Edward Portielje (1861-1949)

Edward Antoon Portielje (1861-1949) was born in Antwerp on 8 February 1861. He trained under Charles Verlat (1824-90), who had taught at the Antwerp Academy since 1877 and became director of it in 1885.

Like his father, Jan Frederik Pieter Portielje (1829-1908), a Dutchman, Edward Antoon Portielje devoted himself primarily to genre painting. His elder brother, Gerard Jozef Portielje, also made a name for himself as a painter.

Edward Antoon Portielje died in his native Antwerp in 1949.

Guido Reni | The Immaculate Conception, 1627

Guido Reni (Bologna, 1575-1642), the most celebrated painter of seventeenth-century Italy, was particularly famous for the elegance of his compositions and the beauty and grace of his female heads, earning him the epithet “Divine".

This altarpiece, with its otherworldly space shaped by clouds and putti in a high-keyed palette, was commissioned in about 1627 by the Spanish ambassador in Rome for the Infanta of Spain.

Guido Reni | The Immaculate Conception, 1627 | Metropolitan Museum of Art

Robert Campin (1375-1444)

Robert Campin, now usually identified with the Master of Flémalle (earlier the Master of the Merode Triptych, before the discovery of three other similar panels), was the first great master of Flemish and Early Netherlandish painting. Campin's identity and the attribution of the paintings in both the "Campin" and "Master of Flémalle" groupings have been a matter of controversy for decades.

Campin was highly successful during his lifetime, and thus his activities are relatively well documented, but he did not sign or date his works, and none can be securely connected with him.

A corpus of work attached to the unidentified "Master of Flémalle", so named in the 19th century after three religious panels said to have come from a monastery in Flémalle.

Edmund Blair Leighton | Pre-Raphaelite painter

Edmund Blair Leighton | Pre-Raphaelite painter ⁽²⁾

Edmund Blair Leighton (1853-1922)

Edmund Blair Leighton (21 September 1853 - 1 September 1922) was an British** Pre-Raphaelite  painter of historical genre scenes, specializing in Regency and medieval subjects.
He was educated at University College School, before becoming a student at the Royal Academy Schools. He exhibited annually at the Royal Academy from 1878 to 1920.

Jean-Francois Raffaëlli | Paris painting