Jan Griffier I

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Painting of the Manoir de Potrel . Griffier thus reconstructed a building in what was later to become the parish of Dragey-Ronthon .

January Griffier (* around 1652 in Amsterdam , † 1718 in London ) was a from the Netherlands originating landscape painter and etcher . In England he was known as the Gentleman of Utrecht .

Life

An essential source for the life of Jan Griffier is the biographical sketch that the Dutch art writer Arnold Houbraken wrote about him in 1718. In addition, many details of his life in England have been passed down through Horace Walpole ( Some Anecdotes of Painting in England , 1762).

Griffier first began an apprenticeship as a carpenter , but did not like this profession. An apprenticeship as a potter did not appeal to him either. After preferring to paint flowers for some time, he turned to landscape painting under the guidance of his friend Roelant Roghman . In Amsterdam he sought lessons from great masters such as Rembrandt , Ruysdael, Lingelbach and others and became familiar with their different styles. Traces of their influence can be found in all of his works. Perhaps Herman Saftleven had the strongest effect on him. Griffier followed his friend, the landscape painter Jan Looten , to England , where he was already staying at the time of the Great Fire of London (1666). He made a large drawing of this fire, a color engraving of which was published by W. Birch in the second volume of the Antiquarian Repertory .

As a result, Griffier settled in London and soon gained reputation here. He was still studying at Looten and got married. In the course of time he became a skilled copyist for works by Dutch and Italian masters. For his pictures, which mainly depicted Italian ruins, Rhine and Thames landscapes, navies and views of London, he achieved high prices. Its Rhine and Moselle landscapes show river valleys enclosed by high mountains, the slopes of which are provided with numerous accurately drawn buildings, ships and figures. When he had earned a lot of money, he bought a yacht , on which he made himself comfortable with his family and his painting utensils. He sailed the Thames , now at Windsor , now at Greenwich, and other places near London. The paintings he executed during this period are counted among his best.

After Griffier had lived on the water for some time, he wanted to return to his birthplace in 1695. He sailed from London on a ship, but found himself stranded on a sandbank off the mouth of the Vlie . Although he saved his family with his family, almost all of his property was lost. Griffier now settled in Rotterdam , got money again and soon afterwards bought another boat, which he also set up as an apartment and workshop. With this he made various trips on the Dutch inland waters. On one of these trips to Dordrecht he got aground and had to stay there for eight days before the ship could be made afloat again. After spending about ten years in the Netherlands, he was persuaded to move to England again, where he won the special favor of the Duke of Beaufort. He stayed in the British Isles for good, bought a house in Millbank , London, and died in 1718, after which his paintings were auctioned in Covent Garden .

In his landscapes, Griffier particularly loved the richness of vegetation and meandering streams and rivers. He also liked to set up ships and other vehicles. Almost all of his pictures show great care in execution. After drawings by Francis Barlow, he etched five large sheets of birds in a series published by Fr. Place, as well as seven smaller sheets of four-footed animals. He also painted six illustrations of the fable of the farmer, his son and the donkey, which were etched by Paul van Somer.

His two sons Robert (around 1675 – after 1727) and Jan Griffier II (1688 – around 1750) also worked as painters.

literature

Web links

Commons : Jan Griffier  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ^ Arnold Houbraken: De groote schouburgh der Nederlantsche konstschilders en schilderessen. Volume 3 (1718), p. 357 ff.
  2. ↑ a b Lionel Henry Cust:  Griffier, Jan . In: Leslie Stephen, Sidney Lee (Eds.): Dictionary of National Biography . Volume 23:  Gray - Haighton. MacMillan & Co, Smith, Elder & Co., New York City / London, 1890, pp 224 - 225 (English).
  3. ↑ a b c d e Griffier (Jan) . In: General Encyclopedia of Sciences and Arts. 1. Section, Volume 91, 1871, p. 61 ( GDZ ).
  4. ↑ a b c d H. Schneider: Griffier, Jan I . In: Ulrich Thieme , Fred. C. Willis (Ed.): General lexicon of visual artists from antiquity to the present . Founded by Ulrich Thieme and Felix Becker . tape 15 : Gresse – Hanselmann . EA Seemann, Leipzig 1922, p. 26–27 ( Textarchiv - Internet Archive ).
personal data
SURNAME Griffier, Jan I
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch painter
DATE OF BIRTH uncertain: 1652
PLACE OF BIRTH Amsterdam
DATE OF DEATH 1718
Place of death London