Antoine Caron
Encyclopedia
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
master
Master craftsman
A master craftsman or master tradesman was a member of a guild. In the European guild system, only masters were allowed to be members of the guild....
glass
Glass
Glass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
maker, illustrator, Northern Mannerist painter
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
and a product of the School of Fontainebleau
School of Fontainebleau
The Ecole de Fontainebleau refers to two periods of artistic production in France during the late Renaissance centered around the royal Château de Fontainebleau, that were crucial in forming the French version of Northern Mannerism....
.
He is one of the few French painters of his time who had a pronounced artistic personality. His work reflects the refined, although highly unstable, atmosphere at the court of the House of Valois during the French Wars of Religion
French Wars of Religion
The French Wars of Religion is the name given to a period of civil infighting and military operations, primarily fought between French Catholics and Protestants . The conflict involved the factional disputes between the aristocratic houses of France, such as the House of Bourbon and House of Guise...
of 1560 to 1598.
Life
Caron was born in BeauvaisBeauvais
Beauvais is a city approximately by highway north of central Paris, in the northern French region of Picardie. It currently has a population of over 60,000 inhabitants.- History :...
.
He began painting in his teens doing frescos for a number of churches. Between 1540 and 1550 he worked under Primaticcio
Francesco Primaticcio
Francesco Primaticcio was an Italian Mannerist painter, architect and sculptor who spent most of his career in France.-Biography:...
and Niccolò dell'Abbate
Niccolò dell'Abbate
Nicolò dell' Abate, sometimes Niccolò, was an Italian painter and decorator. He was of the Emilian school, and was part of the staff of artists called the School of Fontainebleau that introduced the Italianate Renaissance to France.-Biography:Niccolò dell'Abbate was born in Modena, the son of a...
at the School of Fontainebleau. In 1561, he was appointed the court painter
Court painter
A court painter was an artist who painted for the members of a royal or noble family, sometimes on a fixed salary and on an exclusive basis where the artist was not supposed to undertake other work. Especially in the late Middle Ages, they were often given the office of valet de chambre...
by Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici was an Italian noblewoman who was Queen consort of France from 1547 until 1559, as the wife of King Henry II of France....
and Henry II of France
Henry II of France
Henry II was King of France from 31 March 1547 until his death in 1559.-Early years:Henry was born in the royal Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, near Paris, the son of Francis I and Claude, Duchess of Brittany .His father was captured at the Battle of Pavia in 1525 by his sworn enemy,...
. As court painter he also had the duties of organizing the court pageants. In this way he was involved in organizing the ceremony and royal entry
Royal Entry
The Royal Entry, also known by various other names, including Triumphal Entry and Joyous Entry, embraced the ceremonial and festivities accompanying a formal entry by a ruler or his representative into a city in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period in Europe...
for the coronation of Charles IX
Charles IX of France
Charles IX was King of France, ruling from 1560 until his death. His reign was dominated by the Wars of Religion. He is best known as king at the time of the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre.-Childhood:...
in Paris and the wedding of Henry IV of France
Henry IV of France
Henry IV , Henri-Quatre, was King of France from 1589 to 1610 and King of Navarre from 1572 to 1610. He was the first monarch of the Bourbon branch of the Capetian dynasty in France....
with Marguerite de Valois
Marguerite de Valois
Margaret of Valois was Queen of France and of Navarre during the late sixteenth century...
. Some of his surviving illustrations are from these pageants.
His drawings of festivities at the court of Charles IX are likely sources for the depiction of the court in the Valois Tapestries
Valois Tapestries
The Valois Tapestries are a series of eight tapestries depicting festivities or "magnificences" at the Court of France in the second half of the 16th century. The tapestries were worked in the Spanish Netherlands, probably in Brussels or Antwerp, shortly after 1580.Scholars have not firmly...
. He died in Paris in 1599.
Art
Not many of Caron’s works survive, but they include historical and allegorical subjects, court ceremonies, astrological scenes, and his massacres, done in the mid 1560s. An example is his only signed and dated painting, Massacres under the Triumvirate (1566) which hangs in the LouvreLouvre
The Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
. Caron used bright colors and incorporated unusual architectural forms. He often placed his human figures almost insignificantly on grand stages, as did his mentor dell'Abbate. His figures tend to be elongated, even in portraits such as Portrait of a Lady (1577).
Many works attributed to him are also attributed to others. As there is minimal documentation of French painting in that era, this is not unusual. Because Caron is relatively well known, his name is likely to be attached to paintings similar to his known works. In some cases, such painting are now ascribed "to the workshop of Antoine Caron", for example, The Submission of Milan to Francis I in 1515 (c.1570).
Selected works
- Massacres of the Triumvirate, 1566, oil on linen canvas, 116 x 195 cm, Musée du LouvreLouvreThe Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
, Paris - La Sibylle de Tibur, 1575/1580, oil on canvas, 170 x 125 cm, Louvre, Paris, (The Tiburtine Sibyl or Augustus and the Sibyl of the Tiber)
- Abraham and Melchisedek, c. 1590, wood, 80×94 cm. private collection, Paris
- Astronomers Watching an Eclipse or Dionysius the Areopagite Converting the Pagan Philosophers, 1570s, oil on canvas, 93×73 cm., formerly in the collection of Anthony BluntAnthony BluntAnthony Frederick Blunt , was a British art historian who was exposed as a Soviet spy late in his life.Blunt was Professor of the History of Art at the University of London, director of the Courtauld Institute of Art, Surveyor of the King's Pictures and London...
, London, now at the J. Paul Getty MuseumGetty CenterThe Getty Center, in Brentwood, Los Angeles, California, is a campus for cultural institutions founded by oilman J. Paul Getty. The $1.3 billion center, which opened on December 16, 1997, is also well known for its architecture, gardens, and views overlooking Los Angeles...
, Los Angeles - Portrait of a Lady, 1577, Tempera on panel, Alte PinakothekAlte PinakothekThe Alte Pinakothek is an art museum situated in the Kunstareal in Munich, Germany. It is one of the oldest galleries in the world and houses one of the most famous collections of Old Master paintings...
, München - Le train de deuil Amors, Louvre, Paris (The funeral procession of Love or An Allegory of the Death of Love)
- Bagathan and Tharès Staatliche Graphische Sammlung (State Graphics Collection) in the Münchner Haus der Kulturinstitute (Munich Culture Institute), Munich
- The Elephant Carousel, 1598, oil on wood, 87 x 130 cm., private collection, Paris
- The Arrest and Supplication of Sir Thomas More (1478-1535) oil on wood, Musee de Blois, BloisBloisBlois is the capital of Loir-et-Cher department in central France, situated on the banks of the lower river Loire between Orléans and Tours.-History:...
- Apotheose of Semele, c. 1585, oil on wood, 65×76 cm. private collection, Paris
- The Triumph of Winter, c. 1568, oil on canvas, 103 x 179 cm, private collection
- Diane Chasseresse, 1550, oil on Louvre, Paris, (Diana, the Huntress) [School of Fontainebleau ...]
- The Submission of Milan to Francis I in 1515 c. 1570, oil on wood, 50.5 x 66.8 cm, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario [workshop of...]