Herri met de Bles
Encyclopedia
Flanders
Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...
Northern Renaissance
Northern Renaissance
The Northern Renaissance is the term used to describe the Renaissance in northern Europe, or more broadly in Europe outside Italy. Before 1450 Italian Renaissance humanism had little influence outside Italy. From the late 15th century the ideas spread around Europe...
and Mannerist
Northern Mannerism
Northern Mannerism is the term in European art history for the versions of Mannerism practiced in the visual arts north of the Alps in the 16th and early 17th century...
landscape
Landscape
Landscape comprises the visible features of an area of land, including the physical elements of landforms such as mountains, hills, water bodies such as rivers, lakes, ponds and the sea, living elements of land cover including indigenous vegetation, human elements including different forms of...
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...
. He is also defined as a ’’Mosan landscape painter active during the second third of the 16thcentury (i.e., second generation of landscape painters).’’
Very little is positively known about the artist. He is believed to be a certain Herry de Patenir who joined Antwerp's Guild of St. Luke in 1535 as a painter and is also believed to be a 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...
for the d'Este Dukes of Ferrara
Ferrara
Ferrara is a city and comune in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, capital city of the Province of Ferrara. It is situated 50 km north-northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream of the Po River, located 5 km north...
, where he ended his career known as "Il Civetta". He contributed, along with his possible-uncle Joachim Patinir
Joachim Patinir
Joachim Patinir, also called de Patiner , was a Flemish Northern Renaissance history and landscape painter from the area of modern Wallonia...
, to a distinct style of Northern Renaissance landscape painting that combined small history or religious scenes into compositions defined by perspective and atmospheric effects. Also, along with a group of Antwerp-based followers of Hieronymus Bosch that included Jan Mandyn, Pieter Huys
Pieter Huys
Pieter Huys , was a Flemish Renaissance painter.-Biography:Little is known of his early life, and though he was mostly active in Antwerp, his place of birth and death is not certain. According to the RKD he became a master in the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke in 1545, and his last dated work is from 1577...
, and Jan Wellens de Cock
Jan Wellens de Cock
Jan Wellens de Cock was a Flemish painter and draftsman of the Northern Renaissance. He was probably born in Leiden in Holland but settled in Antwerpen....
, Met de Bles continued the tradition of fantastic imagery into northern Mannerism.