1. Of Popes, Peasants, Monarchs, and Merchants:
Baroque Art
17th and Early 18th Centuries in the West

2. Europe in the 17th Century, after the treaty of Westphalia in 1648 ended the 30-Year War. Europe’s power, trade, and financial markets are now world wide.

3. Latin America, a great source of wealth for Europe, especially Spain, was the main destination of the millions of people enslaved and taken out of Africa between 1500 and The U.S. received about 523,000 enslaved immigrants. Cuba alone got more. Spanish America absorbed around 1.5 million and Brazil at least 3.5 million. Their descendants form about half of the population in the Caribbean and Brazil – the two historic centers of sugar production.

4. Bernini was influenced by Hellenistic sculpture
like this one, The Dying Gaul, c. 200 BC.
(Roman copy),
GIANLORENZO BERNINI (Italian, ), David, Marble, approx. 5’ 7” high. Galleria Borghese, Rome.

5. Diskobolos, 5th c. Roman copy of Greek original
Michelangelo,
Bound Slave, c. 1513
GIANLORENZO BERNINI (Italian, ), David, Marble, approx. 5’ 7” high. Galleria Borghese, Rome.

6. MICHELANGELO, David, 1501–1504. Marble, 13’ 5” high.
DONATELLO, David, 1420s-1450s, bronze, 5’ 2” high. First freestanding nude since antiquity
BERNINI (Italian, ), David, Marble, approx. 5’ 7” high. Galleria Borghese, Rome.

7. Detail: face of Teresa
BERNINI, Ecstasy of Saint Teresa, Cornaro Chapel, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome, Italy, 1645–1652. Marble, height of group 11’ 6”.

8. Cornaro family busts in niches on sides, praying devoutly and acting as witnesses to the holy drama. Teresa is experiencing a transfiguring coma, the so-called “Sleep of God,” described by mystics, in which a glimpse of Heaven’s glory is received. Mystics like Teresa would pray for days, often unfed, to achieve such visions.

9. Theatricality is a hallmark
of the Baroque.
CARAVAGGIO (Michelangelo Merisi, Italian, ), Conversion of Saint Paul, Cerasi Chapel, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome, Italy, ca Oil on canvas, approx. 7’ 6” x 5’ 9”. Use of perspective, low horizon line, and tenebrism brings the viewer into the experience.

10. What role does light play in this painting?
Detail from The Creation
of Adam, Michelangelo,
Sistine Chapel, c. 1511
What role does
light play in this
painting?
CARAVAGGIO, Calling of Saint Matthew, Contarelli Chapel, San Luigi dei Francesi, Rome, Italy, ca. 1597–1601. Oil on canvas, 11’ 1” x 11’ 5”.

11. “Caravaggista” theatricality, tenebrism and drama
Poor restoration has
Removed the furrows from
the women's foreheads
that indicated intense
concentration and effort.
ARTEMISIA GENTILESCHI (Italian, ), Judith Slaying Holofernes, ca. 1614–1620. Oil on canvas, 6’ 6 1/3” x 5’ 4”. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

12. Compare (left) Gentileschi’s Judith Slaying Holofernes ( ) and Caravaggio’s Judith Beheading Holofernes

13. PIETRO DA CORTONA (Italian, ), Triumph of the Barberini, ceiling fresco in the Gran Salone, Palazzo Barberini, Rome, Italy, 1633–1639.

14. Know term: genre
DIEGO VELÁZQUEZ (Spain, ), Water Carrier of Seville, ca (The artist was around 20 years old.), Oil on canvas, 3’ 5 1/2” x 2’ 7 1/2”. Wellington Museum, London. Shows influence of Caravaggio.

15. DIEGO VELÁZQUEZ, Las Meninas (The Maids of Honor), 1656
DIEGO VELÁZQUEZ, Las Meninas (The Maids of Honor), Oil on canvas, approx. 10’ 5” x 9’. Museo del Prado, Madrid.

16. Compare the representation and
role of light in Caravaggio and
Velazquez.
CARAVAGGIO, Calling of Saint Matthew, Contarelli Chapel, San Luigi dei Francesi, Rome, Italy, ca. 1597–1601. Oil on canvas, 11’ 1” x 11’ 5”.
DIEGO VELÁZQUEZ, Las Meninas (The Maids of Honor), Oil on canvas, approx. 10’ 5” x 9’. Museo del Prado, Madrid. Is this tenebrism?

17. Self-portrait of Diego Velázquez – a detail in Las Meninas
Self-portrait of Diego Velázquez – a detail in Las Meninas. He is wearing the cross of the Order of Santiago that he was awarded in According to legend, the king himself painted the cross.

18. Ostentation and
elaborate spectacle
PETER PAUL RUBENS (Flemish, ), Arrival of Marie de’ Medici at Marseilles, 1622–1625. Oil on canvas, approx. 5’ 1” x 3’ 9 1/2”. Louvre, Paris. One of 21 vast canvases for the queen’s new Luxembourg palace in Paris.

19. REMBRANDT VAN RIJN (Dutch, ), The Company of Captain Frans Banning Cocq (Night Watch), Oil on canvas (cropped from original size), 11’ 11” x 14’ 4”. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

20. How is light used for psychological purposes?
REMBRANDT VAN RIJN, Self-Portrait, ca. 1659–1660. Oil on canvas, approx. 3’ 8 3/4” x 3’ 1”. Kenwood House, London.

21. Rembrandt, Self Portrait, 1629 (23 years old)
What formal
means does
Rembrandt use
to focus our
attention on the
face?
Rembrandt, Self Portrait, 1629 (23 years old)

22. Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, 1640, National Gallery, London
Is this really by Rembrandt?
Read “Assessing Authenticity:
The Rembrandt Research
Project.”
Rembrandt, Self-Portrait, 1640, National Gallery, London

23. How is an etching
made and when was
the medium invented?
What possibilities did
it open up for the art
market?
REMBRANDT VAN RIJN, Christ with the Sick around Him, Receiving the Children (Hundred Guilder Print), ca Etching, approx. 11” x 1’ 3 1/4”. Pierpont Morgan Library, New York.

24. Vermeer’s paintings
are intimate in scale
JAN VERMEER (Dutch, ), Girl With a Pearl Earring, circa , oil on canvas, 17.5 x 15 inches. Mauritshuis, The Hague, Called “the Dutch Mona Lisa.” Vermeer’s famous blue is ultramarine blue made from crushed lapis lazuli.

25. JAN VERMEER, Woman Holding a Balance, c. 1664; Oil on canvas, 40
JAN VERMEER, Woman Holding a Balance, c. 1664; Oil on canvas, 40.3 x 35.6 cm; National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. Protestant piety and prosperity

26. JAN VERMEER, Young Woman with a Water Pitcher, c
JAN VERMEER, Young Woman with a Water Pitcher, c ; Oil on canvas, 18 X 16 in. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

27. JAN VERMEER, Allegory of the Art of Painting, 1670–1675
JAN VERMEER, Allegory of the Art of Painting, 1670–1675. Oil on canvas, 4’ 4” x 3’ 8”. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.

28. Vermeer’s possible use of the camera obscura
JAN VERMEER, Allegory of the Art of Painting, 1670–1675.
Vermeer’s possible use of the camera obscura
First representation of a
Camera obscura, 1544

29. Absolutism: “The Sun King”
Art in the service of
Absolutism: “The Sun King”
HYACINTHE RIGAUD (French, ) Louis XIV, Oil on canvas, approx. 9’ 2” x 6’ 3”. Louvre, Paris.

30. Aerial view of palace at Versailles, France, begun 1669, and a portion of the gardens and surrounding area.

31. Plan of the park, palace, and town of Versailles, France, (after a seventeenth-century engraving).

32. JULES HARDOUIN-MANSART and CHARLES LE BRUN, Galerie des Glaces (Hall of Mirrors), palace of Versailles, Versailles, France, ca

33. Making nature into art – Gardens of Versailles

34. NICOLAS POUSSIN (French, ) Et in Arcadia Ego (Even in Arcadia I am present), ca Oil on canvas, approx. 2’ 10” x 4’. Louvre, Paris. Classicism aims at “evenness and moderation in all things.” (Poussin)

35. NICOLAS POUSSIN, Burial of Phocion, 1648. Oil on canvas, approx
NICOLAS POUSSIN, Burial of Phocion, Oil on canvas, approx. 3’ 11” x 5’ 10”. Louvre, Paris. From Plutarch’s Life of Phocion (an Athenian general). A noble landscape for a noble theme – the “Grand manner”

36. LOUIS LE NAIN (French, ca. 1592-1635) , Family of Country People, ca
LOUIS LE NAIN (French, ca ) , Family of Country People, ca Oil on canvas, approx. 3’ 8” x 5’ 2”. Louvre, Paris. Genre scene painted during the 30 years war ( ) between the Hapsburg dynasty, Bourbon dynasty of France, and the Holy Roman Empire. The armies lived off the land and caused much suffering among the people.

37. JACQUES CALLOT (Duchy of Lorraine, ), Hanging Tree, from the Large Miseries of War series, Etching, 3 3/4” x 7 1/4”. Bibiliothèque Nationale, Paris.