Abel Grimmer
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Abel Grimmer (family name variations: 'Grimer' and 'Grimmaert') (c. 1570–c. 1620) was a
Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...
late
Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...
painter, mainly of landscapes and, to a lesser extent, of
architectural painting Architectural painting (also Architecture painting) is a form of genre painting where the predominant focus lies on architecture, including both outdoor and interior views. While architecture was present in many of the earliest paintings and illumi ...
s. His works were important in the development towards more naturalism in Flemish landscape painting.Abel Grimmer, ''An Allegory of Summer''
at Sphinx Fine Arts


Life

Grimmer was born and died in
Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,
. He learned to paint from his father, the landscape painter
Jacob Grimmer Jacob Grimmer (1526/26 – before May 1590) was a Flemish landscape painter and draughtsman. His rural scenes and landscapes of views around Antwerp marked an important development in 16th century Flemish landscape painting away from the world l ...
. His father Jacob Grimmer had established a name for himself by imitating the work of
Pieter Bruegel the Elder Pieter Bruegel (also Brueghel or Breughel) the Elder (, ; ; – 9 September 1569) was the most significant artist of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, a painter and printmaker, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes (so-called genr ...
on small panel pictures and selling these on the market at low prices. Abel Grimmer married Catharina Lescornet on 29 September 1591 and became a master of the Antwerp
Guild of Saint Luke The Guild of Saint Luke was the most common name for a city guild for painters and other artists in early modern Europe, especially in the Low Countries. They were named in honor of the Evangelist Luke, the patron saint of artists, who was ide ...
in 1592.Hans Devisscher. "Abel Grimmer."
Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press. Web. 24 April 2014
He took over his father's workshop. He worked his whole career in Antwerp. The date of his death is not known exactly and is placed after 1620.


Work

He often signed and dated his panels. His earliest dated work dates from 1586 and his latest dated work reads "162", so it is dated 1620 or later.Abel Grimmer
at 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 ...
He is principally known for his paintings in small format of country scenes, sometimes with a biblical theme. The works were at times in the form of roundels (i.e. in a round format). Many of his paintings were dedicated to the Four Seasons or the Months of the Year. The paintings were sometimes inspired by or even copied from prints by Pieter Bruegel the Elder and
Hans Bol Hans Bol or Jan Bol (16 December 1534 – 20 November 1593), was a Flemish-Belgian painter, print artist, miniaturist painter and draftsman.Montfaucon-en-Velay Montfaucon-en-Velay (, literally ''Montfaucon in Velay''; oc, Montfaucon de Velai) is a commune in the Haute-Loire department in south-central France. Population See also *Communes of the Haute-Loire department The following is a list of t ...
) is an exact copy of
Adriaen Collaert Adriaen Collaert (c. 1560 – 29 June 1618) was a Flemish designer and engraver. Biography The estimated year of his birth at Antwerp is between 1555 and 1565.
's prints made after paintings by Hans Bol and published by Hans van Luyck in 1585. The paintings ''Spring'' and ''Summer'' (
Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp The Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp (Dutch: ''Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten Antwerpen'', ''KMSKA'') is a museum in Antwerp, Belgium, founded in 1810, that houses a collection of paintings, sculptures and drawings from the fourteenth t ...
) are almost exact copies of two prints by Pieter van der Heyden after designs by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Abel Grimmer's work is characterised by the simplification and systemisation of figures and landscapes. His landscapes show splendid colour harmonies and a certain linearity, through their slightly schematized compositions and their tendency to represent buildings as geometric shapes. His work has been dismissed because of this simplification and its reliance on the work of others. However, it is this combination that enabled him to survive in the Antwerp marketplace. He managed to be so prolific because he had streamlined his technique. Each pictorial area of his landscapes was composed in a single color with little or no modulation. He applied minimal varnishing, which eliminated the effects of roundness and reflection. This stylization and codification of established landscape formulas allowed him to make these works almost as inexpensive and widely available as prints. Jacob Grimmer was one of the first Netherlandish artists to break with the tradition of the mountain landscape pioneered by
Joachim Patinir Joachim Patinir, also called Patenier (c. 1480 – 5 October 1524), was a Flemish Renaissance painter of history and landscape subjects. He was Flemish, from the area of modern Wallonia, but worked in Antwerp, then the centre of the art market ...
, the founder of the so-called
world landscape The world landscape, a translation of the German ''Weltlandschaft'', is a type of composition in Western painting showing an imaginary panoramic landscape seen from an elevated viewpoint that includes mountains and lowlands, water, and buildings. ...
. Abel Grimmer rather depicted broad landscapes of the Flemish countryside characterised by naturalism and a close observation of nature. A favourite theme of Abel Grimmer was the ''Tower of Babel'' of which he produced several versions, clearly inspired by
Pieter Bruegel the Elder Pieter Bruegel (also Brueghel or Breughel) the Elder (, ; ; – 9 September 1569) was the most significant artist of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, a painter and printmaker, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes (so-called genr ...
's treatment of the same subject. The subject is taken from the
Book of Genesis The Book of Genesis (from Greek ; Hebrew: בְּרֵאשִׁית ''Bəreʾšīt'', "In hebeginning") is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. Its Hebrew name is the same as its first word, ( "In the beginning") ...
11:1-9. This narrates the story of the decision to build a city and a tower reaching into the heavens. The biblical character
Nimrod Nimrod (; ; arc, ܢܡܪܘܕ; ar, نُمْرُود, Numrūd) is a biblical figure mentioned in the Book of Genesis and Books of Chronicles. The son of Cush and therefore a great-grandson of Noah, Nimrod was described as a king in the land of ...
was appointed to oversee the project's construction. This story was a rich source of subject matter for various late 16th and early 17th century Flemish painters. Their representations were inspired by the two works of 1563 by
Pieter Bruegel the Elder Pieter Bruegel (also Brueghel or Breughel) the Elder (, ; ; – 9 September 1569) was the most significant artist of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting, a painter and printmaker, known for his landscapes and peasant scenes (so-called genr ...
on this subject matter (
Kunsthistorisches Museum The Kunsthistorisches Museum ( "Museum of Art History", often referred to as the "Museum of Fine Arts") is an art museum in Vienna, Austria. Housed in its festive palatial building on the Vienna Ring Road, it is crowned with an octagonal do ...
, Vienna; and
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen Municipal Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen () is an art museum in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The name of the museum is derived from the two most important collectors of Frans Jacob Otto Boijmans and Daniël George van Beuningen. It is located at ...
, Rotterdam).Abel Grimmer, ''The Tower of Babel''
at Christie's
The story of the Tower of Babel is in essence a reflection on human impiety and hubris, a moral message already implicit in both Bruegel's paintings. The architecture of the Tower of Babel in Grimmer's paintings of the subject echoes that of the
Colosseum The Colosseum ( ; it, Colosseo ) is an oval amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world to ...
, which in the 16th-century symbolised the decay of imperial Rome. Grimmer's treatment of this subject can also be interpreted as a comment on the turbulent times in which he was living. His home country - the Spanish Netherlands - was at the time he created the paintings engaged in a struggle with the breakaway Protestant provinces in the north. The story of the Tower of Babel also tells about a world in which people speaking one language are suddenly riven with the incomprehension of many different languages. This paralleled the 16th century, when the once united Netherlands became divided between a Catholic south and a Protestant north which vigorously debated the interpretation of the bible and the role of the church. Abel Grimmer collaborated with several different figure painters who provided the staffage in his Babel paintings. Abel Grimmer also produced architectural paintings including church interiors such as the ''Interior of a Gothic Church with a Franciscan Monk Preaching'' (sold at Sotheby's in London on 9 March 1983). His interest in perspective and the use of a golden light anticipate the work of the Dutch painter of church interiors
Pieter Saenredam Pieter Jansz. Saenredam (9 June 1597 – buried 31 May 1665) was a painter of the Dutch Golden Age, known for his distinctive paintings of whitewashed church interiors such as ''Interior of St Bavo's Church in Haarlem'' and '' Interior of the ...
. His paintings of interior views, such as ''A Ball'' (
Wrotham Park, Hertfordshire Wrotham Park (pronounced , ) is a neo-Palladian English country house in the parish of South Mimms, Hertfordshire. It lies south of the town of Potters Bar, from Hyde Park Corner in central London. The house was designed by Isaac Ware in 175 ...
) and ''Jesus in the House of Martha and Mary'' (
Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium The Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium (french: Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, nl, Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van België) are a group of art museums in Brussels, Belgium. They include six museums: the Oldmasters Muse ...
) show Abel's interest in portraying interior space. Both works are clearly inspired by
Hans Vredeman de Vries Hans Vredeman de Vries (1527 – c. 1607) was a Dutch Renaissance architect, painter, and engineer. Vredeman de Vries is known for his publication in 1583 on garden design and his books with many examples on ornaments (1565) and perspective (1604 ...
who also painted a ''Jesus in the House of Martha and Mary'' (
Royal Collection The Royal Collection of the British royal family is the largest private art collection in the world. Spread among 13 occupied and historic royal residences in the United Kingdom, the collection is owned by King Charles III and overseen by the ...
). He relied on other artists such as
Frans Francken the Younger Frans Francken the Younger (1581 in Antwerp, 1581 – 6 May 1642, in Antwerp) was a Flemish painter who created altarpieces and furniture panels and gained his reputation chiefly through his small and delicate cabinet pictures with historical, m ...
to paint the staffage in his architectural paintings. He would occasionally paint church interiors without staffage. An example is the ''Church interior'' (Galen Galerie). This depicts a church interior without any figures and shows the artist's interest in architecture and atmosphere.Abel Grimmer, ''Kircheninterieur''
at Galen Galerie
Earlier scholars suggested that Abel was also an architect on the basis of two autograph architectural drawings depicting respectively an elevation of the gable of
Antwerp Cathedral The Cathedral of Our Lady ( nl, Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekathedraal) is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Antwerp, Belgium. Today's see of the Diocese of Antwerp started in 1352 and, although the first stage of construction was ended in 1521, has never been ...
and a church gable with a
Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
spire.


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Grimmer, Abel 1570s births 1620s deaths Flemish history painters Flemish Renaissance painters Flemish landscape painters Artists from Antwerp Painters from Antwerp