Waldemar Januszczak TV - Tim Marlow TV - Diego Velázquez - Metropolitan Museum online - Andrew Graham-Dixon TV - Simon Schama TV -
Velázquez – Spain’s greatest Baroque artist. Waldemar Januszczak, Baroque! – From St Peter’s to St Paul’s II, BBC 2013
An artist who transformed both the image of seventeenth-century Spanish Royal court and the process of painting itself. With a degree of realism that had never been seen before. Diego Velázquez de Silva was born in Seville in 1599. Great Artists with Tim Marlow s1e10: Velazquez, Sky Arts 2003
The competition itself was quite complex; it involved a commission to paint a painting for the Alcazar Palace that showed Philip III, Philip IV’s father, expelling the Moors from Spain. There were three other court painters involved ... There could only be one winner. ibid.
During the 1630s portraits of the king and the royal family formed the chief part of Velázquez’s work. ibid.
It’s unprecedented to show the painter and the royal subjects in the same image. ibid.
Juan de Pareja 1650: One of the best pictures in the entire Metropolitan collection. Tim Marlow Meets Tony Bennett
Old Woman Cooking Eggs 1618: A certain mystery as to what’s going on. Tim Marlow Meets ... Ian Rankin, Tim
We’re looking down on all the objects beautifully painted. But we’re looking straight at the faces. ibid.
I would rather be the first painter of common things than second in higher art. Diego Velázquez
Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez, the most admired — perhaps the greatest — European painter who ever lived, possessed a miraculous gift for conveying a sense of truth. He gave the best of his talents to painting portraits, which capture the appearance of reality through the seemingly effortless handling of sensuous paint. Metropolitan Museum online
Velázquez painted ordinary people living their lives. Andrew Graham-Dixon, The Art of Spain II: The Dark Art, BBC 2008
Velázquez produced images of the royals on demand … with sparkling naturalism. Simon Schama, Civilisations V: The Triumph of Art, BBC 2018