Delphi Complete Paintings of Anthony van Dyck (Illustrated)

By Peter Russell and Anthony van Dyck

The most prominent Flemish Baroque artist of the seventeenth century, Anthony van Dyck was a prolific painter of portraits of European aristocracy, most notably for Charles I and his family. He also executed religious and mythological works and was a fine draftsman and etcher. Along with his contemporary Diego Velázquez, van Dyck revolutionised the genre of portraiture, elevating its status in the arts. Through his evolution of style, the Fleming master would become the dominant influence on English portrait-painting for the next 150 years. Delphi’s Masters of Art Series presents the world’s first digital e-Art books, allowing readers to explore the works of great artists in comprehensive detail. This volume presents van Dyck’s complete paintings in beautiful detail, with concise introductions, hundreds of high quality images and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1)

* The complete paintings of Anthony van Dyck – over 600 paintings, fully indexed and arranged in chronological and alphabetical order
* Includes reproductions of rare works
* Features a special ‘Highlights’ section, with concise introductions to the masterpieces, giving valuable contextual information
* Enlarged ‘Detail’ images, allowing you to explore van Dyck’s celebrated works in detail, as featured in traditional art books
* Hundreds of images in colour – highly recommended for viewing on tablets and smart phones or as a valuable reference tool on more conventional eReaders
* Special chronological and alphabetical contents tables for the paintings
* Easily locate the paintings you wish to view
* Features three bonus biographies – discover van Dyck's artistic and personal life

Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting e-Art books

CONTENTS:

The Highlights
Christ Crowned with Thorns
The Betrayal of Christ
Portrait of Susanna Fourment and her Daughter Clara
Susanna and the Elders
Portrait of Isabella Brant
Portrait of Elena Grimaldi
The Three Ages of Man
Saint Rosalia Interceding for the Plague-Stricken of Palermo
Rinaldo and Armida
Portrait of Nicholas Lanier
Charles I with M. de Saint Antoine
Portrait of the Earl of Pembroke and his Family
Charles I at the Hunt
Portrait of James Stuart, Duke of Lennox and Richmond
Charles I in Three Positions
Portrait of the Children of Charles I
Portrait of the Earl of Denbigh
Cupid and Psyche

The Paintings
The Complete Paintings
Alphabetical List of Paintings

The Biographies
Sir Anthony van Dyck by Henri Simon Hymans
Sir Anthony van Dyck by Lionel Henry Cust
Van Dyck by Percy M. Turner

Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles or to buy the whole Art series as a Super Set

• Language: English
• Publisher: Delphi Classics Ltd
• Release date: Jun 20, 2019
• ISBN: 9781788779692

Book preview

Anthony van Dyck

(1599-1641)

Contents

The Highlights

Christ Crowned with Thorns

The Betrayal of Christ

Portrait of Susanna Fourment and her Daughter Clara

Susanna and the Elders

Portrait of Isabella Brant

Portrait of Elena Grimaldi

The Three Ages of Man

Saint Rosalia Interceding for the Plague-Stricken of Palermo

Rinaldo and Armida

Portrait of Nicholas Lanier

Charles I with M. de Saint Antoine

Portrait of the Earl of Pembroke and his Family

Charles I at the Hunt

Portrait of James Stuart, Duke of Lennox and Richmond

Charles I in Three Positions

Portrait of the Children of Charles I

Portrait of the Earl of Denbigh

Cupid and Psyche

The Paintings

The Complete Paintings

Alphabetical List of Paintings

The Biographies

Sir Anthony van Dyck by Henri Simon Hymans

Sir Anthony van Dyck by Lionel Henry Cust

Van Dyck by Percy M. Turner

The Delphi Classics Catalogue

© Delphi Classics 2019

Version 1

Browse our Art eBooks…

Buy the entire Masters of Art Series at a reduced price

Masters of Art Series

Anthony van Dyck

By Delphi Classics, 2019

COPYRIGHT

Masters of Art - Anthony van Dyck

First published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by Delphi Classics.

© Delphi Classics, 2019.

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

ISBN: 9781788779692

Delphi Classics

is an imprint of

Delphi Publishing Ltd

Hastings, East Sussex

United Kingdom

Contact: [e-mail]

www.delphiclassics.com

Enjoying our Art series of eBooks? Then try our Classical Music series:

A first of its kind in digital print, the Delphi Great Composers series allows digital readers to explore the works of the world’s greatest composers in comprehensive detail, with interactive links to popular streaming services.

Explore the series so far…

The Highlights

Antwerp, modern-day Belgium — van Dyck’s birthplace

‘View of Antwerp’ by Bonaventura Peeters the Elder, c. 1640

Van Dyck’s self portrait, c. 1614

The Highlights

In this section, a sample of van Dyck’s most celebrated works is provided, with concise introductions, special ‘detail’ reproductions and additional biographical images.

Christ Crowned with Thorns

The most prominent Flemish Baroque painter of the seventeenth century, Anthony van Dyck was born in 1599, the seventh of 12 children to Frans van Dyck, a prosperous silk merchant and Maria, the daughter of Dirk Cupers and Catharina Conincx. He manifested signs of artistic brilliance from an early age and by the time he was ten, he was already apprenticed to Hendrik van Balen, a successful Antwerp painter.  Van Balen (c. 1573-1632) specialised in small cabinet pictures often painted on a copper support. His favourite themes were mythological and allegorical scenes and, to a lesser extent, religious subjects and his work would play an important role in the renewal of Flemish painting in the early seventeenth century. For over 30 years, Van Balen led a successful workshop and had many pupils, though none would ever come close to winning the acclaim of his most famous student, Anthony van Dyck.

In short time, the youngster came under the influence of Peter Paul Rubens, who from 1608 was the undisputed master of art in Antwerp. At the age of fifteen, van Dyck was already a highly accomplished artist, as demonstrated in his early Self Portrait (1613). By February 1618, he was admitted to the Antwerp painters’ Guild of Saint Luke as a free master. Within a few years he had reached the position of chief assistant to Rubens. The prestigious master ran a very large and complex studio, making much use of sub-contracted artists, as well as his own expansive workshop, producing countless artworks for his ever-widening clientele. His influence on the young van Dyck was immense and in return, Rubens famously referred to the nineteen-year-old van Dyck as the best of my pupils.

The origins and exact nature of their relationship remain unclear, as there are few surviving documents detailing van Dyck’s early development. It has been suggested by art historians that van Dyck was a pupil of Rubens from about 1613, since his early work reveals little trace of van Balen’s style; nonetheless, there is no clear evidence to support this view. The figural compositions of the first eight years of van Dyck’s career echo Rubens’s melodramatic style, though the pupil avoids the master’s technique of enamel-like glazes, preferring instead to paint directly with a somewhat coarse texture. Van Dyck’s colour scale is darker and warmer than was usually employed by Rubens, while his lights and shades are more abrupt in appearance. The figures of van Dyck’s paintings are more angular in their gestures and less harmoniously proportioned than found in Rubens canvases. The pupil appears to exaggerate the expressions of his figures more, in keeping with the Baroque prevalence for extreme emotion, and his works often reveal acts of fierce fanaticism, sudden violence and feverish ecstasy of saints. From 1620, due to van Dyck’s precocious development, it is probably more accurate to call him a collaborator of Rubens, rather than his pupil.

Completed in c. 1618, the early masterpiece Christ Crowned with Thorns is largely inspired by a 1602 painting of the same subject by Rubens dated to 1602, which was commissioned for the church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme in Rome. The source for the scene is taken from John 19:2-3: And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns and put it on his head.... And said, Hail King of the Jews! Van Dyck’s treatment of the episode is less tense and more intimate than Rubens’ composition. The figures are more equally proportioned and depicted with greater simplicity. The five figures surround Christ in an enclosing semi circle, suggesting a sense of advancing danger. Unlike Rubens’ use of a detailed background, with stairs spiralling up into a much greater depth, van Dyck has opted for only a small window as a separate background to the principal action of the foreground. Our attention is more focused to Christ’s sufferings.  We can glimpse two nonchalant spectators through the window, and their intrusion to the scene adds to our sympathy for the victim.

Even the finely depicted dog to the lower left leans in, as though taunting the surrounded prisoner.  An armoured man, who places the crown of thorns on Christ’s head, is an extraordinary display of youthful dexterity for the artist. The figure is likely borrowed from Albrecht Dürer’s engraving The Knight, Death, and the Devil, produced over a hundred years before. The light glints off the metal in a display of great naturalism. The other faces surrounding Christ can be identified from several oil studies made by the artist during his tutelage and which would appear again in later paintings.

Christ’s suffering is highlighted by his shame for his tormentors and the inhumanity of their actions, as he looks down to the right in dejection. Produced when the artist was aged only twenty, the painting is noted for its debt to Rubens’s sombre palette and characteristic use of chiaroscuro, while revealing an increased interest in the realistic portrayal of musculature. The influence of Titian and the Venetian school has been identified in the handling of Jesus’ face.

The painting was a gift from van Dyck to Rubens and during the 1640’s it was purchased for 1,000 florins from Rubens’s estate by Philip IV of Spain, who installed the canvas with two other van Dyck paintings, The Lamentation (now also in the Prado) and a Saint Sebastian (now lost) in the Chapter Room of the Prior at El Escorial. It was in this room that Diego Velázquez arranged some of the most important works of the king’s legendary collection. The three van Dycks shared walls with paintings by Titian, Tintoretto, and Rubens. Christ Crowned with Thorns remained in the Escorial until 1839, when it entered the Prado Museum.

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Hendrick van Balen by Anthony van Dyck, c. 1627-1632 – van Balen was van Dyck’s first tutor.

‘The Mystical Marriage of Saint Catharine’ by Hendrick van Balen – one of his celebrated paintings

Self portrait of Rubens, 1623, Royal Collection

‘The Mocking of Christ’ by Peter Paul Rubens, Grasse Cathedral — this image was the model for van Dyck’s painting.

‘Knight, Death and the Devil’ by Albrecht Dürer, 1513 — the figure of the knight was a source of inspiration to van Dyck’s ‘Christ Crowned with Thorns’.

The Betrayal of Christ

In 1620, at the instigation of George Villiers, Marquess of Buckingham, van Dyck went to England, where he would return in later years to produce some of his greatest paintings. In his first visit to London he worked for King James I, receiving £100. It was during his time in England that he first saw the work of Titian in the collection of the Earl of Arundel. At once van Dyck was entranced by the Venetian master’s use of colour and subtle modelling of form, which would later prove transformational, offering a new stylistic language that would enrich the compositional lessons that he had learned from Rubens.

Unwilling to remain at the court of King James I, van Dyck returned to Antwerp in October 1621, before setting out for Italy on an artistic pilgrimage. Rubens’ recommendations would pave the way for the aspiring artist, opening many doors that would otherwise have been closed. His first destination was Genoa, where he was immediately patronised by the same group of aristocratic families for whom Rubens had been active fourteen years before. He made the northern Italian city his headquarters, though he also visited Rome, Venice, Padua, Mantua, Milan and Turin. A sketchbook now held in the British Museum reveals his attraction to the works of the Venetian artists, especially Titian. Van Dyck made many rapid sketches of his compositions, occasionally adding notes about colour and spontaneous words of praise. The few figural compositions of van Dyck’s years in Italy signal a trend towards colouristic and expressive refinement, in keeping with the Venetian school.

Dating to his time in Italy, The Betrayal of Christ exists in three versions, one of which is held today in The Minneapolis Institute of Arts. The episode of Christ’s betrayal by Judas Iscariot is narrated in each of the four Gospels and van Dyck combines all of the accounts into in a single unique composition. He also includes the episode of Saint Peter cutting off the ear of the high priest’s servant, Malchus, which Jesus then restores. The version of the canvas in the City of Bristol Museum lacks this dramatic episode.

Immediately, we can detect the lessons taught by Rubens and his penchant for dramatic and tempestuous action. The dramatic staging is, of course, intensified by the inclusion of the Malchus episode in the lower left corner, adding an element of explosive action. In spite of the portrait dimensions of the painting, the image exerts a sense of dynamic movement, sweeping from left to right. The crowding of frantic figures culminates with Judas’ orange cloak, appearing to gather like a mighty wave, leading the viewer to the focal point of the composition: Christ, the only motionless figure of the drama. In contrast to the chaos surrounding him, Christ beholds the scene with a sombre and calm expression.  His face appears in open light, encouraging us to sympathise with his plight, while conversely Judas is portrayed in profile, obscured in shadow, confirming his treachery.

If the structural devices are indebted to Rubens, then the experimental use of colour must be derived from the Venetian school. The commotion of the figures is reinforced by van Dyck’s treatment of colour, employing a wide palette. Notable examples would include the impasto technique of portraying Malchus’ eyes as bright white, the intense handling of light in the torch, the cooling blue of Saint Peter’s robe, the vivid crimson of Christ’s cloak. All of these features are set against the dark and neutral landscape in the background.  Meanwhile, the torchlight flickers over the contorted group of figures, projecting the action with heavy shadows behind. A new approach by van Dyck is the incredibly loose handling of paint, almost impressionistic at times, imbuing the scene with a spontaneous impact.

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Detail

Portrait of George Villiers, first Duke of Buckingham by Peter Paul Rubens,

1625 — an early supporter of van Dyck, the Duke was a popular English courtier and a patron of the arts. He was a favourite and possibly also a lover of King James I of England.

The version of the painting held in the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery — this version does not include the Malchus episode, giving the canvas a less dramatic element.

Portrait of Susanna Fourment and her Daughter Clara

Altogether, van Dyck remained in Italy for six years, studying the Italian masters and commencing his career as a successful portraitist. He was already presenting himself as a figure of consequence, irritating the bohemian Northern artist’s colony in Rome, according to Giovan Pietro Bellori, who complained how the young Flemish man acted with the the pomp of Zeuxis ... his behaviour was that of a nobleman rather than an ordinary person, and he shone in rich garments; since he was accustomed in the circle of Rubens to noblemen, and being naturally of elevated mind, and anxious to make himself distinguished, he therefore wore — as well as silks — a hat with feathers and brooches, gold chains across his chest, and was accompanied by servants.

Portraiture was to become his dominant form of art. With the exception of the earlier Holbein, van Dyck and his contemporary Diego Velázquez were the first prominent painters to work mainly as court portraitists, revolutionising the genre. In time van Dyck would emerge as the leading influence on English portrait-painting and this would continue until the next 150 years. His portrait style changed considerably between the different countries he worked in, culminating in the relaxed elegance of his last English period. The Belgian patricians and their wives that he painted during his early years were generally portrayed in bust or knee-length, while their hands hold gloves or objects fitting their distinction, while at other times the hands fall idly over the back or armrest of a chair. His earliest portraits feature neutral backgrounds, yet under Rubens’ guidance he introduced props such as columns to enrich the setting with a classical elegance. With consummate skill he rendered details of costume and décor with the quality of photographic realism. He grew a great reputation for capturing incredible likenesses and a politic way of representing his sitters as calm and dignified. More often than not, their expressions are guarded rather than warm.

In the early Portrait of Susanna Fourment and her Daughter Clara (1621), van Dyck aptly conveys the full extent of his artistic abilities, in spite of his mere twenty-one years of age. It