Biography
Diego Velasquez is an artist-individualist of the Spanish era Baroque, the court painter Philip IV, recreated historical scenes, writing portraits of monarchs, famous persons and commoners. His works became a model for impressionists and realist artists and were recreated in the work of El Salvador and Pablo Picasso. The Velasquez cannons are stored in the collections of the world's largest museums, in 1999 and 2014, documentaries devoted to the skill of recognized genius came to the screens.Childhood and youth
Diego Rodriguez de Silva-I-Velasquez was born in Seville in the family of Juan Rodriguez de Silva and Jeronima Velasquez, who baptized the Son in the local church of St. Peter on June 6, 1599, a few days or weeks after the appearance of ones.
As a child, the boy received good training in the field of languages and philosophy, in parallel fond of elegant arts. Learn Diego's drawing began in the studio Francisco de Errera, a progressive artist who ignored the influence of the Italian school.
When Velasquez turned 12 years old, he switched to the beginning of Francisco Pacheco. The teacher believed in the talent of a novice master and brought him to the light. At the age of 17, Diego became an independent artist, joined the corporation of the painters of Seville, dreaming of a career at the court of the king.
Painting
At the beginning of the creative biography, Velasquez was famous for the image of household scenes from the life of commoners. "Old woman, fried eggs," Two young men in the table "," Breakfast "were written in the genre of Bodegones, which translated from Spanish meant" Harchevnya, Tavern. "
In the spring of 1622, Diego went to Madrid with a recommendation letter to Archbishop Huan Rodriguez de Fonsiek, who presented a young artist Royal Minister, Duke Olivares. The courtroom ordered Velasquez his own portrait, writing which Diego won the audience at the king and received the praise of the monarch.
In 1623, Diego ordered to settle in Madrid, promising that other artists will never write Philip IV. The first portrait of the Spanish Majesty Velasquez created in 1623. After that, he began the court career, receiving 20 doubles per month, medical care, accommodation and fee for the paintings that it will draw.
In 1627, Velasquez became the winner in the competition of Spanish painters, who was established by the king, the theme of which was the expulsion of Moors. The picture died in a fire in Madrid Alcasar in 1734, according to the description of contemporaries, Philip III was depicted on it, showing the battlehead to the crowd of men and women, stimpled by soldiers. As a reward, Diego received the position of Chamber, and in a year he became the court artist of His Majesty King Spain, replacing the deceased James Morag.
In 1629, the permission of the monarch Velasquez went to Italy for a year and a half. Although his first visit to the homeland of Michelangelo researchers recognized an important milestone in the development of an individual style, a little information was preserved about who was met by the artist, which was seen and what innovation hoped to contribute to their painting.
Returning to Spain, Velasquez began to create portraits of the royal family and the environment of Philip IV. The most famous pictures of the "Riding Hand Riding Lesson of Prince Baltazar Carlos", where the young heir is depicted in the village of Field Marshal on the Garlication Kone, the images of the Queen Elizabeth of the Bourbon and Poet Francisco de Cuevedo, as well as several portraits of the Duke of Olivares, in which the artist expressed gratitude to his benefactor.
Performing the duties of the court painter, Velasquez constantly watched Philipp IV carefully, he wrote more than 40 portraits. Frequently following the monarch on travel, he was present when conquering Lerida. It was then that the artist painted an equestrian portrait on which the king appeared in the form of a great commander, who headed the troops, which was actually never happening.
Velasquez also wrote a certain number of jesters and dwarfs at the courtyard of Philip, to which he treated with respect and sympathy. In the picture "Dwarf Don Diego de Asedo, a smart face and a solid folio with an ink bottle and a handle next to the character show that the royal servant is wiser and formed by many courteous nobles. Other works of the artist on this topic are the works of Pablo de Valladolid, Francisco Leskano, Don Juan de Calabasas.
By the 1630s, the greatest of the artists of the Velasquez of the religious direction "Christ on the Cross", depicting the Savior immediately after death. At the end of the 1640s, Filipp entrusted the foundation of the Academy of Arts in Madrid to the court painter. Spain's rich in paintings needed sculpture, and Velasquez was instructed to visit Italy once again to make acquisitions.
In 1649, the artist visited Genoa, Milan and Venice to buy works by Titian, Tintoretto and Veronese. Arriving in the Vatican, Velasquez received an order to the portrait of the Pope Innocent X and performed it in a new grade and a sharp style, called Manera Abreviada (fast letters technique).
The picture showed such merciless in facial expression that some approximate was afraid of the wrath of the head of the Roman Catholic Church. Contrary to expectations, Innokenti liked the work, he hung her room in front of his office.
In 1651, at the request of Philippe Velasquez returned to Spain, organized and cataloged paintings and sculptures brought from Italy and began to create its most famous works. Having drawn inspiration in the works of Italian painters, Velasquez finished the picture of Venus with a mirror, depicting the Roman goddess of love, beauty and fertility, languidly lying on the bed, back to the viewer. She looks into a mirror held by Cupid.
Folding sheets repeat the physical form of the goddess and emphasize the wide bends of her body. The artist used the shades of red, white and gray in the figure of Venus in the foreground of the composition. These paints contrast with dark silks, on which the goddess lies, and with the brown color of the wall for its reflection.
Interesting is the fact that "Venus with a mirror" was attacked by Vandals in 1914. The suffling of Mary Richardson entered the National Gallery of London and attacked the Velasquez cans with meat Tesacians, leaving the cuts between the shoulders of the central figure.
By 1655, art historians belong to another famous picture of Velasquez "Straight", where, according to some researchers, women workers in the tapestry workshop are depicted. According to another version, which is considered the right interpretation of the work, the artist drew the plot from the Baszy Ovid about the mortal Arahan, which dared to challenge the goddess of Athena at the weaving competition. In this work, Velasquez used the multilayer composition of the Bodegones genre characteristic of his early work.
The "straight" was created by order of the court hunter Don Pedro de Arstee and entered the royal collection. The canvas survived in a fire of 1734, but received significant damage at the edges. In the process of restoration, the missing elements were added and preserved to the present. However, only the surviving part of the picture is exhibited in the Prado Museum, and the recovered elements that do not belong to Velasquez's brush are closed by frame.
The last portraits of the Royal Shows of Velasquez, drawn shortly before death, are among the best paintings of the Spanish Master. In "Infanta Margarit Teresa in a blue dress", the individual style of the author reached apogee: the flickering spots of the colors on the wide picturesque surfaces produce an almost impressionistic effect of three-dimensional space.
Personal life
On April 23, 1618, Diego Velasquez married the daughter of his teacher Francisco Pacheki - Juan. The artist and his wife had two children. The youngest daughter, Ignashi, died in infancy, and the eldest Francisa arranged his personal life, coming to marry the future court artist Juan Batista Martineza del Mazo, who continued the tradition of his great testing.Death
In June 1660, Velasquez had the honor of executing the Spanish Pavilion and the entire picturesque exposition of the wedding ceremony of Princess Mary Teresia with the King of France Louis XIV, which was held on the island of Pheasanov, on the Bidasoa River.
This event undermined the health of the court painter. After returning to Madrid, he rose a temperature. Feeling end approach, Velasquez signed a will, appointing the sole performers of the last will and the heirs of his wife and his friend, the keeper of royal records.
On August 6, 1660, the artist died. The cause of death was fever. 8 days after Velasquez was devoted to the Earth, his wife Juan died. Their graves were in the Church of San Juan Bautista, which the French destroyed in 1811. Where is the burial of the artist, unknown.
Paintings
- 1618-1619 - "Breakfast"
- 1619 - "WHOLCHES"
- 1628 - "Triumph of Wakha, or Drunka"
- 1631 - "Portrait of Prince Baltazar Carlos with Dwarf"
- 1632 - "Crucified Christ"
- 1638 - "Portrait of Count Olivares"
- 1637-1639 - "Don Juan de Calabasas"
- 1647-1651 - "Venus with a mirror"
- 1650 - "Portrait of the Pope Innokenti X"
- 1653-1655 - "Portrait of Philip IV"
- 1656 - "Menins"
- 1657 - "Straight, or arahn myth"