RUBENS Peter Paul (Rubens Peter Paul)

(1577-1640)
He was born in Siegen in Westphalia, 28 June 1577 in the family of Jan Rubens, Antwerp lawyer. When Peter Paul Rubens was eleven years old, his father died, and his mother moved with her children in Antwerp. The future artist was educated at the Jesuit School. The ability for languages (he spoke six languages) have allowed him not only learn the cultural heritage of his era, but also achieved significant successes in diplomacy. Rubens studied at three Flemish painters - Tobias Verhahta, Adam van North and Otto Van Vienna. In 1598 he was accepted into the guild of St.. Luke. In 1600 the artist went to Italy, where he studied ancient architecture and sculpture, Italian painting, as well as portraits (mainly in Genoa) and the altarpiece (in Rome and Mantua). In 1603, Italian patron of Rubens Vicenza Gonzaga had sent him to Spain as part of a diplomatic mission. In 1608 Rubens became court painter Isabella of Austria, he settled in Antwerp and in 1609 he married a noblewoman Isabella Brant. From this marriage were born three children. To meet the growing demand for his paintings, Rubens few years created a large workshop, where he worked A.van Dyck, J. Jordaens and F. Snyders. He performed sketches, which his students and assistants were transferred onto canvas, and then, after work, a little picture of an amendment to. He even organized an engraving school in order to extend our work. Paintings by Rubens those years are full of passionate speakers. Among the subjects dominated by scenes of hunting, battles, vivid and dramatic Gospel episodes and scenes from the lives of saints, allegorical and mythological compositions, in which Rubens happy to write robust, powerful body, like his contemporaries. In addition to orders from local churches and aristocrats Antwerp, the artist received commissions from abroad, mainly from England. Large workshop, a building which he designed in the style of the Genoese palazzi (restored in 1937-1946), soon became the social center and attractions of Antwerp. In 1620-ies Rubens worked for the French royal house. He has written for Marie de Medicis cycle of allegorical panels on the themes of her life and cartoons for tapestries executed by order of Louis XIII, . and began a cycle tracks with episodes from the life of King Henry IV of Navarre, . and an unfinished,
. Since the early 1620-ies Rubens was very active diplomatic activities. In 1628 and 1630 Rubens traveled to Madrid and London on diplomatic missions and participated in a peace treaty between Spain, Britain and Holland. Returning to Antwerp, Rubens was greeted with great honor, the Spanish king granted him the title of state councilor, and the English king - the personal nobility. Soon Rubens married Helena sixteen Fourmen, they had five children. In those years the style of Rubens changed - songs are built in a free and smooth rhythm, characteristic of the early period of creativity rigid interpretation of sculptural forms is replaced by a light and airy color and volume. They can see the influence of works by Titian, Rubens copied that during his stay in Madrid. Although, . that he took up a lot of time working on large decorative compositions and structures (painting the ceiling in a banquet hall in the palace of Whitehall in London and triumphal arch in honor of the entry into Antwerp Infante Ferdinand, the decoration of a hunting castle Torre de la Parada), . Rubens managed to write more chamber, . lyrical works,
. Among them should be called a portrait of Helen Fourmen coat (ok. 1638-1640, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum), Kermessa (ca. 1635-1636, Louvre), and especially a few shining, brightly lit landscapes created in the last five years of living in a country estate near Mehlina. Rubens died May 30, 1640.
In his works, Rubens managed to achieve that, striving for the previous three generations of Flemish artists: Connections Flemish realism with the classical tradition, revived by Italian Renaissance. The artist was endowed with great creative energy and an inexhaustible imagination, drawing inspiration from various sources, he created his own unique style. To fulfill altarpiece is characterized by sensory and emotional; decorating palaces of the aristocracy of the emerging era of absolutism, . He contributed to the spread of the Baroque style - the artistic language is not only the Counter-Reformation, . but the secular culture of the time.,