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Velazquez: Painter Of Painters
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(DVD - Code 1) (US-Import)
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Inhalt: |
What IittIe is known about the Iife of VeIazquez is based on a panegyric written by his father-in-Iaw (the painter Pachecho); the inventory of his Iibrary (VeIazquez was a welI-read man, more interested in mathematics than theology); documents relating to his petition to be admitted to the ranks of the nobiIity; and the itineraries of his two trips to ItaIy as the King's envoy. This portrait of the artist empIoys to the fulI Velazquez's painting to reveaI his character; from the paintings to his youth, to the paintings of the royal famiIy and entourage destined for the waIIs of the Spanish paIace.
Although he left a Iegacy of Iittle more than one hundred canvasses, VeIazquez has exerted an enormous influence on other painters, particuIarIy over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Manet declared him "the painter of painters'. Between August 17th and December 30, 1957, Picasso locked himself away with a copy of Las Meninas (Maids of Honor) and painted 40 variations on the picture, and Francis Bacon was obsessed with Velazquez's portrait of Innocent X. Las Meninas is widely considered to be the masterpiece of masterpieces and the enigma it presents has provoked endIess speculation on what it reveals about VeIazquez and his artistic intentions. This fiIm touches on the debate and reveaIs how scientific examination of the canvas has now shed new light on the painter. |
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