, he was part of a committee formed to relocate, against the artist's will, Michelangelo's statue of David.
In 1506 he returned to Milan. Many of Leonardo's most prominent pupils or followers in painting either knew or worked with him in Milan, including Bernardino Luini, Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio and Marco D'Oggione. However, he did not stay in Milan for long because his father had died in 1504, and in 1507 he was back in Florence trying to sort out problems with his brothers over his father's estate. By 1508 he was back in Milan, living in his own house in Porta Orientale in the parish of Santa Babila.
Old age
From September 1513 to 1516, Leonardo spent much of his time living in the Belvedere in the Vatican in Rome, where Raphael and Michelangelo were both active at the time. In October 1515, François I of France recaptured Milan. On 19th December, Leonardo was present at the meeting of Francois I and Pope Leo X, which took place in Bologna. It was for Francois that Leonardo was commissioned to make a mechanical lion which could walk forward, then open its chest to reveal a cluster of lilies. In 1516, he entered François' service, being given the use of the manor house Clos Lucé near the king's residence at the royal Chateau Amboise. It was here that he spent the last three years of his life, accompanied by his friend and apprentice, Count Francesco Melzi, supported by a pension totalling 10,000 scudi.
Leonardo died at Clos Lucé, France, on May 2, 1519. François I had become a close friend. Vasari records that the King held Leonardo's head in his arms as he died, although this story, beloved by the French and portrayed in romantic paintings by Ingres, Ménageot and other French artists, may be legend rather than fact. Vasari also tells us that in his last days, Leonardo sent for a priest to make his confession and to receive the Holy Sacrament. In accordance to his will, sixty beggars followed his casket. He was buried in the Chapel of Saint-Hubert in the castle of Amboise. Melzi was the principal heir and executor, receiving as well as money, Leonardo's paintings, tools, library and personal effects. Leonardo also remembered his other long-time pupil and companion, Salai and his servant Battista di Vilussis, who each received half of Leonardo's vineyards, his brothers who received land, and his serving woman who received a black cloak of good stuff with a fur edge.
Some twenty years after Leonardo's death, François was reported by the goldsmith and sculptor Benevenuto Cellini as saying: "There had never been another man born in the world who knew as much as Leonardo, not so much about painting, sculpture and architecture, as that he was a very great philosopher." (From wikipedia)