A BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF
Venice. Acadenn/. A Virgin reading at a desk.
„ Casa Giovaneili. The portrait of a young Patrician,
rienna. Galleri/. The dead body of Christ supported
by three Angels.
ANTONIO, GiKOLAMO da, a Carmelite Friar, who entered his order in 1490, at Florence, and worked in it and for it until his death in 1529. He is known chiefly by two works — the one a picture of ' Christ as a Man of Sorrows,' signed and dated 1504, in the Carmine : the other, an altar-piece, representing ' Christ adored by the Virgin and St. Joseph,' signed and dated 1519, in the Souola della Cariti, at Savona.
ANTONIO, Pedro, was born at Cordova in 1614, and was a scholar of Antonio del Castillo. Some pictures which he painted for the convent of San Pablo at Cordova, established his character as a good colourist. He died in 1675 in bis native city.
ANTONIO DA FERRARA. See Ferrara.
ANTONIO DA MONZA, Fra. See Monza.
ANTONIO DA MURANO. See Mdr. o. ANTONIO DA TRENTO. See Trento.
ANTONIO DE HOLANDA. See Holanda.
ANTONIO DE SAN ANTONIO. See San Antonio.
ANTONIO VENEZIANO. See Veneziano.
ANTONISSEN, Henricds JosEPnos, a painter of landscapes and cattle, was born at Antwerp in 1737. He entered the studio of Balthazar Beschey, in 1752-53, and three years later he was free of the Guild at Antwerp of which he was twice Dean. His works are mostly in private collections on the Continent. In the Stadel Gallery at Frankfort there is a 'Landscape with Cuttle' by him ; signed and dated 1792. He died at Antwerp, in 1794. He instructed numerous scholars, and amongst them the celebrated Ommeganck.
ANTONISZOON, Cornelis. See Anthoniszoon.
ANTONJ, Degli. See Antonio, Antonello d'.
ANTUM, Aart van, was a Dutch marine-painter, who flourislied from about 1630 to 1640. A sea- piece by him, signed A. A., is in the Berlin Museum.
APARICIO, Jos6, a Spanish historical painter, was born at Alicante, in 1773, and studied in Paris under David. His chef-d'oeuvre, ' The Redemption of Algerian Captives,' is in the Madrid Gallery. He died in Madrid, in 1838.
APELDOORN, Jan, a landscape painter and designer, was scholar to Jordan Hoorn, at Amers- foort, where he was born in 1765. He painted but few pictures in oil. He resided nearly fifty years at Utrecht, but died in his native town in 1838.
APELLES, the greatest of all Grecian painters, was probably born at Colophon in Ionia, although, according to Pliny and Ovid, he was a native of the isle of Cos ; whilst Strabo and Lucian call him an Ephesian. Neither the date of his birth, nor that of his death, is known ; it is only certain that he flourished from before B.C. 336 until after B.C. 332. He was a disciple of Pamphilus, and was probably of a distinguished family, as no student of mean birth was admitted into the school of that master. Combining in himself all the excellences of the artists who had preceded him, and endowed with a genius capable of contending with the most arduous difficulties, Apelles is generally supposed to have carried art to the highest attainable per- fection. He not only excelled in composition, design, and colouring, but also possessed an un- bounded invention. He was select and beautiful in his proportions and contours, and, above all, his figures were always distinguished by an unspeakable grace, which was peculiar to him, and may be almost said to have been the effect of inspiration. No painter ever applied to the study of his art with more persevering assiduity than Apelles. He never permitted a day to pass without practising some branch of his art ; hence tlie proverb. Nulla dies sine lined.
His extraordinary talents, and the polished accomplishments of his mind, secured him the patronage and esteem of Alexander the Great, from whom he received the exclusive privilege of painting his likeness. Among others, was a por- trait of Alexander holding a thunderbolt, painted on the walls of the temple of Diana, at Ephesus: which was so admirably executed, that Plutarch reports that it used to be said there were two Alexanders, one invincible, the son of Philip, the other inimitable, the work of Apelles. For this picture he received twenty talents (£4320). But his most admired production, which is said to have cost the enormous sum of 100 talents (£21,600), was a picture of Venus rising from the sea, called ' Venus Anadyomene,' which was painted for the temple of .^sculapius at Cos, and which Ovid has celebrated in his verses :
Si Venerem Cois nunquam pinxisset Apelles, Mersa sub sequoreis ilia lateret aquis. Pliny asserts that Alexander permitted his fa- vourite mistress, the beautiful Campaspe, to sit to him for his Venus, and that the painter became so enamoured of his model, that the conqueror resigned her to liim. Other writers pretend that Phryne served him as a model for his Venus. We are told by .lElian, in his ' Various Histories,' that, having painted a portrait of Alexander on horse- back, which was not so much admired as it de- served by the monarch, whose horse neighed at the sight of the charger in the picture, Apelles said to Alexander : " Sire, it is plain that your horse is a better judge of painting than your Majesty." One of this painter's disciples having shown him a picture of Helen, which he had loaded with gold, " Young man," said the painter, " not being able to make thy Helen beautiful, thou hast resolved to make her rich."
One of the chief excellences of Apelles in portrait painting was to give so perfect a resemblance of the person represented, that the physiognomists were able to form a judgment as easily from his pictures as if they had seen the originals. This readiness and dexterity in taking a likeness was of singular utility to the painter, in extricating him from a very perilous dilemma into which he was thrown at the court of Ptolemy. When that prince reigned in Egypt, Apelles, who had not the good fortune to be in favour with Ptolemy, was driven by a storm into the port of Alexandria, where his enemies suborned a mischievous fellow, who was one of the king's buffoons, to play a trick upon him, by inviting Apelles, in the king's name, to supper. On his arrival, finding Ptolemy surprised, and not very well pleased with his visit, he apologized for his coming by assuring the king that he should not have presumed to wait upon him but by his own invitation. Being required to point out the person who had thus imposed upon him, he sketched his portrait from memory, with a coal upon the wall, which Ptolemy instantly recognized to be his buffoon. This adventure reconciled him to Ptolemy, who afterwards loaded him with wealth and honours.
46
