Albertus Gerardus "Gerard" Bilders (9 December 1838 – 8 March 1865) was a Dutch landscape-painter, associated with some members of the
Hague School
The Hague School is a group of artists who lived and worked in The Hague between 1860 and 1890. Their work was heavily influenced by the Realism (visual arts), realist painters of the French Barbizon school. The painters of the Hague school genera ...
, as
Anton Mauve
Anthonij "Anton" Rudolf Mauve (18 September 18385 February 1888) was a Dutch realist painter who was a leading member of the Hague School. He signed his paintings 'A. Mauve' or with a monogrammed 'A.M.'. A master colorist, he was a very signific ...
and
Willem Maris
Willem Maris (18 February 1844 – 10 October 1910) was a Dutch landscape painter of the Hague School.
Biography
He was born in The Hague. Willem was the third in a family of five children. His two brothers Jacob and Matthijs Maris preceded him ...
.
Biography
Bilders was born in
Utrecht
Utrecht ( , , ) is the List of cities in the Netherlands by province, fourth-largest city and a List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, capital and most populous city of the Provinces of the Netherlands, pro ...
, where he lived until 1856, though from 1841 to 1845 the Bilders family lived in
Oosterbeek
Oosterbeek is a village in the eastern part of Netherlands. It is located in the municipality of Renkum in the province of Gelderland, about west of Arnhem.
The oldest part of Oosterbeek is the Benedendorp (Lower Village), on the northern bank o ...
, a village near Arnhem which later became a major center for Dutch
plein-air
''En plein air'' (; French for 'outdoors'), or ''plein air'' painting, is the act of painting outdoors.
This method contrasts with studio painting or academic rules that might create a predetermined look. The theory of 'En plein air' painting ...
-painters. His father
Johannes Warnardus Bilders
Johannes Warnardus Bilders (18 August 1811 – 29 October 1890) was a Dutch landscape-painter; he was the father of Gerard Bilders (1838–1865) and a forerunner of the Hague School because of his connections with H.W. Mesdag, Jozef Israëls, ...
was a Dutch landscape-painter. In 1857 Gerard moved to The Hague.
Bilders was financially supported by the Dutch writer who lived in Oosterbeek since 1851, where he inhabited a rural estate and invited several young artists as his protégés. Kneppelhout was rather critical of Bilders's painterly talent and tried to push him into a more literary direction, what Gerard definitely refused. The two men wrote for several years many letters which were published by Kneppelhout
ncluding Bilders' diary-notes of 1860 and 1862 shortly after Bilder's death in 1865.
Bilders received his first drawing lessons from his father, the landscape painter
Johannes Warnardus Bilders
Johannes Warnardus Bilders (18 August 1811 – 29 October 1890) was a Dutch landscape-painter; he was the father of Gerard Bilders (1838–1865) and a forerunner of the Hague School because of his connections with H.W. Mesdag, Jozef Israëls, ...
. From the start of his artistic career Bilders' focus was on landscape painting but also on animals in the landscape. Bilders studied at the Academy of Visual Arts in The Hague from about 1857 to 1859 and drew naked and dressed models there. In the Mauritshuis museum he copied
Paulus Potter
Paulus Potter (; 20 November 1625 (baptised) – 17 January 1654 (buried)) was a Dutch painter who specialized in animals within landscapes, usually with a low vantage point.
Before Potter died of tuberculosis at the age of 28 he succeeded in p ...
's landscapes with cattle; for a while he was the pupil of landscape and animal painter Charles Humbert in Switzerland. From time to time Gerard Bilders would assist his father by filling in his landscape-painting with animals, as he did a.o. in 1859 by painting some goats in a large forest-landscape of his father, commissioned by a Russian art-seller.
![Koeien in de weide Rijksmuseum SK-A-2264](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f8/Koeien_in_de_weide_Rijksmuseum_SK-A-2264.jpeg)
In 1860 they traveled together to the 'Exposition Générale des Beaux-Arts' in Brussel where he became acquainted for the first time in his life with the painters of the French
School of Barbizon. Two times he made a voyage to Switzerland/France; the first time as of September 1858, when he painted there together with some artist-friends in open air, in the
Savoy
Savoy (; frp, Savouè ; french: Savoie ) is a cultural-historical region in the Western Alps.
Situated on the cultural boundary between Occitania and Piedmont, the area extends from Lake Geneva in the north to the Dauphiné in the south.
Savo ...
.
Later in 1859 he began painting in the county-area around Leiden, often 'meadows with cattle'. Here he tried to reproduce the moods that the Dutch flat landscape evoked by using peculiar light effects as well as 'a colored, fragrant warm grey.' In July 1860 he wrote: "I am searching for a tone, which we call 'colored grey'. I mean that all colors, even the strongest, can be brought together in such a way as to give the impression of a warm, vital grey.". When he mixed all the colors of the palette just with grey to get this graying effect, he was usually dissatisfied with the result. His attempts in mixing unbroken colors foreshadowed the later tonal painting style of the
Hague School
The Hague School is a group of artists who lived and worked in The Hague between 1860 and 1890. Their work was heavily influenced by the Realism (visual arts), realist painters of the French Barbizon school. The painters of the Hague school genera ...
painters.
Gerard Bilders returned to Oosterbeek from 1857 - 1864 where he met
Anton Mauve
Anthonij "Anton" Rudolf Mauve (18 September 18385 February 1888) was a Dutch realist painter who was a leading member of the Hague School. He signed his paintings 'A. Mauve' or with a monogrammed 'A.M.'. A master colorist, he was a very signific ...
and the Maris brothers, in particular
Willem Maris
Willem Maris (18 February 1844 – 10 October 1910) was a Dutch landscape painter of the Hague School.
Biography
He was born in The Hague. Willem was the third in a family of five children. His two brothers Jacob and Matthijs Maris preceded him ...
. He died in Amsterdam because of tuberculosis when he was only 26.
Artistic development and style
At the end of 1856 and beginning of 1857 Gerard Bilders was frequently visiting the
Mauritshuis
The Mauritshuis (; en, Maurice House) is an art museum in The Hague, Netherlands. The museum houses the Royal Cabinet of Paintings which consists of 854 objects, mostly Dutch Golden Age paintings. The collection contains works by Johannes Vermeer ...
in The Hague, where he studied and copied the paintings of 17th century Dutch landscape painters, in particular the works of
Paulus Potter
Paulus Potter (; 20 November 1625 (baptised) – 17 January 1654 (buried)) was a Dutch painter who specialized in animals within landscapes, usually with a low vantage point.
Before Potter died of tuberculosis at the age of 28 he succeeded in p ...
and
Jacob Ruisdael.". He then also wrote his menaces Kneppelhout in a letter how he sought and found refuge in these works; he felt himself being outside - in the landscape itself, while watching them in the museum. The paintings of Potter and Ruisdael inspired him to copy them carefully and faithfully, but now already he started to recognize at the same time in their works 'the landscape as a whole'! This was a characteristic point of interest for him, that would return again and again in his later letters and Journal notes. Apparently, 'wholeness' and 'unity' of the expressed landscape were essential elements for him. So he wrote for instance later, on 19 May 1861: "It is not my aim and object to paint a cow for the cow's sake or a tree for the tree's, but by means of the whole - to create a beautiful and huge impression which nature sometimes creates, also with most simple means"
Gallery - ranked by year
Image:Koeien bij een plas Rijksmuseum SK-A-3073.jpeg, 'Landscape with cows at a puddle', 1856–58; oil-painting on panel
Image:View on the village St. AngeGezicht op het dorpje St. Ange in Savoije - drawing in pencil.jpg, 'View on the village St. Ange, Savoije', 1858; drawing in pencil
Image:Mountain-landscape with watermill by Gerard Bilders; drawing in pencil-brush, undated.jpg, 'Mountain-landscape with watermill', 1858; drawing with pencil and watercolor
Image:View over the water near Zoeterwoude, Netherlands, drawing, c. 1859.jpg, 'View over the water near Leiden
Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...
', 1859; drawing with pencil
Image:Weiland_bij_Oosterbeek.jpg, 'Meadow near Oosterbeek', 1860; oil-painting on canvas
Image:Gerard Bilders - Koestudie - SA 678 - Amsterdam Museum.jpg, 'Cow studies', c. 1860; on paper
Image:Zwitsers landschap Rijksmuseum SK-A-2297.jpeg, 'Swiss landscape with two goatskin', 1860; oil-painting on panel
Image:Koeien in de weide.jpg, 'Cows in the Meadow', 1861; oil on canvas
Image:Bosvijver bij zonsondergang Rijksmuseum SK-A-3072.jpeg, 'Woodland Pond at Sunset', c. 1862; oil on panel
Image:Koeien_bij_een_plas_(2).jpg, 'Landscape with cows in a pool of water', c. 1860-65; oil on panel
Image:Geitenhoedster Rijksmuseum SK-A-2262.jpeg, 'Landscape with goatskin, resting in the shadows', 1864; oil on canvas
Image:Jacob van Ruisdael, een watermolen schetsend Rijksmuseum SK-A-4865.jpeg, 'Jacob van Ruisdael
Jacob Isaackszoon van Ruisdael (; 1629 – 10 March 1682) was a Dutch painter, draughtsman, and etcher. He is generally considered the pre-eminent landscape painter of the Dutch Golden Age, a period of great wealth and cultural achi ...
sketching a water mill, 1864; oil on canvas
Image:Bilders 5.jpeg, 'Brook through the forest', undated; drawing on paper
Image:Bilders 2.jpeg, 'View in the forest', undated; drawing on paper
Image:View over the river-landscape near Opheusden, Netherlands - pencil, drawing.jpg, 'View over the river-landscape near Opheusden
Opheusden is a village in the Dutch province of Gelderland. It is a part of the municipality of Neder-Betuwe, and lies some 5 km south-west of Wageningen.
Opheusden (or "Heusden", as it was known then) was a separate municipality until 1818, ...
', undated; pencil on paper
Sources
*Sillevis, John and Tabak, Anne, ''The Hague School Book'', Waanders Uitgegevers, Zwolle, 2004 (pp 281–387)
Bilders, Gerard at the RKD - the
Netherlands Institute for Art History
The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: RKD-Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center i ...
.
References
External links
*
images of paintings of Gerard Bilders in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdambiography notes of Gerard Bilder in the Dutch R.K.D. Archive, The Hague
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bilders, Gerard
1838 births
1865 deaths
19th-century Dutch painters
Dutch male painters
Dutch landscape painters
Hague School
Artists from Utrecht
19th-century Dutch male artists