06 works, Today, October 18th, is Apostle and Evangelist Luke's day, his story illustrated #289

Jacob Jordaens, (1593–1678)

The Four Evangelists, between 1620 and 1625

Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John

Oil on canvas

Height: 133 cm (52.3 in); Width: 118 cm (46.4 in)

Louvre Museum, Paris, France

Jacob Jordaens (19 May 1593 – 18 October 1678) was a Flemish painter, draughtsman and tapestry designer known for his history paintings, genre scenes and portraits. After Peter Paul Rubens and Anthony van Dyck, he was the leading Flemish Baroque painter of his day. Unlike those contemporaries he never travelled abroad to study Italian painting, and his career is marked by an indifference to their intellectual and courtly aspirations. In fact, except for a few short trips to locations in the Low Countries, he remained in Antwerp his entire life. As well as being a successful painter, he was a prominent designer of tapestries. Like Rubens, Jordaens painted altarpieces, mythological, and allegorical scenes, and after 1640—the year Rubens died—he was the most important painter in Antwerp for large-scale commissions and the status of his patrons increased in general. However, he is best known today for his numerous large genre scenes based on proverbs in the manner of his contemporary Jan Brueghel the Elder, depicting The King Drinks and As the Old Sing, So Pipe the Young. Jordaens' main artistic influences, besides Rubens and the Brueghel family, were northern Italian painters such as Jacopo Bassano, Paolo Veronese, and Caravaggio. More on Jacob Jordaens

The Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke, was a native of Syrian Antioch, a companion of the holy Apostle Paul, and a physician enlightened in the Greek medical arts. Hearing about Christ, Luke arrived in Palestine and fervently accepted the preaching of salvation from the Christ Himself. As one of the Seventy Apostles, Saint Luke was sent by the Christ with the others to preach the Kingdom of Heaven. After the Resurrection, the Jesus Christ appeared to Saints Luke and Cleopas on the road to Emmaus.

Charles de La Fosse (1636–1716)

St Paul Commanding St Luke to Accompany Him to Rome, c. 1692

Oil on canvas

H 81.5 x W 104 cm

The Bowes Museum, Durham, England

Charles de La Fosse (June 15, 1636 – December 13, 1716), French painter, was born in Paris. He was one of the most noted and least servile pupils of Le Brun, under whose direction he shared in the chief of the great decorative works undertaken in the reign of Louis XIV. Leaving France in 1662, he spent two years in Rome and three in Venice. The influence of his prolonged studies of Veronese is evident in his Finding of Moses (Louvre), and in his Rape of Proserpine (Louvre), which he presented to the Royal Academy as his diploma picture in 1673. He was at once named assistant professor, and in 1674 the full responsibilities of the office devolved on him, but his engagements did not prevent his accepting in 1689 the invitation of Lord Montagu to decorate

He visited London twice, remaining on the second occasion—together with Rousseau and Monnoyer more than two years. William III vainly strove to detain him in England by the proposal that he should decorate Hampton Court, for Le Brun was dead, and Mansart pressed La Fosse to return to Paris to take in hand the cupola of Les Invalides. During his latter years La Fosse executed many other important decorations in public buildings and private houses. The artis't works and conception played a key role in the French art history from shifting the classicism of the French style from the court of Louis XIV towards the lighter and more playful Rococo period's style. More on Charles de La Fosse

Luke accompanied Saint Paul on his second missionary journey, and from that time they were inseparable. When Paul’s coworkers had forsaken him, only Luke remained to assist him in his ministry. After the martyric death of the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, Saint Luke left Rome to preach in Achaia, Libya, Egypt and the Thebaid. He ended his life by suffering martyrdom in the city of Thebes.

Maarten van Heemskerck, (1498–1574)

St. Luke painting the Virgin, c. 1532

Oil on panel

168 x 235 cm

Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, the Netherlands

Maerten van Heemskerck or Marten Jacobsz Heemskerk van Veen (1 June 1498 – 1 October 1574). The artist is named after Heemskerk, the village of his birth, which lies a short distance to the north of Haarlem. Heemskerck first studied in Haarlem and then in Delft. Between 1527 and 1530 Heemskerck worked with Jan van Scorel during the period that Scorel resided in Haarlem and was ostensibly attracted by the new manner of painting that Scorel had brought back from Italy. Heemskerck himself remained in Haarlem until at least May of 1532, at which point he set off for Rome, arriving there by July 1532.

While in Rome Maerten van Heemskerck made accurate, conscientious sketches of antique ruins and statues; he was influenced by Raphael and contemporary artists such as Michelangelo and Salviati. It is also likely that on his way home, in late 1536 or early 1537, Heemskerck stopped in Mantua and viewed the work of Giulio Romano. By 1537 Heemskerck was back in Haarlem, where he was to remain virtually the rest of his life. Heemskerck belonged to the Haarlem Guild of Saint Luke; he was a minor official in 1551 and 1552 and deacon of the Guild in 1554. When the Spanish laid siege to the city of Haarlem in 1572, the artist was given permission to live in Amsterdam. Maerten van Heemskerck returned to Haarlem the following year and died at the age of seventy-six on 1 October 1574. More on Maerten van Heemskerck

Tradition credits Saint Luke with painting the first icons of the Mother of God. “Let the grace of Him Who was born of Me and My mercy be with these Icons,” said the Virgin after seeing the icons. Saint Luke also painted icons of the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul. Saint Luke’s Gospel was written in the years 62-63 at Rome, under the guidance of the Apostle Paul. In the preliminary verses, Saint Luke precisely sets forth the purpose of his work. He proposes to record, in chronological order, everything known by Christians about Jesus Christ and His teachings. By doing this, he provided a firmer historical basis for Christian teaching. He carefully investigated the facts, and made generous use of the oral tradition of the Church and of what the Virgin Mary Herself had told him.

Masolino (1426)

The Book of Acts: Making Jesus Known

Oil on canvas

I have no further description, at this time

Masaccio (December 21, 1401 – summer 1428), born Tommaso di Ser Giovanni di Simone, was a Florentine artist who is regarded as the first great Italian painter of the Quattrocento period of the Italian Renaissance. According to Vasari, Masaccio was the best painter of his generation because of his skill at imitating nature, recreating lifelike figures and movements as well as a convincing sense of three-dimensionality.

Despite his brief career, he had a profound influence on other artists and is considered to have started the Early Italian Renaissance in painting with his works in the mid- and late-1420s. He was one of the first to use linear perspective in his painting, employing techniques such as vanishing point in art for the first time. He moved away from the International Gothic style and elaborate ornamentation of artists like Gentile da Fabriano to a more naturalistic mode that employed perspective and chiaroscuro for greater realism.

Masaccio died at the age of twenty-six and little is known about the exact circumstances of his death. More on Masaccio

Saint Luke also wrote the Acts of the Apostles at Rome around 62-63 A.D. The Book of Acts, which is a continuation of the four Gospels, speaks about the works and the fruits of the Apostles after the Ascension of the Christ. 

Unknown artist

The Jerusalem Council

Icon

I have no further description, at this time

At the center of the narrative is the Council of the holy Apostles at Jerusalem in the year 51, a Church event of great significance, which resulted in the separation of Christianity from Judaism and its independent dissemination into the world. The theological focus of the Book of Acts is the coming of the Holy Spirit, Who will guide the Church “into all truth” until the Second Coming of Christ. 

James Tissot, (1836–1902)

Saint Luc, c. between 1886 and 1894

Gouache over graphite on gray wove paper

Height: 13.8 cm (5.4 in); Width: 10 cm (3.9 in)

Brooklyn Museum

Jacques Joseph Tissot (15 October 1836 – 8 August 1902), Anglicized as James Tissot, was a French painter and illustrator. He was a successful painter of Paris society before moving to London in 1871. He became famous as a genre painter of fashionably dressed women shown in various scenes of everyday life. He also painted scenes and characters from the Bible. More on James Tissot

Luke died at age 84 in Boeotia, Greece. More on Apostle and Evangelist Luke

Please visit my other blogs: Art Collector, Mythology, Marine Art, Portrait of a Lady, The Orientalist, Art of the Nude and The Canals of Venice, Middle East Artists, and 365 Saints, also visit my Boards on Pinterest

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12 works, Today, September 26th, is Saint John the Evangelist's day, his story illustrated #268

El Greco, (1541–1614)

Opening of the Fifth Seal, The Vision of Saint John, from 1608 until 1614

Oil on canvas

87.5 × 76 in (222.2 × 193 cm); 88.5 × 78.5 in (224.7 × 199.3 cm)

Metropolitan Museum, New York

Doménikos Theotokópoulos (1541 – 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco; Spanish for "The Greek", was a painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. The nickname "El Greco" refers both to his Greek origin and Spanish citizenship. The artist normally signed his paintings with his full birth name in Greek letters.

 

El Greco was born in Crete, which was at that time part of the Republic of Venice, and the center of Post-Byzantine art. He trained and became a master within that tradition before traveling at age 26 to Venice, as other Greek artists had done. In 1570 he moved to Rome, where he opened a workshop and executed a series of works. During his stay in Italy, El Greco enriched his style with elements of Mannerism and of the Venetian Renaissance. In 1577, he moved to Toledo, Spain, where he lived and worked until his death. In Toledo, El Greco received several major commissions and produced his best-known paintings.

 

El Greco's dramatic and expressionistic style was met with puzzlement by his contemporaries but found appreciation in the 20th century. El Greco is regarded as a precursor of both Expressionism and Cubism, while his personality and works were a source of inspiration for poets and writers. El Greco has been characterized by modern scholars as an artist so individual that he belongs to no conventional school. He is best known for tortuously elongated figures and often fantastic or phantasmagorical pigmentation, marrying Byzantine traditions with those of Western painting. More on El Greco

Saint John came from Bethsaida, a poor village in Galilee. He was the son of Zebedee the fisherman and of Salome, the daughter of Joseph, the Betrothed of the Virgin Mary. Joseph had four sons by his first marriage: James, Joses, Jude, and Simon, and three daughters: Esther, Martha, and Salome. Thus, Jesus Christ our Savior was the uncle of Saint John the Theologian, since He was the half-brother of John’s mother Salome.

John and his brother James were helping their father Zebedee with the fishing when the Savior called them to follow Him and become fishers of men. John became the “beloved disciple.

Unknown artist

The last supper, Saint John  leaned on the breast of his beloved Master

I have no further description, at this time

At the Last Supper, the Lord placed him at His side, where he leaned on the breast of his beloved Master. When the Jews laid hold of Jesus, Saint John followed Him into the palace of the high priest. 

Anthony van Dyck, (1599–1641)

Christ Crucified with the Virgin, Saint John and Mary Magdalene, c. between 1617 and 1619

Oil on canvas

Height: 3.3 cm (1.2 in); Width: 2.8 cm (1.1 in)

Louvre Museum , Paris

Sir Anthony van Dyck, ( 22 March 1599 – 9 December 1641) was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England, after enjoying great success in Italy and Flanders. He is most famous for his portraits of Charles I of England and his family and court, painted with a relaxed elegance that was to be the dominant influence on English portrait-painting for the next 150 years. He also painted biblical and mythological subjects, displayed outstanding facility as a draughtsman, and was an important innovator in watercolour and etching. The Van Dyke beard is named after him. More Sir Anthony van Dyck

He alone remained with the Virgin Mary at the foot of the Cross when the Savior was crucified. Seeing John standing by, Christ said to His mother: “Woman, behold your son!” and to John: “Behold your mother!” From that hour, John took the Virgin Mary into his own home.

Giotto di Bondone, (–1337)

Descent from the cross, c, between 1304 and 1306

Fresco

Height: 200 cm (78.7 in); Width: 185 cm (72.8 in)

Scrovegni Chapel,  Padua, Italy

St. John is wearing a red robe with open hands in the center of the screen

Giotto di Bondone (1266/7 – January 8, 1337), known mononymously as Giotto, and Latinized as Giottus, was an Italian painter and architect from Florence in the late Middle Ages. He is generally considered the first in a line of great artists who contributed to the Renaissance.

In his Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, the late-16th century artist and art historian Giorgio Vasari describes Giotto as making a decisive break with the prevalent Byzantine style and as initiating "the great art of painting as we know it today, introducing the technique of drawing accurately from life, which had been neglected for more than two hundred years."

Giotto's masterwork is the decoration of the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua, also known as the Arena Chapel, completed around 1305. This fresco cycle depicts the Life of the Virgin and the Life of Christ. It is regarded as one of the supreme masterpieces of the Early Renaissance.[4] That Giotto painted the Arena Chapel and that he was chosen by the Commune of Florence in 1334 to design the new campanile (bell tower) of Florence's Cathedral are among the few certainties of his biography. Almost every other aspect of it is subject to controversy: his birthdate, his birthplace, his appearance, his apprenticeship, the order in which he created his works, whether or not he painted the famous frescoes in the Upper Basilica of Saint Francis in Assisi, and his burial place. More Giotto di Bondone

He saw Christ after His Resurrection and was commissioned with the other disciples to preach the Gospel throughout the world when. He was present also at the Lord’s Ascension into heaven and received the Holy Spirit. He remained the last of the disciples in Jerusalem, in the company of the Virgin Mary, whom he served until the time of her Dormition.

Peter Paul Rubens, (1577–1640)

Assumption of Mary, c. 1626

Oil on panel

Height: 490 cm (16 ft); Width: 325 cm (10.6 ft)

Cathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp

Sir Peter Paul Rubens (28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish Baroque painter. A proponent of an extravagant Baroque style that emphasized movement, colour, and sensuality, Rubens is well known for his Counter-Reformation altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects.

In addition to running a large studio in Antwerp that produced paintings popular with nobility and art collectors throughout Europe, Rubens was a classically educated humanist scholar and diplomat who was knighted by both Philip IV of Spain and Charles I of England.  More on Sir Peter Paul Rubens

After the Dormition of the Mother of God the Apostle John went to Ephesus and other cities of Asia Minor to preach the Gospel, taking with him his own disciple Prochorus. 

Unknown artist

They boarded a ship, which floundered during a terrible tempest

I have no further description, at this time

They boarded a ship, which floundered during a terrible tempest. All the travellers were cast up upon dry ground, and only the Apostle John remained in the depths of the sea. Prochorus, bereft of his spiritual father and guide, and he went on towards Ephesus alone.

Germán Hernández Amores, (1823–1894)

Travel of the Blessed Virgin and St. John to Ephesus after the death of Savior, c. 1862

The Virgin didn't travel with him to Ephesus!

Oil on canvas

Height: 244 cm (96 in); Width: 390 cm (12.7 ft)

Museo del Prado

Germán Hernández Amores (10 June 1823, Murcia – 16 May 1894, Murcia) was a Spanish painter who specialized in Classical, mythological, and Biblical scenes. He was one of the few artists in Spain to adopt stylistic elements from the German Nazarene movement.

He began by studying drawing with the Italian-born sculptor, Santiago Baglietto (1781-1853), at the Sociedad Económica de los Amigos del País in Murcia. Then, he studied at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, with José and Federico de Madrazo. During this time, he paid his way by doing book illustrations.

The year 1851 found him in Paris, on a scholarship from the Consejo y Comisaría de Cruzada. Two years later, he received a pension that allowed him to stay at the Academia de España en Roma. He was there until 1857 and made contact with several German painters of the Nazarene movement, which influenced his style.

In 1858, he was awarded a Second Class prize at the National Exhibition of Fine Arts. His depiction of the Virgin Mary and Saint John on their way to Ephesus received a First Class prize at the Exhibition of 1862. He would continue to participate until 1892, but won no further prizes.

Later, he became a Professor at the Escuela Superior de Pintura and, in 1892, was named a member of the Real Academia. More on Germán Hernández Amores

On the fourteenth day of his journey he stood at the shore of the sea and saw that the waves had cast a man ashore. Going up to him, he recognized the Apostle John, whom the Lord had preserved alive for fourteen days in the sea. Teacher and disciple went to Ephesus, where the Apostle John preached incessantly to the pagans about Christ. His preaching was accompanied by such numerous and great miracles, that the number of believers increased with each day.

Alonso Cano, (1601–1667)

Saint John the Evangelist and the Poisoned Cup, c. between 1635 and 1637

Oil on canvas

Height: 53.5 cm (21 in); Width: 35.5 cm (13.9 in)

Louvre Museum, Paris

The chalice held by Saint John alludes to tradition according to which St. John was handed a cup of poisoned wine, from which, at his blessing, the poison fled in the shape of a serpent.

Alonzo Cano or Alonso Cano (19 March 1601 – 3 September 1667) was a Spanish painter, architect and sculptor born in Granada. He learned architecture from his father, Miguel Cano; painting in the academy of Juan del Castillo, and from Francisco Pacheco the teacher of Velázquez; and sculpture from Juan Martínez Montañés. As a sculptor, his most famous works are the Madonna and Child in the church of Lebrija.

He was made first royal architect, painter to Philip IV, and instructor to the prince, Balthasar Charles, Prince of Asturias. The King gave him the church preferment of a canon of the Granada Cathedral, in order to take up a position as chief architect of the cathedral, where his main achievement in architecture was the façade, designed at the end of his life.

After the death of his wife he took Holy Orders. More on Alonzo Cano

During this time there had begun a persecution of Christians under the emperor Nero (56-68). They took the Apostle John for trial at Rome. Saint John was sentenced to death for his confession of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, but the Lord preserved His chosen one. The apostle drank a cup of deadly poison, but he remained alive. 

Sigmund Gleismüller, (1449-1511)

Saint John on Patmos, c. 1490

Oil on canvas

Germanisches Nationalmuseum,  Nuremberg, Germany

Meister von Mörlbach or Meister des Mörlbacher Marienaltar is the emergency name for a painter of the late 15th century who was under Flemish influence. Björn Statnik identified him in 2009 with the Landshut court painter Sigmund Gleismüller.

The panels of the Annunciation altar in the church of St. Stephan in Mörlbach come from the master of Mörlbach . The panels of the Catherine Altar in the former monastery church of the Attel monastery (now the parish church of St. Michael) are ascribed to him. More on Sigmund Gleismüller

Juan de las Roelas, (Spanish, 1558–1625)Title:

The Martyrdom of Saint John the Evangelist

Oil on Canvas

147 x 105 cm. (57.9 x 41.3 in.)

Private collection

Juan de Roelas, de las Roelas or Ruela (c. 1570, in Flanders – 1625, in Olivares) was a Flemish painter whose entire documented career took place in Spain. He played a major role in the transition from Mannerist to Baroque painting in Spain.

The new findings about the prior mix-up of the biographical details of the painter with those of a Spanish monk and the lack of other documentation have made it difficult to separate and confirm the details of his life.

It is known that in 1598 he worked in Valladolid in the commemorative ceremonies for the death of king Philip II of Spain, contributing to the design of his funerary monument. He remained there until 1604, when he obtained a benefice or favour from the Count-Duke of Olivares. In the village of, Olivares, near Seville, de Roelas made several large paintings to decorate altars in and around Seville. It is reported that he moved to Madrid where he tried to obtain an appointment as painter to the royal court, but that when he failed he returned to Olivares where he died in 1625.

He had many disciples, among whom Francisco Varela from Seville and Pablo Legote from Luxembourg. More on Juan de Roelas

Later, he emerged unharmed from a cauldron of boiling oil into which he had been thrown on orders from the torturer.

After this, they sent the Apostle John off to imprisonment to the island of Patmos, for many years. Proceeding along on his way to the place of exile, Saint John worked many miracles. On the island of Patmos, his preaching and miracles attracted to him all the inhabitants of the island, and he enlightened them with the light of the Gospel. 

Domenichino, (1581–1641)

Saint John the Evangelist, c. between 1624 and 1629

Oil on canvas

Height: 259 cm (101.9 in); Width: 199.4 cm (78.5 in)

National Gallery, London

Domenichino, original name Domenico Zampieri, (born October 1581, Bologna, Papal States —died April 6, 1641, Naples), Italian painter who was a leading practitioner of Baroque classicism in Rome and Bologna.

He was trained in the academy of Lodovico Carracci and in 1602 was in Rome, where he joined the Bolognese artists at work in the decoration of the Farnese Palace. He decorated a room in the Villa Belvedere at Frascati with mythological frescoes and a chapel in the Badia at Grottaferrata...

In 1617–18 Domenichino painted for Cardinal Aldobrandini the celebrated canvas of The Hunt of Diana. This work shows that he was a sensitive colourist, and its idyllic mood departs from the arid classicism of his frescoes. Though Domenichino’s work remained in great demand, there was a reaction against the rigid classicism of his style, and in the last works that he produced in Rome he worked in a broader, less classical style. This closer approximation to the Baroque is also apparent In Naples his style was less acceptable than it had proved in Rome. More on Domenichino

Unknown artist

The Evangelist St. John with his symbol the eagle on Patmos, the devil stealing the ink-well

National Library of the Netherlands

I have no further description, at this time

After his prolonged exile, the Apostle John received his freedom and returned to Ephesus, where he continued with his activity In the year 95, the Apostle John wrote his Gospel at Ephesus. 

When it was time for the departure of the Apostle John, he went out beyond the city limits of Ephesus with the families of his disciples. He bade them prepare for him a cross-shaped grave, in which he lay, telling his disciples that they should cover him over with the soil. The disciples tearfully kissed their beloved teacher, but not wanting to be disobedient, they fulfilled his bidding. They covered the face of the saint with a cloth and filled in the grave. Learning of this, other disciples of Saint John came to the place of his burial. When they opened the grave, they found it empty. More on John the Evangelist

Please visit my other blogs: Art Collector, Mythology, Marine Art, Portrait of a Lady, The Orientalist, Art of the Nude and The Canals of Venice, Middle East Artists, and 365 Saints, also visit my Boards on Pinterest

Images are copyright of their respective owners, assignees or others. Some Images may be subject to copyright

I don't own any of these images - credit is always given when due unless it is unknown to me. if I post your images without your permission, please tell me.

I do not sell art, art prints, framed posters or reproductions. Ads are shown only to compensate the hosting expenses.

If you enjoyed this post, please share with friends and family.

Thank you for visiting my blog and also for liking its posts and pages.

Please note that the content of this post primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online.