Balthasar Denner
Encyclopedia
Paraphernalia
In modern usage, the word paraphernalia most commonly refers to apparatus, equipment, or furnishing used in or necessary for a particular activity as in, "Beth is such an avid sports fan that her walls are covered with baseball paraphernalia"....
were done by other painters or later his daughter.
Life
Denner was born in the city of Altona, now incorporated into HamburgHamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
. At the time Altona was part of the Danish kingdom, its second largest city after Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
and famous for its religious tolerance. His father Jacob Denner was a Mennonite
Mennonite
The Mennonites are a group of Christian Anabaptist denominations named after the Frisian Menno Simons , who, through his writings, articulated and thereby formalized the teachings of earlier Swiss founders...
minister and a dyer
Dyeing
Dyeing is the process of adding color to textile products like fibers, yarns, and fabrics. Dyeing is normally done in a special solution containing dyes and particular chemical material. After dyeing, dye molecules have uncut Chemical bond with fiber molecules. The temperature and time controlling...
. Balthasar had seven sisters; he was the only son. When he was eight years old he had an accident and for the rest of his life he walked with a limp
Limp
A limp is a type of asymmetric abnormality of the gait. Limping may be caused by pain, weakness, neuromuscular imbalance, or a skeletal deformity. The most common underlying cause of a painful limp is physical trauma however in the absence of trauma other serious causes such as septic arthritis,...
. His convalescence was slow and to cope with boredom Denner started to draw and copy paintings by Berchem and Bloemaert. His teacher became a Dutchman, Frans van Amama. In 1696 the family moved to Danzig, where Denner practiced oil painting
Oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...
between 1698 to 1700.
In 1701 the family moved back to the Hanseatic town. Balthasar became a clerk at his uncle, who was a merchant. In 1707 he became a member of the Akademie der Künste
Akademie der Künste
The Akademie der Künste, Berlin is an arts institution in Berlin, Germany. It was founded in 1696 by Elector Frederick III of Brandenburg as the Prussian Academy of Arts, an academic institution where members could meet and discuss and share ideas...
in Berlin. The
Denner began his career as a painter of miniatures, In 1709 he painted the nine year old Charles Frederick, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp
Charles Frederick, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp
Duke Charles Frederick of Holstein-Gottorp was the son of Frederick IV of Holstein-Gottorp and his wife, Hedvig Sophia, daughter of King Charles XI of Sweden...
and his sister in miniature; Denner was invited to Gottorp Castle and painted him self at the background of group portrait of the ducal family. In 1712 he married and the next year he moved to Hamburg when Altona was destroyed by Magnus Stenbock
Magnus Stenbock
Count Magnus Gustafsson Stenbock was a Swedish military officer at the time of the Great Northern War.He was the son of Gustaf Otto Stenbock and Christina Catharine de la Gardie....
during the Great Nordic War; in 1714 he made a trip to Amsterdam; in 1715 to London; in 1717 to Copenhagen. In 1720 he visited the court in Wolfenbüttel
Wolfenbüttel
Wolfenbüttel is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany, located on the Oker river about 13 kilometres south of Brunswick. It is the seat of the District of Wolfenbüttel and of the bishop of the Protestant Lutheran State Church of Brunswick...
and Hanover. Denner was invited to England, but first he met with Adriaen van der Werff
Adriaen van der Werff
Adriaen van der Werff was an accomplished Dutch painter of portraits and erotic, devotional and mythological scenes. His brother, Pieter van der Werff , was his principal pupil and assistant.-Life:...
, and showed him his painting of an old woman.Van der Werff was impressed and could only compare the painting with the Mona Lisa
Mona Lisa
Mona Lisa is a portrait by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. It is a painting in oil on a poplar panel, completed circa 1503–1519...
. Also in London the painting caused great excitement and it was sent to Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor
Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor
Charles VI was the penultimate Habsburg sovereign of the Habsburg Empire. He succeeded his elder brother, Joseph I, as Holy Roman Emperor, King of Bohemia , Hungary and Croatia , Archduke of Austria, etc., in 1711...
. Denner received 5875 guilders and in 1725 he was ordered to paint an old man as a counterpiece for the same amount of money. In 1728 he left London because of the smog
Smog
Smog is a type of air pollution; the word "smog" is a portmanteau of smoke and fog. Modern smog is a type of air pollution derived from vehicular emission from internal combustion engines and industrial fumes that react in the atmosphere with sunlight to form secondary pollutants that also combine...
and sailed to Hamburg.
After London
In 1729 he visited the court in Blankenburg am HarzBlankenburg am Harz
Blankenburg is a town and health resort in the district of Harz, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany, at the north foot of the Harz Mountains, southwest of Halberstadt....
en Dresden; afterwards he went to Berlin. In 1730 his pupil Dominicus van der Smissen married Catharina Denner, his sister. Denner went for the second time to Amsterdam; in 1734 to Braunschweig
Braunschweig
Braunschweig , is a city of 247,400 people, located in the federal-state of Lower Saxony, Germany. It is located north of the Harz mountains at the farthest navigable point of the Oker river, which connects to the North Sea via the rivers Aller and Weser....
and Salzdahlum. In 1734 he rented a house in Amsterdam, but was busy painting for Christian Ludwig II, Duke of Mecklenburg in Schwerin
Schwerin
Schwerin is the capital and second-largest city of the northern German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The population, as of end of 2009, was 95,041.-History:...
. He moved there in 1736
and painted the wealthy Dutch banker George Clifford
George Clifford III
George Clifford III was a wealthy Dutch banker and one of the directors of the Dutch East India Company. He is known for his keen interest in plants and gardens...
, a keen plant-collector who had invited Linnaeus to live on his estate Hartekamp
Hartekamp
Hartekamp, or Hartecamp, is the name of a villa in Heemstede, the Netherlands, on the Bennebroek border. It was once the summer home of George Clifford, who employed Linnaeus in 1737 to write his Hortus Cliffortianus, a detailed description of the gardens of Hartecamp.-History:The house was built...
. In 1739 he left Amsterdam. When he painted the twelve-year-old Peter III of Russia
Peter III of Russia
Peter III was Emperor of Russia for six months in 1762. He was very pro-Prussian, which made him an unpopular leader. He was supposedly assassinated as a result of a conspiracy led by his wife, who succeeded him to the throne as Catherine II.-Early life and character:Peter was born in Kiel, in...
in Kiel
Kiel
Kiel is the capital and most populous city in the northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 238,049 .Kiel is approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the north of Germany, the southeast of the Jutland peninsula, and the southwestern shore of the...
(around 1740), he had to make several copies, which were sent to all the European courts; one was sent to Russia as a silent reminder Peter could be considered the heir. In 1742 he refused to move to Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
, where he was offered a good job. When painting a sitter, his children would play music for them. In 1743 he painted Adolf Frederick, King of Sweden. Around 1745 he lived in Altona again, where three of his children were buried. Denner was in grief and did not paint for one year.
When he died there were 46 unfinished paintings in his studio. Staatliches Museum Schwerin ownes 75 portraits by Denner. His portrait of Georg Frideric Handel (1733) is at the National Portrait Gallery, London. Denner also painted the children of Barthold Heinrich Brockes
Barthold Heinrich Brockes
Barthold Heinrich Brockes was a German poet.He was born at Hamburg and educated at the Gelehrtenschule des Johanneums. He studied jurisprudence at Halle, and after extensive travels in Italy, France and the Netherlands, settled in Hamburg in 1704...
, a poet from Hamburg, who was the librettist of the Brockes Passion
Brockes Passion
The Brockes Passion, or Der für die Sünde der Welt gemarterte und sterbende Jesus is a German oratorio libretto by Barthold Heinrich Brockes, first published in 1712 and going through 30 or so editions in the next 15 years....
. Denner had become friends with Johan van Gool, and had sent him his biography.
In 1837 a Swiss painter fooled the Louvre
Louvre
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...
experts with
Head of an old woman wearing a bonnet.
External links
- http://www.rijksmuseum.nl/zoeken/search.jsp?value=Denner,%20Balthasar&operator=contains&field=name&lang=en&focus=assetsFour portraits by Denner in the RijksmuseumRijksmuseumThe Rijksmuseum Amsterdam or simply Rijksmuseum is a Dutch national museum in Amsterdam, located on the Museumplein. The museum is dedicated to arts, crafts, and history. It has a large collection of paintings from the Dutch Golden Age and a substantial collection of Asian art...
and selfportrait] - Three portraits in Historisch Museum Rotterdam
- http://www.scholarsresource.com/browse/artist/357Three portraits in Kunsthalle HamburgKunsthalle HamburgThe Hamburger Kunsthalle is an art museum in Hamburg, Germany. The art museum focuses on painting in Hamburg in the 14th century, paintings by Dutch and Flemish artists of the 16th and 17th centuries, French and German paintings of the 19th century, modern, and contemporary art...
]