Baroque Art- Peter Paul Rubens

Ryan Robinson

Integrated Art 6^th

16 February 2011

Baroque Artist Paper

Peter Paul Rubens

                Peter Paul Rubens was a painter from the Netherlands during the 1600’s. People from the Netherlands are called Flemish. So we call Peter Paul Rubens a Flemish painter. He was born in 1577 in a region of Germany called Westphalia. The next year, his family moved to a different German city called Cologne. There, Peter’s father died when Peter was only twelve. Then, he moved with his mother to Antwerp, in Belgium. His early childhood was heavily influenced by the Catholic church, which probably inspired the subject matter of his paintings. During his teenage years, however, he became educated in Humanist and Classical principles. At 14 years old, he apprenticed under a man named Tobias Verhaeght. He spent a lot of time copying other famous paintings by artists such as Adam van Noort and Otto van Veen until he finished his education in 1598. He painted for eight years in Italy, then moved back to Antwerp when he heard that his mother was getting sick. There he set up a successful studio. Anthony Van Dyck was one of his pupils. Peter was also a diplomat, so he was able to travel extensively throughout Europe during his career. In the 1620’s he painted a large piece for the queen mother of France and spent a lot of time traveling between Spain and England. He spent the last decade of his life painting in Antwerp, where he died of gout in 1640.

                Rubens received commissions mostly for religious subjects as part of the Catholic counter-reformation. He painted mostly portraits, but did a few landscapes later on in life. His work is very realistic and detailed. He is exemplary of the extravagant Baroque style. According to Wikipedia, he painted so many large women that the term Rubenesque now is used to describe large women. He had a large influence on the Flemish painting style in the 1600’s.  Many Flemish painters trained in his studio.

                Rubens is considered to be part of the Baroque period, because the time period in which he was active is referred to as Baroque. Baroque art is said to be more dramatic than renaissance art. Baroque art is detailed and grand. Ruben’s art is described well by these words.

                Rubens was important in the development of Baroque painting in the Netherlands. Without his work, art might never have gotten past the Renaissance. I cannot point to any modern examples where the correlation between Ruben’s art and the modern piece is apparent, but I believe that the Baroque period was a step that art had to take. It was reflective of the cultural climate and the social norms of the day.

                I appreciate the level of detail Rubens put into his paintings, but I don’t like his work very much at all. It’s too busy for me. I think baroque art is too uptight and stiff. His portraits are so haunting. But, I do realize that it was a necessary step in the development of Western Culture. I’m just glad that we’ve moved past it.