The reason for the decline of seventeenth-century German art is considered to be the thirty years of war and the resulting insecurity. But it is not understood why the art of its neighboring country Switzerland also declined at a time when it was free and prosperous from the conditions caused by war.
At that time, there were some painters in Germany and Austria like Rottenhammer (1564-1623) and the Dutch Abraham Minion (1640-1679) who were blindly imitating Italian art, but apart from Adam Elsheimer (1578-1610), no one did any particularly praiseworthy work. Did.
Elsheimer was born in Frankfurt and went to Rome in 1601, where he died. While going to Rome, he may have also stayed in Venice, which is proved by his painting ‘Baptism of Jesus’ (National Gallery, London) because the color scheme and lighting scheme of that painting is similar to the Venetian style.
In Rome he was attracted to the art of classical artists like Caravadgio and Caracci and there he was introduced to the Flemish artist Rubens. Elsheimer made miniature paintings on copper sheet. There is a philosophy of precision in his notation system but it is not rigid.
The subjects of his paintings are taken from the Bible and mythology and are painted on the background of natural scenes, examples of which are ‘The Angel Emerging from the Forest’ (Berlin), ‘Moses and Jethro’ (Kassel), ‘The Good Samaritan (Leipzig).
Seeing the importance given to nature scenes in Elsheimer’s paintings, he can be considered as a painter of historical nature scenes preceding Poussin and Claude Lorrain. english painter
The best painters of sixteenth and seventeenth century England were Holbein and Van Dyck, but both of them were foreigners. Among the English painters, there were imitators of Holbein and Van Dyck, but their paintings are of only documentary importance and do not show any special talent.
Nevertheless, ‘Endymion Porter’ by painter William Dobson (1610-1646) is an exceptional work which is counted among the best works of that period. Sir Peter Lely (1618-1680) is considered an English painter, although he was born in Holland and lived there till the age of 23.
Like Dobson, he worked for Van Dyck and took his place after Van Dyck’s death. Lely painted portraits of many distinguished gentlemen and ladies of the court of King Charles II. These individual portraits of ‘Lady Bellasis’ and ‘Comtesse de Gramont’ (Hampton Court) are representative works of his courtly style.
Lely painted portraits of people with the aim of pleasing his patrons and spectators and he was successful in achieving that aim, but Van Dyck’s superiority in his art and dominance over the method of drawing is not the same.
