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(b Dolni Dŭbnik, nr Pleven, July 24, 1901; d Sofia, Jan 23, 1958).

Bulgarian cartoonist, illustrator, draughtsman, painter, teacher, editor and critic. In 1926 he studied painting at the Academy of Art, Sofia, and although he was later known for his paintings, he achieved greater fame as a political and social cartoonist and newspaper and magazine illustrator. His early cartoons are courageous commentaries on political events in Bulgaria from 1925 to 1934, wittily satirizing the monarchy and dictatorships. He also mocked the machinations of the various bourgeois political parties as they fought for power. Among his most celebrated cartoons are the Kidnapping of the Constitution and the Tsar’s Family, published in the Sofia newspapers Zemedelsko Zname and Sturetz, as well as Suvremennik and other left-wing publications. He also illustrated the series Spanish Chronicle (1936). In 1940 he began freelancing for the anti-Fascist satirical newspaper Sturshel (Sofia) and in 1941 became its editor. During World War II he executed many political cartoons opposing Fascism and Nazism (e.g. ...

(Richard)

(b Croydon, London, March 31, 1888; d Toronto, March 21, 1955).

Canadian painter, critic and writer of English birth. He emigrated in 1905 to Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. In 1921 he moved to Toronto to work as an editor and publisher. He is best known as a pioneer of abstract painting in Canada. His show (1927) at Toronto’s Arts & Letters Club was the first solo exhibition of abstract art by a Canadian artist. His early work is characterized by the bold non-objective imagery seen in the complex Sounds Assembling (1928; Winnipeg, A.G.). After 1930 he reassessed his artistic direction: he turned first to figurative imagery (e.g. Torso, 1937; Ottawa, N.G.) and then looking to Cubism he re-examined the nature of abstraction in his painting, without returning to the non-objectivity of his earlier work. Between 1926 and 1930 Brooker wrote ‘The Seven Arts’, a syndicated column of art criticism for the Southam Press. In addition, he edited The Yearbook of the Arts in Canada...

(fl 1660–83)

English miniature painter, writer, printmaker and print publisher. In 1665 he taught limning to Elizabeth Pepys, wife of Samuel Pepys, probably on the recommendation of Pepys’s superior, Sir William Penn, whose daughter he had previously taught. Pepys, finding Browne over-familiar, terminated the acquaintance the following year. In 1669 Browne published Ars Pictoria, or an Academy Treating of Drawing, Painting, Limning and Etching, with 31 plates etched by himself after Old Master painters. It was published with Browne’s portrait by Jacob Huysmans, engraved by Arnold de Jode (b 1638; fl 1658–66), as its frontispiece. Six years later Browne added An Appendix to the Art of Painting in Miniture [sic] or Limning, etc and in 1677 published A Commodious Drawing Book with 40 plates after modern masters. In 1683, according to Horace Walpole, Browne obtained a 14-year patent to publish 100 mezzotint prints from works by Anthony van Dyck and ...

(b Paris, c. 1604; d Laluque, Landes, March 29, 1678).

French painter, engraver and print publisher. Although it was as a painter that he was received (reçu) in 1663 by the Académie Royale, it is as an engraver that he is now remembered. His earliest known print is dated 1630, and he later made many plates, particularly reproductive engravings after his contemporaries Jacques Blanchard and Claude Vignon. He was one of Simon Vouet’s best interpreters, and Vouet himself commissioned from him at least 11 plates after his own paintings. Daret’s most important projects were the engraving of plates for and the publication of M. de Gomberville’s La Doctrine des moeurs (Paris, 1646) and the monumental collection of over 100 portraits in the Tableaux historiques où sont gravez les illustres français et estrangiers (Paris, 1652). His translation of Vasari’s life of Raphael, Abrégé de la vie de Raphael Sansio d’Urbin (Paris, 1651), is celebrated as the first monograph on an artist published in France....

Swiss, 20th century, male.

Born 1938, in Cernier.

Painter, watercolourist, draughtsman. Landscapes.

Aloys Perregaux was a journalist, art historian and professor at the University of Neuchâtel, but painted in his free time. Largely self-taught, he was advised by the Bernese painter Max von Mühlenen. A thesis written by Perregaux alludes to the painter Charles Lapicque, whose influence he specifically acknowledges....

(b Craiova, Aug 13, 1877; d Bucharest, Aug 4, 1953).

Romanian painter, illustrator, critic and teacher. He began his artistic training in a printer’s workshop in Craiova, then worked in a lithographic workshop in Düsseldorf (1898–9); from 1900 to 1905 he studied at the Fine Arts School in Bucharest. He rapidly became a well-known illustrator for newspapers and journals, notable for his polemical spirit, his conciseness and his geometrical and energetic graphic style. He also exhibited paintings in Bucharest at the official Salon and at the exhibitions of the association Tinerimea Artistică (The young artists) (e.g. A Halt, 1912; Bucharest, N. Mus. A.), and in 1916 he began to write art criticism. He participated in the exhibitions of the Arta Română association (1921–4) and with Ştefan Dimitrescu (1886–1933), Nicolae Tonitza (1886–1940) and the sculptor Oscar Han (1891–1976) created the Group of Four (1925–33), whose objective was to promote modern art in Romania. Şirato’s best-known paintings during this period featured Romanian peasants, as in ...

[Sirak; Christov, Panayot Todorov]

(b Sliven, Oct 22, 1883; d Sofia, March 5, 1943).

Bulgarian painter, draughtsman, stage designer, writer, critic, editor and publisher. He studied (1908–12) under Léon Bakst at the Academy of Arts (Akademiya Khudozhestv) in St Petersburg and became a follower of the aesthetic concept of World of Art, dominated by the innovative decorative designs of Vera Komissarzhevskaya and Tairov. After he returned to Bulgaria, Skitnik was engaged in a variety of projects, writing poetry, critical reviews of exhibitions and plays and monographs on other artists such as Bencho Obreshkov. He also designed sets for the National Theatre (Naroden Teatâr) in Sofia. He painted mainly landscape and still-lifes in oils (e.g. Interior with Flowers, 1920), tempera (e.g. Russian Monastery, 1912), gouache (e.g. the Kiss of Judas, 1920; all Sofia, N.A.G.) and watercolour; he also drew in coloured pencil. During the 1920s and 1930s he became known in Bulgaria as an innovator who experimented with new problems of colour and form. Both his poetry and his original and highly emotional painting show his allegiance to the Symbolist movement. From ...