Frans van Mieris the Elder
(April 16, 1635 - March 12, 1681) |
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Portraiture, Romantic Narratives, Genre Subjects Art Work
| Name: |
Frans van Mieris the Elder |
| Gender: |
Male |
| Place of Birth: |
Leiden |
| Nationality: |
Dutch |
| Birth: |
April 16, 1635 |
| Death: |
March 12, 1681 |
| Website: |
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| Past Auctions: |
Click Here |
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Quick Facts
| Known For: |
Portraiture, Romantic Narratives, Genre Subjects |
| Medium: |
Oil |
| Method: |
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| Style: |
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| Fine Art Profession(s): |
Painting
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Biography
| Together with his teacher Gerrit Dou, Frans van Mieris was the acknowledged leader of Leiden's Fineschilders (fine painters) whose small, meticulously executed pictures influenced European painting well into the mid-nineteenth century. Born the son of a goldsmith, Frans first trained in that medium with his cousin. Houbraken reports that Frans transferred briefly to the glass painter Abraham van Toorenvliet before moving on to Gerrit Dou, who called van Mieris the prince of his pupils. Van Mieris undertook further study with the portrait and history painter Abraham van den Tempel and then completed his training with Dou around 1657. In that year he married Cunera van der Cock, and in 1658 he was admitted to the Leiden St. Luke's Guild. After serving as hoofdman (leader) in 1663 and 1664, he was elected dean in 1665. From the start, van Mieris was a success. Ranked among Leiden's most prominent citizens, he was sufficiently admired abroad to gain commissions from Duke Cosimo III de' Medici and an invitation from Archduke Leopold Willem to become court painter in Vienna, an offer that van Mieris declined. In 1663 the French collector Balthazar de Moncony sought out van Mieris's pictures during his visit to Holland. During van Mieris's lifetime, his pictures sold well and for high prices, yet he suffered from chronic indebtedness. He must have been an alcoholic as well, since contemporary references to his habitual drunkenness appear too often to be discounted. Houbraken recounts that van Mieris fell into a sewer during one escapade. Severely injured, he was fished out by a shoemaker and his wife, whom van Mieris rewarded with a painting. It has been assumed that his accident, his drinking, or both contributed to van Mieris's premature death at age fortysix. After his death in 1681 he was buried in a prestigious spot in the Pieterskerk. Despite the absence of dated works before 1657, it is thought that Frans began painting around 1650 in a manner close to Dou. His Peasant's Meal (signed, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi) adopts Dou's subject matter, lighting, and pictorial devices, including his often-used arched window, through which the scene is viewed. In this and other pictures done before 1657, van Mieris continued Dou's rustic subject matter while perfecting his technique. To some minds he excelled Dou in his ability to render invisible brushstrokes and minute details. By 1657, the year inscribed on his Doctor's Visit (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum), van Mieris had found the theme (courtships and quasi-erotic subjects) and had created the aristocratic characters that would occupy him for the rest of his life. Interested in clear light (in contrast to Dou's darkened rooms) and searching for vivid colors, van Mieris took the unusual step (in The Doctors Visit) of painting on gilded copper to provide extra luminosity. The following year saw van Mieris assume his place as a rising star with a series of important masterpieces including Duet (signed and dated, Schwerin, Staatliches Museum), which has a strong affinity to contemporary paintings by Ter Borch* in subject matter as well as in figure types. The picture also shows van Mieris's adoption of the light-washed wall that had developed among painters in Delft (notably Carel Fabritius*). Jan Steen,* who lived in the nearby village of Warmond from 1656 to 1660, likely befriended van Mieris and clearly responded to his work. One of van Mieris's most famous pictures, his Inn Scene (The Hague, Mauritshuis), was also painted in 1658. Its explicit sexual references, its direct and happy interchange between the flirting soldier and the maiden make this one of the most frank and humorous licentious subjects of its time. By the 1660s van Mieris had simplified his imagery and reduced the numbers of details to essentials, thereby condensing and enriching his narrative. His Teasing the Pet (dated 1660) and The Oyster Meat (dated 1661; both in The Hague, Mauritshuis) show him developing a more personal means to interpret his subjects-at once spontaneous, intimate, and humorous. He also began a lifelong interest in portrayals of individual women, such as A Woman Feeding a Parrot (dated ca. 1663, London, National Gallery). Van Mieris also was active as a portrait artist, producing some of the most celebrated likenesses of his age. His Man Holding a Roemer (dated 1664, Leipzig, Museum der bildenden Kunste) combines portraiture with narrative. It also readopts pictorial devices (the arched window) of Gerrit Dou, but uses them in new contexts. Perhaps his finest portrait of the decade is his likeness of Florentius Schuyl (dated 1666, The Hague, Mauritshuis). Always seeking new ways to portray old themes, he p one of his most original narratives, Cavalryman's Boot (Munich, Alte Pinakothek) in the same year, Using the device of still life, van Mieris allows a minor detail (the soldier's discarded boot) to dominate the scene and elucidate the action in the background. His best and most influential work dates from about 1657 to about 1666. Gracefully assimilating the most significant prevailing trends, van Mieris gave them interpretations that had a major influence on such diverse artists as Jacob Ochtervelt,* Steen,* Vermeer,* Eglon van der Neer, and Adriaen van der Werff.* By the late 1660s and the 1670s, van Mieris's style had grown slicker, harder, and more self-conscious, adopting the so-called French manner that grew fashionable during the second half of the century. His attention to fabrics and other external embellishments was even more punctilious, but his treatment of the human form (particularly women) became so summary that their limbs become doll-like and their faces mere types. Although his men still retained some of their individuality and personality, the narratives lost subtlety. His Music Lesson (dated 1672, Dresden, Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister) is a good case in point. His courtship scenes, such as The Old Lover (Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi), incorporated repellent themes. Cast in lurid light, the narrative in such pictures is blatant, the actors mere caricatures. His portrayals of individual women grew more prurient, as in his Sleeping Courtesan (Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi). Now turning to Jan Steen (who had earlier borrowed from him), van Mieris deprived his aristocratic characters of some of their dignity by giving them expressions like those of Steen's characters, as in A Family Concert (dated 1675). Still capable of exquisite passages and occasional brilliance, as his Portrait of a Lady (dated 1672, Lugano, Thyussen-Bornemisza Collection), van Mieris's later pictures, particularly the nocturnes, were important to such later painters as Godfried Schalken and van Mieris's son, Willem. |
Samples of Work
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