Isaac Oliver

Last updated

Young Man Seated under a Tree, 1590-95, Royal Collection Isaac Oliver - Young Man Seated under a Tree - Google Art Project.jpg
Young Man Seated under a Tree, 1590–95, Royal Collection

Isaac Oliver (c.1565 – bur. 2 October 1617) or Olivier was an English portrait miniature painter. [1] [2] [3]

Contents

Life and work

Born in Rouen, he moved to London in 1568 with his Huguenot parents Peter and Epiphany Oliver to escape the Wars of Religion in France. He then studied miniature painting under Nicholas Hilliard; and developed a naturalistic style, which was largely influenced by Italian and Flemish art. His first wife, Elizabeth, died in 1599. With her he fathered Peter Oliver, who was also eminent in miniature painting. In 1602, he married Sara, daughter of the well-known portrait painter Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder (c.1520 – c.1590) and his wife Susannah de Critz. Susannah was the daughter of Troilus de Critz, a goldsmith from Antwerp, and close relative of John de Critz, the Queen's Serjeant-Painter. She was also the eldest sister or cousin of Magdalen de Critz, who married Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger (15621635).

After the death of Elizabeth I, he became a painter of James I's court, painting numerous portraits of the queen Anne of Denmark and Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales.

Oliver died in London in 1617 and was buried at the church of St Ann Blackfriars, which was destroyed in the Great Fire of London. [1]

Some of his work is housed in Windsor Castle. Some of his pen drawings are located in the British Museum.

Portrait miniatures

Larger works

See also

Related Research Articles

Events from the year 1595 in art.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Portrait miniature</span> Miniature portrait painting

A portrait miniature is a miniature portrait painting, usually executed in gouache, watercolor, or enamel. Portrait miniatures developed out of the techniques of the miniatures in illuminated manuscripts, and were popular among 16th-century elites, mainly in England and France, and spread across the rest of Europe from the middle of the 18th century, remaining highly popular until the development of daguerreotypes and photography in the mid-19th century. They were usually intimate gifts given within the family, or by hopeful males in courtship, but some rulers, such as James I of England, gave large numbers as diplomatic or political gifts. They were especially likely to be painted when a family member was going to be absent for significant periods, whether a husband or son going to war or emigrating, or a daughter getting married.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nicholas Hilliard</span> 16th and 17th-century English artist

Nicholas Hilliard was an English goldsmith and limner best known for his portrait miniatures of members of the courts of Elizabeth I and James I of England. He mostly painted small oval miniatures, but also some larger cabinet miniatures, up to about 10 inches tall, and at least two famous half-length panel portraits of Elizabeth. He enjoyed continuing success as an artist, and continuing financial troubles, for forty-five years. His paintings still exemplify the visual image of Elizabethan England, very different from that of most of Europe in the late sixteenth century. Technically he was very conservative by European standards, but his paintings are superbly executed and have a freshness and charm that has ensured his continuing reputation as "the central artistic figure of the Elizabethan age, the only English painter whose work reflects, in its delicate microcosm, the world of Shakespeare's earlier plays."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland</span> English noble (1558 – 1605)

Sir George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland, 13th Baron de Clifford, 13th Lord of Skipton,, was an English peer, naval commander, and courtier of Queen Elizabeth I of England. He was notable at court for his jousting, at the Accession Day Tilts, which were highlights of the year at court. Two famous survivals, his portrait miniature by Nicholas Hilliard and a garniture of Greenwich armour, reflect this important part of his life. In contrast, he neglected his estates in the far north of England and left a long succession dispute between his heirs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Levina Teerlinc</span> Flemish painter (1510-1576)

Levina Teerlinc was a Flemish Renaissance miniaturist who served as a painter to the English court of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I. She was the most important miniaturist at the English court between Hans Holbein the Younger and Nicholas Hilliard. Her father, Simon Bening was a renowned book illuminator and miniature painter of the Ghent-Bruges school and probably trained her as a manuscript painter. She may have worked in her father's workshop before her marriage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder</span>

Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, Marc Gerard and Marcus Garret was a Flemish painter, draughtsman, print designer and etcher who was active in his native Flanders and in England. He practised in many genres, including portraits, religious paintings, landscapes and architectural themes. He designed heraldic designs and decorations for tombs. He is known for his creation of a print depicting a map of his native town Bruges and the illustrations for a Dutch-language publication recounting stories from Aesop's Fables. His attention to naturalistic detail and his practice of drawing animals from life for his prints had an important influence on European book illustration. His son Marcus the Younger became a prominent court painter at the English court.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Plumbago drawing</span>

Plumbago drawings are graphite drawings from the 17th and 18th centuries. There was a group of artists whose work in plumbago is remarkable for their portraits drawn with finely pointed pieces of graphite and on vellum. These works were initially prepared as the basis of an engraving. Eventually they would be produced as works in their own right.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Lely</span> 17th-century Dutch painter

Sir Peter Lely was a painter of Dutch origin whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court. He became a naturalised British subject and was knighted in 1679.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Larkin (painter)</span> English painter

William Larkin was an English painter active from 1609 until his death in 1619, known for his iconic portraits of members of the court of James I of England which capture in brilliant detail the opulent layering of textiles, embroidery, lace, and jewellery characteristic of fashion in the Jacobean era, as well as representing numerous fine examples of oriental carpets in Renaissance painting.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger</span> Flemish painter (c. 1561/62 – 1636)

Marcus Gheeraerts was a Flemish artist working at the Tudor court, described as "the most important artist of quality to work in England in large-scale between Eworth and van Dyck" He was brought to England as a child by his father Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, also a painter. He became a fashionable portraitist in the last decade of the reign of Elizabeth I under the patronage of her champion and pageant-master Sir Henry Lee. He introduced a new aesthetic in English court painting that captured the essence of a sitter through close observation. He became a favorite portraitist of James I's queen Anne of Denmark, but fell out of fashion in the late 1610s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul van Somer I</span> English painter

Paul van Somer, also known as Paulus van Somer, was a Flemish artist who arrived in England from Antwerp during the reign of King James I of England and became one of the leading painters of the royal court. He painted a number of portraits both of James and his consort, Queen Anne of Denmark, and of nobles such as Ludovic Stuart, earl of Lennox, Elizabeth Stanley, Countess of Huntingdon, and Lady Anne Clifford. He is sometimes designated as "Paul van Somer I" to distinguish him from the engraver of the same name who was active in England between 1670 and 1694.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John de Critz</span> English painter

John de Critz or John Decritz was one of a number of painters of Flemish origin active at the English royal court during the reigns of James I of England and Charles I of England. He held the post of Serjeant Painter to the king from 1603, at first jointly with Leonard Fryer and from 1610 jointly with Robert Peake the Elder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Serjeant Painter</span> British royal paintmaster up to the 18th-century

The Serjeant Painter was an honourable and lucrative position as court painter with the English monarch. It carried with it the prerogative of painting and gilding all of the King's residences, coaches, banners, etc. and it grossed over £1,000 in a good year by the 18th century. The work itself involved painting the palaces, coaches, royal barges, and all sorts of decorations for festivities, which often had to be designed as well. The actual involvement of the serjeant painters in this gradually declined. The post itself fell out of use in the 18th century, after a period when "fine art" painters were appointed, and expected to supervise rather than execute decorative painting, for a good salary.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rowland Lockey</span> English painter

Rowland Lockey was an English painter and goldsmith, and was the son of Leonard Lockey, a crossbow maker of the parish of St Bride's, Fleet Street, London. Lockey was apprenticed to Queen Elizabeth's miniaturist and goldsmith Nicholas Hilliard for eight years beginning Michaelmas 1581 and was made a freeman or master of the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths by 1600.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Artists of the Tudor court</span> Painters and limners engaged by the Tudor dynasty between 1485 and 1603

The artists of the Tudor court are the painters and limners engaged by the monarchs of England's Tudor dynasty and their courtiers between 1485 and 1603, from the reign of Henry VII to the death of Elizabeth I.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Peake the Elder</span> English painter (c. 1551–1619)

Robert Peake the Elder was an English painter active in the later part of Elizabeth I's reign and for most of the reign of James I. In 1604, he was appointed picture maker to the heir to the throne, Prince Henry; and in 1607, serjeant-painter to King James I – a post he shared with John De Critz.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Portraiture of Elizabeth I</span> Portraits of Elizabeth I of England and Ireland

The portraiture of Queen Elizabeth I (1533–1603) spans the evolution of English royal portraits in the early modern period (1400/1500-1800), from the earliest representations of simple likenesses to the later complex imagery used to convey the power and aspirations of the state, as well as of the monarch at its head.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Bettes the Younger</span> English painter

John Bettes the Younger was an English portrait painter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Graham Reynolds (art historian)</span> English art historian

Arthur Graham Reynolds,, was an English art historian who was Keeper of Paintings at the Victoria and Albert Museum. He was a leading expert on portrait miniatures and the art of John Constable, for whose works he wrote the catalogue raisonné. Reynolds's approach exemplified traditional scholarship and connoisseurship and he was fiercely opposed to the New Art History of the 1970s.

<i>Pelican Portrait</i>

The Pelican Portrait is an oil painting of Elizabeth I of England on a wood panel, named for the pelican pendant shown on Elizabeth's breast. It is generally attributed to Nicholas Hilliard, on the basis of a scientific study and similarities to his other work.

References

  1. 1 2 Lee, Sidney, ed. (1895). "Oliver, Isaac"  . Dictionary of National Biography . Vol. 42. London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 145–6.
  2. Macfall, Haldane. A history of painting, volume 7 (Boston: Estes, 1912) pp. 40–41.
  3. Baskett, John. Paul Mellon's legacy: a passion for British art (Yale University Press, 2007) pp. 240–1.