JOÃO TEIXEIRA ALBERNAZ (Lisbon, c. l 560-165 2): Son of the cartographer Luis Teixeira, he is usually known as Joao Teixeira Albemaz the Elder to distinguish him from a grandson of the same name who was also a cartographer. In 1602, he received the title of Master of Navigational Charts and Nautical Instruments. Three years later he was named Cartographer of Guinea and India and supplied some of the maps and instruments for the Royal Fleets. He is the author of the first Atlas of Brazil.
GILLIS PEETERS (1612-1653) : Landscape painter who, with his brother Bonaventura, became Master of the Painters' Guild of Antwerp in 1634. He was also an engraver. Some writers have suggested that he spent some time in Brazil during the occupation of part of the North-East by the Dutch West India Company. Erik Larsen even says that he was a member of the retinue of the Nassau mission and stayed for about a year, making notes and sketches and painting.
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| GILLIS PEETERS - LANDSCAPE WITH POLYPHEMUS |
GEORG MARGGRAF (Liebstadt, 1610 - Sao Paulo de Luanda, 1644): Dutch Naturalist, studied astronomy at Leiden University. Came to Brazil in 1638, landing in Bahia and later travelling to Recife, where he worked for Maurice of Nassau. He was responsible for the setting up of the first astronomical observatory in the new continent. Until 1641 he probably worked as assistant to the physician Willem Piso and apparently had a disagreement with him, which is the reason for the coded notes to his scientific works, subsequently deciphered by Johannes de Laet. During his travels he drew maps and put together a considerable collection of plants and animals. In 1644 he travelled to Angola and died there of fever. Together with Willem Piso, he is the author of Historia Naturalis Brasiliae (Antwerp, 1648), the first natural history of Brazil.
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| FRANS JANSZOON POST |
NIELS AAGARD LYI'ZEN (1826-1890): Danish painter of portraits, animals, landscapes and religious themes.
MANUFACTURE DES GOBELINS: Charged with the supply of furnishings to the royal palaces. Based in Paris and headed by Charles Le Brun, besides tapestries and furniture it was also responsible for sculptures, objects in gold and silver, carriages lock etc. In 1687, the Inspector of the Royal Palaces proposed the use of American themes in the carpets produced by the Factory. From this year on, a series of tapestries were produced based on cartoons made from drawings attributed to Eckhout, whose originals had been presented by Maurice of Nassau to King Louis XIV in 1678. Between 1737 and 1741 François Desportes created new cartoons for Gobelins, based on the earlier ones but introducing so many changes that the new series came to be known as the Nouvelles Indes, while the old designs were known as Anciennes Indes.
JOAQUIM JOSE DE MIRANDA: Nothing is known about the painter apart from the work portraying "The Tenth Expedition to the Tibagi Backlands", commanded by Dom Luis Antonio de Souza Botelho Mourao, which entered the Carrapato area on the 17th of November 1771, with the aim of surveying the territory, including the natural resources available for settlement and the local Indian tribes and their culture. The description of the expedition, up to the 16th of December 1771, was contained in three reports sent to the Governor of Sao Paulo and accompanied by a Chorographic Map, showing the geographical features of the area and the situation of indigenous villages. The drawings are unsigned, but the name Miranda appears at the foot of the descriptive sheet, the last of the thirty nine scenes making up the collection.
SYDNEY PARKINSON (1745 - 1771): Contracted by the naturalist Joseph Banks as artist to the Cook expedition. Died of fever when the expedition left Java.
FIRST CIRCUMNAVIGATION BY CAPTAIN JAMES COOK (1768 - 1771): the first of three voyages of circumnavigation commanded by Capt.a.in Cook and sponsored by the Royal Geographical Society had as its main aim the observation of the transit of Venus from Tahiti, in an attempt to measure the distance between the Earth and the Sun. The Endeavour set out from England in 1768, arriving off the coast of Brazil between November and December of that year. Having rounded Cape Hom, it crossed the Pacific and spent a considerable time exploring the unknown East coast of Australia. Various members of the crew perished before the expedition returned to England, among them the two official artists.
JEAN-BAPTISTE DEBRET (Paris 1768 - Paris 1848): Painter and draughtsman, who also worked as a theatre designer and decorator. A cousin of Jacques-Louis David, his studies at the School of Fine Arts in Paris were interrupted, in 1791, by the Revolution. He then studied engineering at the Polytechnic, where he was later to work as professor of design. In 1815 he was invited by Lebreton to be professor of historical painting in the French Artistic Mission, which was to found the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts of Rio de Janeiro. Arriving in Brazil in 1816, he worked on the decoration of the city of Rio de Janeiro for the celebrations to mark the acclamation of the Prince Regent. Owing to delay in the construction of the Academy, he gave painting classes on his own account with Montigny, and formed a first group of Brazilian followers. During this period he travelled through the provinces of Sao Paulo, Parana, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul. When the Academy officially opened in 1829, he organised the first exhibitions of Fine Arts ever held in Brazil. He returned to France in 1831, accompanied by his pupil Manuel de Araujo Porto Alegre, the future director of the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts of Rio de Janeiro. The Voyage Pittoresque et Historique au Bresil was published in Paris by Firmin-Didot Freres between 1834 and 1839.
WILLIAM HAVELL (Reading 1782 - London 1857): Painter. Although he was the son of Luke Havell, Drawing Master at Reading Grammar School, William appears to have been self taught as an artist. From 1804 he was a regular exhibitor at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, and at the Society of British Artists, and was one of the founders of the Royal Society of Painters in Watercolour. In 1816 he passed through Rio de Janeiro, on his way to China with Lord Amherst's mission. From 1817 to 1825 he worked in India as a watercolour portraitist. He returned to England in 1827.
NICOLAS ANTOINE TAUNAY (Paris 1755 - Paris 1830): Painter of landscapes, portraits and historical themes. Member of a family of artists. In 1784 he entered the Royal Academy of Painting in Paris, where he was a student of David. Between 1789 and 1793 he was a pensioner of the Parisian Academy in Rome. He was elected to the Institut de France in 1795, and ten years later was chosen to paint the campaigns of Napoleon in Germany. He joined the French Artistic Mission, organised by Lebreton, and sailed for Brazil with his family in 1816. While awaiting the completion of the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts of Rio de Janeiro, he taught painting and became official painter to the Court. He was appointed to the chair of landscape painting at the Academy. In 1821 he decided to return to France with his wife, leaving his son Felix Emile Taunay as his successor at the Academy. In Rio de Janeiro he lived at Alto da Boa Vista, near the Tijuca Waterfall, known today by the name of the artist.
JOHANN MORITZ RUGENDAS (Augsburg 1802 - Weilheim 1859): Drawer and painter. He came from a family of artists and was educated in Munich. Excited by the reports of the journeys of Spix and Martius and by the exhibition in Vienna of Thomas Ender's Brazilian drawings, he joined the Langsdorff expedition and arrived in Rio de Janeiro in March 1822. He travelled through Minas Gerais, but quarrelled with Langsdorff and left the expedition. He returned to Europe in 1825, where he met Alexander von Humboldt, who became a great admirer of his work. He travelled throughout the Americas between 1831 and 1846, including Haiti, Mexico, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Urugua' Argentina and Brazil.
COMTE DE CLARAC (Paris 1777 - Paris 1847): Landscape painter and archaeologist. In 1808 he became tutor to the children of the King of Naples, while at the same time directing archaeological excavations at Pompeii. As a member of the diplomatic mission of the Count of Luxembourg, he travelled to the West Indies and South America in 1816. Accompanied by the botanist Auguste de Saint-Hilaire, he arrived in Rio de Janeiro in June of that year and stayed there until September. During this period he produced drawings of various scenes of the Brazilian capital. On his return to France, he became a member of the Institute and of the Academy of Fine Arts in Paris. At the Salon de Paris in 1819, he exhibited a work entitled Interior of a forest in Brazil, inspired by his recent travels.
FELIX EMILE TAUNAY (Montmorency 1795 - Rio de Janeiro 1881): Painter of landscapes, portraits and historical scenes. The son of Nicolas Antoine Taunay, he accompanied his father on his journey to Brazil as a member of the French Artistic Mission in 1816. He settled in Rio de Janeiro, where from an early age he pursued an artistic career. He was tutor in French, Greek and Literature to the Emperor Pedro II. In 1824 he succeeded his father as professor of landscape painting at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. In 1833 he became Secretary and, between 1834 and 1851, Director of the Academy.
E.F. SCHUTE: Romantic landscape painter, about whom vecy little is known. Probably of German origin, he was in Brazil in the middle years of the 19th cent.icy, in the north-east region of the country.
JOHN CHRISTIAN SCHETKY (Edinburgh 1778 - London 1874): Painter of sea scenes, inspired by Dutch artists of the 17th century, such as Wilhem Van de Velde. He was a pupil of Nasmyth and was professor of drawing at the Royal Military College in Great Marlow; at the Royal Naval College in Portsmouth; and at the East India College in Addiscombrie. He worked as a marine painter for George IV, William IV and Queen Victoria.
NICOLA ANTONIO FACCHINETII (Treviso 1824 - Rio de Janeiro 1900): Landscape and portrait painter. Little is known about his background and education, except that, on his arrival in Brazil in 1849, he had served three years of an artistic apprenticeship. He probably left Italy for political reasons. He settled in the city of Rio de Janeiro, where he gave drawing and painting classes and worked as a portrait painter. In 1870 he started painting landscapes, which brought him some fame, and he became a member of the Grimm group. He did works on commission, principally for the large landowners of Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais. He took part in several of the general exhibitions of the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts.
JOHANN GEORG GRIMM ( - 1846 - Palermo 1887): Bavarian landscape painter, educated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. After serving in the Franco-Prussian War, he left Germany and travelled through the Alps, northern Italy, Sicily, Greece, Turkey, Palestine, North Africa, Spain and Portugal. His reasons for coming to Brazil in 1878 are unknown. At the exhibition promoted by the Society for the Propagation of the Fine Arts at the School of Arts and Crafts in 1882, he showed 128 of his works, which caused a great stir in the artistic circles of the time. He became professor of landscape painting at the Imperial Academy, where he introduced the technique of painting in the open air. He left the Academy in 1884, accompanied by his followers Castagneto, Parreiras, Caron, Garcia y Vazquez, Franca Junior and Gomes Ribeiro and by his friend Driendl, in order to work in Niter6i. The group, which became known as the Grimm group, later moved to Teres6polis. Between 1885 and 1886, he painted on commission in Minas Gerais. He returned to Europe in 1887, and died shortly afterwards in Italy, after travelling through Tunis and Sicily.