| Gaspar de Crayer attained court support and enjoyed considerable success in his lifetime. Often called one of the best imitators of Rubens, de Crayer did not emulate that painter's powerful compositions or his highly charged energetic mood. Instead, de Crayer worked in a calmer, more restrained vein. No doubt, his vast oeuvre is less even in quality than that of Rubens because of diversely talented studio assistants helping to complete de Crayer's many commissions. Baptized in Brussels in 1584, de Crayer was de a pupil of the mannerist painter Michel de Coxie. De Crayer joined the Brussels Guild as a master in 1607. Younger than Rubens, de Crayer outlived him by nearly three decades, enjoying an active career in Brussels for fifty seven years. From 1614 to 1616 he was dean of the Brussels Painters Guild. Archduke Albert was one of his early patrons, for whom Gaspar purchased pictures, among other duties. Rubens's paintings from around 1611 to 1615 were de Crayer's models up to about 1631. Yet even those earlier pictures by de Crayer have their own distinctive personality. Their mood is starker, their manner more precise, their imagery less splendid. Among his finest efforts from these years are The Prop het Elias in the Desert in the Antwerp, Royal Museum .The Judgement of Solomon doc. 1620, Ghent, Museum voor Schone Kunsten, and The Annunciation Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum. After Albert's death in 1621, the Infanta Isabella appointed him Archer de la Garde Noble. From about 1631 to 1648 de Crayer*s style became more dramatic and the emotions more violent and palpable, as exemplified by The Lamentation Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, which may be the result of the impact of Spanish painters. Among his pictures commissioned by Afflighem Abby for the Archbishop of Mechclen was a painting reportedly admired by Rubens. Van Dyck, who visiied Gaspar in 1634, painted his portrait. The following year, Gaspar supplied some of the decorations for the pageant entry into Ghent of the Cardinal Infante Ferdinand. and then he become his court painter. After Rubens's death in 1640, de Crayer was in increased demand, receiving the appointment as painter to King Philip IV in 1641. The Cardinal Infante arranged for de Crayer to undertake the completion of Rubens's unfinished canvases for the Torre de la Parada and the Buen Retiro. By then, his imagery changed yet again, adopting the restrained and rigid piety which Spanish religious sentiment preferred. A notable example of the period is The Madonna Offering the Rosary to St. Dominic Brussels, Mus6e Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique. Moving back and forth between expression and restraint, de Crayer continued to produce pictures of great emotional intensity such as The Four Martyrs (dated 1642, Lille, Mus6e des Beaux-Arts), which contrasts in its power to the calmer expression found in his later Ascension of St. Catherine (Brussels, Church of St. Catherine). In 1664 de Crayer left Brussels and settled in Ghent with Jan van Cleef, his pupil. Thereafter, Venetian painting eclipsed the impact of Rubens and van Dyck in de Crayer's work. Three pictures at the Church of St. Michael in Ghent St. Barbara, the Circumcision, and The Adoration of the Magi demonstrate this late shift in de Crayer's orientation. De Crayer's histories, religious works, and mythologies are, however, still largely entangled in the oeuvre of Rubens and van Dyck, so that definitive conclusions about his contributions in those areas are, as yet, difficult to establish. Scholars are on more secure ground when evaluating de Crayer as a portrait artist. His portrait of Cardinal Infante Ferdinand Madrid, Prado is universally accepted as a masterpiece of its kind, having affinities with Rubens and van Dyck but clearly a solid, accomplished example of official portraiture. The numerous extant copies of the portrait testify to its importance in de Crayer's time. Moreover, a letter from the cardinal, dated June 30th 1638, praises the picture. |
