191 x 2261 mm Musees Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels This sketch for the homonymous painting in the Brussels museum is fascinating in more than one respect. First of all because it allows us, so to speak, to look over the artist's shoulder during the creation process. A comparison between the drawn object and the painted composition shows us how Jordaens strongly increased the concentration of the figures in the painting. By omitting motifs from the original sketch, such as a figure looking upwards to the right of the woman with a mantle and a goat or ass on the right edge, the satyrs to the right are more closely connected with the nymphs in the middle. The painter makes the link between both groups even tighter by having the nymph's hand reach upward at the back and by reversing the position and the direction of the gaze of the crouching nude in the front. Finally the central group of women is made tighter by the removal of a flute-playing satyr in the background and of one of the children in the foreground. In a second draft sketch, conserved in the Copenhagen museum, most of the changes have already been carried out, demonstrating how the artist achieved his balanced final result not immediately but in various phases. We note that Jordaens already planned the cornucopia in his sketches, although in the final painting it was executed by Frans Snyders. The lowering of the skyline in the painting is to be attributed to a later shortening of the canvas by a foreign hand. Secondly this sketch illustrates Jordaens' preference for pen and paper as against chalk in his initial designs, unlike Rubens, who frequently opted for oil paint sketches. This concords with Jordaens' training as a "water painting painter". This technique had been developed in earlier generations, in particular in Mechelen, where it was used to produce a cheaper variant of tapestry, which was very expensive. On the one hand a drawn sketch was less good than an oil paint sketch in suggesting both the placing of the shapes and their colouring and modelling. On the other hand, it allowed an artist with a good command of ink and water to achieve a lively linear handling, a subtle chiaroscuro effect and a sense of nuance. Jordaens has taken full advantage of the possibilities of this balanced drawing technique in this sketch. , Artist: JORDAENS, Jacob , Allegory of Fertility , 1651-1700 , Flemish , graphics , mythological
Painting ID:: 64186
Jacob Jordaens Flemish Baroque Era Painter, 1593-1678
Jacob Jordeans was born on May 19, 1593, the first of eleven children, to the wealthy linen merchant Jacob Jordaens Sr. and Barbara van Wolschaten in Antwerp. Little is known about Jordaens's early education. It can be assumed that he received the advantages of the education usually provided for children of his social class. This assumption is supported by his clear handwriting, his competence in French and in his knowledge of mythology. Jordaens familiarity with biblical subjects is evident in his many religious paintings, and his personal interaction with the Bible was strengthened by his later conversion from Catholicism to Protestantism. Like Rubens, he studied under Adam van Noort, who was his only teacher. During this time Jordaens lived in Van Noort's house and became very close to the rest of the family. After eight years of training with Van Noort, he enrolled in the Guild of St. Luke as a "waterscilder", or watercolor artist. This medium was often used for preparing tapestry cartoons in the seventeenth century. although examples of his earliest watercolor works are no longer extant. In the same year as his entry into the guild, 1616, he married his teacher's eldest daughter, Anna Catharina van Noort, with whom he had three children. In 1618, Jordaens bought a house in Hoogstraat (the area in Antwerp that he grew up in). He would then later buy the adjoining house to expand his household and workspace in 1639, mimicking Rubens's house built two decades earlier. He lived and worked here until his death in 1678.
Jordaens never made the traditional trip to Italy to study classical and Renaissance art. Despite this, he made many efforts to study prints or works of Italian masters available in northern Europe. For example, Jordaens is known to have studied Titian, Veronese, Caravaggio, and Bassano, either through prints, copies or originals (such as Caravaggio's Madonna of the Rosary). His work, however, betrays local traditions, especially the genre traditions of Pieter Bruegel the Elder, in honestly depicting Flemish life with authenticity and showing common people in the act of celebratory expressions of life. His commissions frequently came from wealthy local Flemish patrons and clergy, although later in his career he worked for courts and governments across Europe. Besides a large output of monumental oil paintings he was a prolific tapestry designer, a career that reflects his early training as a "watercolor" painter.
Jordaens' importance can also be seen by his number of pupils; the Guild of St. Luke records fifteen official pupils from 1621 to 1667, but six others were recorded as pupils in court documents and not the Guild records, so it is probable that he had more students than officially recorded. Among them were his cousin and his son Jacob. Like Rubens and other artists at that time, Jordaens' studio relied on his assistants and pupils in the production of his paintings. Not many of these pupils went on to fame themselves,however a position in Jordaens's studio was highly desirable for young artists from across Europe. Allegory of Fertility 17th century
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions 119 x 182 cm (46.9 x 71.7 in)
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