Peter Paul Rubens - Oil Painting Reproductions

Rubens was born in Siegen in Westphalia, currently in Germany, in a well-to-do family of a lawyer. Following his father’s death when Peter was just 10 years old, he, along with his six siblings and his mother moved to Antwerp, where he went to school and received his early artistic education. Initially, he worked as an apprentice to a number of established artists and was admitted to the town’s guild of painters in 1598. A couple of years later, Rubens traveled to Italy, where he became acquainted with the art of Titian and Tintoretto in Venice and then Raphael and Michelangelo in Rome. The Duke of Mantua became his patron, commissioning not only portraits but also sponsoring his travels to Genoa and Rome. His initial career proved to be successful as he was able to get a large number of commissions from private clients for portraits and religious works from churches.

In 1608, Rubens returned to Antwerp where he married, settled down and established his own studio with many assistants. His status as the court painter to Albert VII, Archduke of Austria, and Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain helped him to win many commissions from affluent merchants and Roman Catholic churches, including the Antwerp Cathedral. During this period, apart from his religious paintings that depicted biblical or mythological scenes, he also executed a large number of historical and hunting scene paintings. He became known as "the prince of painters and the painter of princes" for his immense talent and the number of commissions he received from the royalty, including notably Louis XIII of France and Charles I of England.

After his wife died, Rubens started traveling again, however, this time, he combined his artistic pursuits with diplomatic assignments from The Netherlands to England and Spain. In 1630, the 53-year old Rubens married his first wife’s niece, the 16-year old daughter of a wealthy merchant, Helene Fourment, who soon bore him a son. Both featured in a self-portrait that he painted subsequently. His domestic happiness was also depicted in many of the mythological works of this period that featured courting couples in idyllic landscapes. Helene was also the inspiration behind many of the paintings of full-figured women that he executed in this period.

Rubens is especially famous for his paintings of biblical and mythological women in the Baroque style of depicting them as passive, soft-bodied and extremely sexual beings that emphasized concepts of physical beauty, desire, temptation, fertility, as well as virtue. His voluptuous nudes were undoubtedly crafted to appeal to his largely male patrons. Not surprisingly, the partially nude males in his paintings were characteristically depicted as being engaged in physical action illustrating them as powerful, forceful, compelling and capable of high achievement in athletics, valor in war as well as authority in civil life. The female archetypes that Rubens portrayed were the virgin, wife, widow, consort and diplomatic regent while for males it was typically husband, father, hero, king, civic leader and the battle-weary warrior.

Rubens is especially acknowledged for his outstanding skill in arranging complex groups of figures in his compositions, his effortlessness at depicting diverse subjects and his capacity to work on a large scale.

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