SIMONE MARTINI (1283-1344). Madonna.
Painted in the 1330′s.
The Department of the History of West-European Art begins with the exhibition devoted to the Italian School, which is housed in 32 rooms (1st floor, rooms 207 — 233) and embraces a period from the 13th to the 18th century. Here, displayed side by side, according to the principle assumed by the Hermitage, are paintings of which a great many are of outstanding importance, sculptures, engravings, objects of applied art, such as textiles, furniture, earthenware, glass, enamels, etc. Continue Reading »
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THE ITALIAN SCHOOL ART. PART I
THE ITALIAN SCHOOL ART. PART II
RAPHAEL (1483 -1520). Madonna and Child.
(The “Madonna Conestabile”).
Painled about 1500.
Raphaelis represented by two early works of his. Hermitage, 1st floor, room 229. One is the “Madonna Conestabile” painted when the artist was not older than twenty, a tiny tondo, fully representative of the sense of delicacy and purity so typical of the works of the youthful Raphael. The carved and gilt frame originally formed part of the panel on which the picture was painted and which was removed when in the 19th century the work was transferred from panel to canvas. Continue Reading »
THE NETHERLANDISH SCHOOL ART
ROGIEK VAN DER WEYDEN (about 1400-1464). St. Luke
painting the Madonna. Painted about 1435—1440.
The Netherlandish section of the Museum is not large (Hermitage, 1st floor, rooms 260 — 262, 258) but contains a number of noteworthy paintings Among these will be found: two panels by Mattre de Flemalle “Madonna and Child” and “The Trinity” which were two wings of an altarpiece, and of which the first is most characteristic of the artist’s tendency towards realistic rendering of the subject while he places the Madonna Continue Reading »
THE FLEMISH SCHOOL ART
PETER PAUL RUBENS (1577 1640). The Carters. Painted about 1620.
The Hermitage collection is particularly rich in Flemish works, having 42 canvases by Rubens, 26 – by Van Dyck, 14 – by Snyders, 37 – by David Teniers the Younger, 10 — byJ Jасоb Jordaens, as well as paintings by Adriaen Brouwer, Pauland Cornelisde Vos, Lucasvan Valkenborch, Joosde Momper, “Velvet-Brueghel”, Sebastian Vrancx, Theodor Rombouts, Lucas van Uden and others. (1st floor, rooms 248 -245). The art of Rubens (Hermitage, room 247) Continue Reading »
THE DUTCH SCHOOL ART. PART I
Hermitage_FRANS_HALSFRANS HALS (about 1580 -1666). Portrait of a Young Man with
a Glove in his Hand. Painted about 1650
Realistic art of Holland has always been popular in Russia. Already the earliest acquisitions made for the Hermitage in the 18th century included Dutch pictures. The purchase of Count Braid’s collection in 1769 gave the Museum the “Portrait of an Old Woman” and the “Portrait of a Scientist” by Rembrandt, a number of paintings by Terborch, Mieris, Isaak and Adriaen van Ostade, and Wouwerman. A series of Dutch paintings including four canvases by Rembrandt came to the Hermitage with the collections of Crozat and Walpole acquired in 1772 and 1779. Continue Reading »
THE DUTCH SCHOOL ART. PART II (REMBRANDT)
REMBRANDT HARMENSZ VAN RUN (1606
Signed and dated in 1634.
Among the chief glories of the Museum is the Rembrandt collection. Hermitage, room 254 numbering 25 paintings and almost all of his etchings, most of them being the first imprints. The collection embraces all the phases of Rembrandt’s artistic career, from the early works of his to those dated in the year of his death. Portraits, mythological and biblical subjects are represented in the collection with equal completeness. It is a series of masterpieces, probably unrivalled in any other picturegallery of the world. There are portraits of the painter’s early period. Continue Reading »
THE GERMAN SCHOOL ART
LUCAS CRANACH THE ELDER (1472 1553).
Madonna and Child under an Apple Tree.
The German section of the Hermitage Museum is not so rich in masterpieces as the Dutch or the Flemish ones. However the collection takes 15 rooms (Hermitage, 1st floor, rooms 263 — 268; 2nd floor, rooms 314 — 323) and is recognized as the largest in the Russia. Apart from a number of paintings, sculptures, prints and drawings, it contains many specimens of applied art such as stained glass, furniture, wood- and ivory carvings, silversmiths’ works etc. Continue Reading »
THE BRITISH SCHOOL ART
THOMAS GAINS BO ROUGH (1727 1788). Portrait of the Duchess
of Beaufort (?). Painted in the 1770′s.
The Hermitage Museum is one of the very few on the Continent which contains a special section for English pictures. Hermitage, 1st floor, rooms 298—302. Portraiture, landscape painting, and satiric art, i. e. the branches of art in which England excelled, are represented by a number of first class paintings and prints by the most outstanding artists of the British School mainly of the 18th century. Some seventeenth- and nineteenth-century works are on show too. There are also some notable examples among the specimens of applied art which include a fine group of silver and Wedgwood wares. Continue Reading »
THE FRENCH SCHOOL ART. PART I
The Hermitage is notably rich in French works of art, the collection being housed in forty-one rooms (Hermitage, 1st floor, rooms 273 — 297; 2nd floor, rooms 333 — 350) and covering the period from the 15th to the 20th century.
It possesses first class paintings of the greatest French artists. Especially notable are two groups of the material: one covering the 17th and 18th centuries, the other — the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries. Continue Reading »