POST-RENAISSANCE PAINTING, painting as practised in Europe after the middle of the 15th century.
Seventeenth Century.— The great color school of monumental and decorative painting which was the glory of Venice was one of the last to disappear (see RENAISSANCE PAINTING). Paris Bordone (q.v.), a pupil of Titian, did little to maintain it, but a much more vigorous and original talent was that of Jacopo Robusti (1518-94), called Il Tintoretto from his father's occupation as a dyer, and also sur named Il Furioso from his manner of working. The number of his paintings was very great, and their merit very unequal. From the school of Verona, which had been for some time rising in importance, and even in the 15th century had produced some painters of note, came another illustrious artist to add to the fame of Venice, Paolo Cagliari (q.v.), called Paolo Veronese (1532-88), one of the most brilliant of all dec orative painters. The school of Bologna was founded by Lodovico Carracci, aided by his two cousins, Agostino and Annibale, in 1589, at the period of the rise of the Electric school, protesting against the Mannerists, and of the naturalisti, rejecting all tradition and professing to study nature directly. In Naples appeared an Hispano-Neapolitan school of which the chief was Jusepe Ribera, called Lo Spagnoletto. Spain produced a number of native painters in the 15th and at the beginning of the 16th cen tury; and the influence of Italian art became more predominant toward the middle and at the close of the latter. But the authority of the Inquisition was strongly restrictive. Francisco de Zurbaran (q.v.) (1598-1662?) was pre eminently a painter of monks. The three great names in Spanish art are Alonzo Cano (q.v.) (1601-67), a pupil of Francisco Pacheco, the master and also the father-in-law of Velasquez ; Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velasquez (q.v.) (1599-1660) ; and Bartolome Esteban Murillo (q.v.) (1618-82). The name of Velasquez has been raised by modern criticism to the summit of the art of painting. In Germany, no painter attained the eminence of Diirer and holbein for more than two centuries; after them, a baleful imitation of the mannerisms of the Italians suppressed any assertion of national individual ity, and the so-called inspiration from Michel angelo affected even foreign painters visiting in Germany,— as the Hollanders Goltzius, Hubert and Hendrick. The works of Adam Elzheimer (1578-1620), though he visited Italy and died in Rome, displayed a curious and original talent, both in figures and landscape, unusual at this period.
But it was to the Netherlands that the chief seat of the art of painting was transferred in the 17th century, made illustrious by the great development of all resources of the art; the influence of Peter Paul Rubens (q.v.) (1577 1640) not only revolutionized the schools of painting of his era but is still felt in those of our day. One of the most celebrated of his pupils was Anton Vandyck (q.v.) (1599-1641), whose portraits constitute his chief title to emi nence; another was David Teniers the elder (q.v.) (1582-1649), instructor of his still more famous son of the same name. In the works of the latter, and of a number of the painters of Holland, Adrian Brauwer (q.v.), Adrian Van Ostade (q.v.), Jan Steen (q.v.), Gerard Terburg (q.v.), Gabriel Metzu (q.v.), Gerard Dow (q.v.), is carried to the highest point the genre painting of contemporary life, the exteriorite, which so strongly differentiates this Northern art from that of Italy. In the paint ing of landscapes, animals, marines and even still-life, this excellence of technique was also maintained, reaching its supreme development in the genius of Rembrandt (q.v.) (1607-69), the greatest master of light and darkness of any school of painters. Under Francois I, a number of Italian painters were induced to visit France, many of them being employed in the decorate ing of the palace of Fontainebleau, and their influence prevailed strongly for nearly two cen turies. The art of the 17th century was largely the official art of Louis XIV and of his court painter, Charles Lebrun (q.v.) ; one of the most important events was the establishment of the Academy of Painting and Sculpture at Paris in 1648. A much more graceful and idyllic art was introduced by Nicholas Poussin (q.v.) ; and the classic landscape by Claude Gelee, called Claude Lorrain (q.v.). In England, also, for eign artists, in this case French, Flemish and even Greek, were largely employed before the reign of Henry VII (1485-1509), in painting miniatures on glass, enamels, etc. The example of Henry VIII in encouraging the great Holbein was followed by his successors,— Mary Tudor employed Antonio de More (An tonio Moro) ; Elizabeth, Lucas de Heere and Frederico Zuccari; Charles I, Rubens and Van Dyck; Charles II, Peter Lely, of Soest in West phalia, and Godfrey Kneller of Liibecic. The only English names that assume any importance in these annals are those of Isaac Oliver, his son Peter, Samuel Cooper, a pupil of Van Dyck, Robert Streator, Henry Anderton and Peter Monamy.