Artists of the Tudor court - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The artists of the Tudor court are the painters

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...

and limners

Illuminated manuscript

An illuminated manuscript is a manuscript in which the text is supplemented by the addition of decoration, such as decorated initials, borders and miniature illustrations...

engaged by the monarch

Monarch

A monarch is the person who heads a monarchy. This is a form of government in which a state or polity is ruled or controlled by an individual who typically inherits the throne by birth and occasionally rules for life or until abdication...

s of England's

Kingdom of England

The Kingdom of England was, from 927 to 1707, a sovereign state to the northwest of continental Europe. At its height, the Kingdom of England spanned the southern two-thirds of the island of Great Britain and several smaller outlying islands; what today comprises the legal jurisdiction of England...

Tudor dynasty

The Tudor dynasty or House of Tudor was a European royal house of Welsh origin that ruled the Kingdom of England and its realms, including the Lordship of Ireland, later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1485 until 1603. Its first monarch was Henry Tudor, a descendant through his mother of a legitimised...

and their courtier

Courtier

A courtier is a person who is often in attendance at the court of a king or other royal personage. Historically the court was the centre of government as well as the residence of the monarch, and social and political life were often completely mixed together...

s between 1485 and 1603, from the reign of Henry VII

Henry VII of England

Henry VII was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizing the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death on 21 April 1509, as the first monarch of the House of Tudor....

to the death of Elizabeth I

Elizabeth I of England

Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...

.

Typically managing a group of assistants and apprentices in a workshop

Workshop

A workshop is a room or building which provides both the area and tools that may be required for the manufacture or repair of manufactured goods...

or studio

Studio

A studio is an artist's or worker's workroom, or the catchall term for an artist and his or her employees who work within that studio. This can be for the purpose of architecture, painting, pottery , sculpture, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, radio or television...

, many of these artists produced works across several disciplines, including portrait miniature

Portrait miniature

A portrait miniature is a miniature portrait painting, usually executed in gouache, watercolour, or enamel.Portrait miniatures began to flourish in 16th century Europe and the art was practiced during the 17th century and 18th century...

s, large-scale panel portraits

Panel painting

A panel painting is a painting made on a flat panel made of wood, either a single piece, or a number of pieces joined together. Until canvas became the more popular support medium in the 16th century, it was the normal form of support for a painting not on a wall or vellum, which was used for...

on wood, illuminated manuscript

Illuminated manuscript

An illuminated manuscript is a manuscript in which the text is supplemented by the addition of decoration, such as decorated initials, borders and miniature illustrations...

s, heraldric emblems

Heraldry

Heraldry is the profession, study, or art of creating, granting, and blazoning arms and ruling on questions of rank or protocol, as exercised by an officer of arms. Heraldry comes from Anglo-Norman herald, from the Germanic compound harja-waldaz, "army commander"...

, and elaborate decorative schemes for masque

Masque

The masque was a form of festive courtly entertainment which flourished in 16th and early 17th century Europe, though it was developed earlier in Italy, in forms including the intermedio...

s, tournaments

Tournament (medieval)

A tournament, or tourney is the name popularly given to chivalrous competitions or mock fights of the Middle Ages and Renaissance . It is one of various types of hastiludes....

, and other events.

Isolation and iconography

The Tudor period was one of unusual isolation from European trends for England. At the start the Wars of the Roses

Wars of the Roses

The Wars of the Roses were a series of dynastic civil wars for the throne of England fought between supporters of two rival branches of the royal House of Plantagenet: the houses of Lancaster and York...

had greatly disrupted artistic activity, which apart from architecture had reached a very low ebb by 1485. The Yorkist dynasty

House of York

The House of York was a branch of the English royal House of Plantagenet, three members of which became English kings in the late 15th century. The House of York was descended in the paternal line from Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, the fourth surviving son of Edward III, but also represented...

overthrown by the Tudors had been very close to their Burgundian

Duchy of Burgundy

The Duchy of Burgundy , was heir to an ancient and prestigious reputation and a large division of the lands of the Second Kingdom of Burgundy and in its own right was one of the geographically larger ducal territories in the emergence of Early Modern Europe from Medieval Europe.Even in that...

allies, and English diplomats had their portraits painted by the finest Early Netherlandish painters

Early Netherlandish painting

Early Netherlandish painting refers to the work of artists active in the Low Countries during the 15th- and early 16th-century Northern renaissance, especially in the flourishing Burgundian cities of Bruges and Ghent...

- Edward Grimshaw by Petrus Christus

Petrus Christus

Petrus Christus was an Early Netherlandish painter active in Bruges from 1444.-Life:Christus was born in Baarle, near Antwerp and Breda. Long considered a student of and successor to Jan van Eyck, his paintings have sometimes been confused with those of Van Eyck. At the death of Van Eyck in 1441,...

and Sir John Donne

Sir John Donne

Sir John Donne was a Welsh courtier, diplomat and soldier, a notable figure of the Yorkist party. In the 1470s he commissioned the Donne Triptych, an triptych altarpiece by Hans Memling now in the National Gallery, London. It contains portraits of him, his wife Elizabeth and a daughter...

by Hans Memling

Hans Memling

Hans Memling was a German-born Early Netherlandish painter.-Life and works:Born in Seligenstadt, near Frankfurt in the Middle Rhein region, it is believed that Memling served his apprenticeship at Mainz or Cologne, and later worked in the Netherlands under Rogier van der Weyden...

(both National Gallery, London

National Gallery, London

The National Gallery is an art museum on Trafalgar Square, London, United Kingdom. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The gallery is an exempt charity, and a non-departmental public body of the Department for Culture, Media...

). However these were both painted abroad. In the Tudor period foreign artists were recruited and often welcomed lavishly by the English court, as they were in other artistically marginal parts of Europe like Spain or Naples. The Netherlandish painters remained predominant, though French influence was also important on both Lucas Horenbout

Lucas Horenbout

Lucas Horenbout, often called Hornebolte in England, was a Flemish artist who moved to England in the mid-1520s and worked there as "King's Painter" and court miniaturist to King Henry VIII from 1525 until his death...

and Nicholas Hilliard

Nicholas Hilliard

Nicholas Hilliard was an English goldsmith and limner best known for his portrait miniatures of members of the courts of Elizabeth I and James I of England. He mostly painted small oval miniatures, but also some larger cabinet miniatures, up to about ten inches tall, and at least two famous...

, respectively the founder and the greatest exponent of the distinctively English tradition of the portrait miniature

Portrait miniature

With the virtual extinction of religious painting at the Reformation

Protestant Reformation

The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...

, and little interest in classical mythology

Classical mythology

Classical mythology or Greco-Roman mythology is the cultural reception of myths from the ancient Greeks and Romans. Along with philosophy and political thought, mythology represents one of the major survivals of classical antiquity throughout later Western culture.Classical mythology has provided...

until the very end of the period, the portrait

Portrait

thumb|250px|right|Portrait of [[Thomas Jefferson]] by [[Rembrandt Peale]], 1805. [[New-York Historical Society]].A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expression is predominant. The intent is to display the likeness,...

was the most important form of painting for all the artists of the Tudor court, and the only one to have survived in any numbers. How many of these have been also lost can be seen from Holbein's book (nearly all pages in the Royal Collection

Royal Collection

The Royal Collection is the art collection of the British Royal Family. It is property of the monarch as sovereign, but is held in trust for her successors and the nation. It contains over 7,000 paintings, 40,000 watercolours and drawings, and about 150,000 old master prints, as well as historical...

) containing preparatory drawings for portraits - of eighty-five drawings, only a handful have surviving Holbein paintings, though often copies have survived. Portraiture ranged from the informal miniature, almost invariably painted from life in the course of a few days and intended for private contemplation, to the later large-scale portraits of Elizabeth I such as the Rainbow Portrait, filled with symbol

Symbol

A symbol is something which represents an idea, a physical entity or a process but is distinct from it. The purpose of a symbol is to communicate meaning. For example, a red octagon may be a symbol for "STOP". On a map, a picture of a tent might represent a campsite. Numerals are symbols for...

ic iconography

Iconography

Iconography is the branch of art history which studies the identification, description, and the interpretation of the content of images. The word iconography literally means "image writing", and comes from the Greek "image" and "to write". A secondary meaning is the painting of icons in the...

in dress

Clothing

Clothing refers to any covering for the human body that is worn. The wearing of clothing is exclusively a human characteristic and is a feature of nearly all human societies...

, jewels

Jewellery

Jewellery or jewelry is a form of personal adornment, such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, and bracelets.With some exceptions, such as medical alert bracelets or military dog tags, jewellery normally differs from other items of personal adornment in that it has no other purpose than to...

, background, and inscription.

Much energy was also expended on decorative painting of fixtures and fittings, often of a very temporary nature. In theory the "Serjeant Painter

Serjeant Painter

The Serjeant Painter was an honorable and lucrative position with the British monarchy. It carried with it the prerogative of painting and gilding all of the King's residences, coaches, banners, etc. and it grossed over £ 1,000 in a good year by the 18th century...

s" of the King, a lower rank of painter, did most of this, probably to the designs of the more elevated "King's Painters" (or Queen's), but it is clear that they too spent time on this, as did court artists all over Europe (see Royal Entry

Royal Entry

The Royal Entry, also known by various other names, including Triumphal Entry and Joyous Entry, embraced the ceremonial and festivities accompanying a formal entry by a ruler or his representative into a city in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period in Europe...

). There was also the Master of the Revels

Master of the Revels

The Master of the Revels was a position within the English, and later the British, royal household heading the "Revels Office" or "Office of the Revels" that originally had responsibilities for overseeing royal festivities, known as revels, and later also became responsible for stage censorship,...

, whose Office was responsible for festivals and tournaments, and no doubt called upon the artists and Serjeant Painters for assistance.

Jewellery and metalwork were regarded as extremely important, and far more was spent on them than on painting. Holbein produced many spectacular designs for now-vanished table ornaments in precious metals, and Hilliard was also a practising goldsmith. The main artistic interests of Henry VIII were music, building palaces and tapestry

Tapestry

Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven on a vertical loom, however it can also be woven on a floor loom as well. It is composed of two sets of interlaced threads, those running parallel to the length and those parallel to the width ; the warp threads are set up under tension on a...

, of which he had over 2,000 pieces, costing far more than he ever spent on painters.

Elizabeth spent far less, hardly building anything herself, but took a personal interest in painting, keeping her own collection of miniatures locked away, wrapped in paper on which she wrote the names of the sitter. She is reputed to have had paintings of her burnt that did not match the iconic image she wished to be shown.

The most progressive and spectacular palace of the Tudor period, Nonsuch Palace

Nonsuch Palace

Nonsuch Palace was a Tudor royal palace, built by Henry VIII in Surrey, England; it stood from 1538 to 1682–3. Its ruins are in Nonsuch Park.- Background :Nonsuch Palace in Surrey was perhaps the grandest of Henry VIII's building projects...

, begun by Henry VIII in 1538 a little way south of London, was covered inside and out with prodigous quantities of figurative sculpted stucco reliefs - the whole scheme covered over 2,000 square metres (21,000 sq ft). There was also probably much decorative painting. As for the similar work at the Château de Fontainebleau

Château de Fontainebleau

The Palace of Fontainebleau, located 55 kilometres from the centre of Paris, is one of the largest French royal châteaux. The palace as it is today is the work of many French monarchs, building on an early 16th century structure of Francis I. The building is arranged around a series of courtyards...

, which Nonsuch was certainly intended to compete with, and outshine, Italians were brought in to provide authentic Mannerist work, however much the general plan remains English. The scattered fragments and images that have survived suggest that the awestruck accounts of visitors were not exaggerated.

A community of artists

Many of the artists active at the Tudor court were connected by ties of family, marriage, and training. Lucas Horenbout

Lucas Horenbout

(often called Hornebolt in England), who began painting and illuminating for Henry VIII

Henry VIII of England

Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...

in the mid-1520s, was accompanied in his workshop by his sister Susanna, who was also an illuminator. It is generally accepted that Lucas Horenbout taught Hans Holbein the Younger

Hans Holbein the Younger

Hans Holbein the Younger was a German artist and printmaker who worked in a Northern Renaissance style. He is best known as one of the greatest portraitists of the 16th century. He also produced religious art, satire and Reformation propaganda, and made a significant contribution to the history...

the techniques of painting miniatures on vellum when Holbein was engaged by Henry VIII in the early 1530s.

Lucas and Susanna Horenbout's father, Gerard Horenbout

Gerard Horenbout

Gerard Horenbout was a Flemish miniaturist, a late example of the Flemish Primitives. He has been identified with the Master of James IV of Scotland.-Biography:...

- possibly he was the Master of James IV of Scotland

Master of James IV of Scotland

The Master of James IV of Scotland was a Flemish manuscript illuminator and painter most likely based in Ghent, or perhaps Bruges. Circumstantial evidence, including several larger panel paintings, indicates that he may be identical with Gerard Horenbout. He was the leading illuminator of the...

- was an active member of the Ghent-Bruges School of manuscript illustrators and also was employed briefly at the Tudor court. In Bruges, Gerard was associated with Sanders Bening or Benninck and his son Simon

Simon Bening

Simon Bening was a 16th century miniature painter of the Ghent-Bruges school, the last major artist of the Netherlandish tradition....

, with whom he worked on the illustrations for the Grimani Breviary. Simon Bening's eldest daughter Levina Teerlinc

Levina Teerlinc

Levina Teerlinc was a Flemish miniaturist who served as a painter to the English court of Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I....

was also trained as an illuminator. She entered the service of Henry VIII at the close of 1546 following the deaths of Holbein (1543) and Lucas Horenbout (1544), and would remain as court painter to Henry's son Edward VI

Edward VI of England

Edward VI was the King of England and Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death. He was crowned on 20 February at the age of nine. The son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour, Edward was the third monarch of the Tudor dynasty and England's first monarch who was raised as a Protestant...

and as painter and lady-in-waiting to both his daughters, Mary I

Mary I of England

Mary I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death.She was the only surviving child born of the ill-fated marriage of Henry VIII and his first wife Catherine of Aragon. Her younger half-brother, Edward VI, succeeded Henry in 1547...

and Elizabeth. Levina Teerlinc, in turn, taught the art of limning to Nicholas Hilliard, an apprentice goldsmith

Goldsmith

A goldsmith is a metalworker who specializes in working with gold and other precious metals. Since ancient times the techniques of a goldsmith have evolved very little in order to produce items of jewelry of quality standards. In modern times actual goldsmiths are rare...

who would marry the daughter of Queen Elizabeth's jeweler and rise to become the supreme miniaturist of the age. John Bettes the Elder

John Bettes the Elder

John Bettes the Elder was an English artist whose few known paintings date from between about 1543 and 1550. His most famous work is his Portrait of a Man in a Black Cap...

apprenticed his son, John the Younger

John Bettes the Younger

John Bettes the Younger was an English portrait painter.His father, the painter John Bettes the Elder died in, or before 1570. Like Isaac Oliver and Rowland Lockey, Bettes the Younger is believed to have studied under Nicholas Hilliard. He lived in London on Grub Street in St Giles Cripplegate...

to Hilliard. Hilliard's most famous student, Isaac Oliver

Isaac Oliver

Isaac Oliver was a French-born English portrait miniature painter.-Life and work:Born in Rouen, he moved to London in 1568 with his Huguenot parents Peter and Epiphany Oliver to escape the Wars of Religion in France...

, later limner to Anne of Denmark

Anne of Denmark

Anne of Denmark was queen consort of Scotland, England, and Ireland as the wife of King James VI and I.The second daughter of King Frederick II of Denmark, Anne married James in 1589 at the age of fourteen and bore him three children who survived infancy, including the future Charles I...

and Henry, Prince of Wales

Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales

Henry Frederick Stuart, Prince of Wales was the elder son of King James I & VI and Anne of Denmark. His name derives from his grandfathers: Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley and Frederick II of Denmark. Prince Henry was widely seen as a bright and promising heir to his father's throne...

, was married to the niece of Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger

Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger

Marcus Gheeraerts was an artist of the Tudor court, described as "the most important artist of quality to work in England in large-scale between Eworth and Van Dyck" He was brought to England as a child by his father Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, also a painter...

. Gheeraerts was also the brother-in-law of Lucas de Heere

Lucas de Heere

Lucas de Heere was a Flemish portrait painter, poet and writer.De Heere was a Protestant and became a refugee from the Dutch Revolt against Philip II of Spain, who tried to suppress Protestantism...

's apprentice John de Critz the Elder

John de Critz

John de Critz or John Decritz was one of a number of painters of Flemish and Dutch origin active at the English royal court during the reigns of James I of England and Charles I of England...

, who took the dynasty into the Stuart period, and was succeeded as Serjeant-Painter by his son. De Heere was also a religious refugee from Flanders

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...

; although the upheavals of the Protestant Reformation

Protestant Reformation

acted to reduce artistic contacts, especially with Italy, England could also benefit from them.

Residents

Lucas Horenbout
Lucas Horenbout
Lucas Horenbout, often called Hornebolte in England, was a Flemish artist who moved to England in the mid-1520s and worked there as "King's Painter" and court miniaturist to King Henry VIII from 1525 until his death...

, pioneer of the portrait miniature, King's Painter from 1531 until his death in 1544
"Antony Toto" and Bartolommeo Penni - see below
Hans Holbein the Younger
Hans Holbein the Younger
Hans Holbein the Younger was a German artist and printmaker who worked in a Northern Renaissance style. He is best known as one of the greatest portraitists of the 16th century. He also produced religious art, satire and Reformation propaganda, and made a significant contribution to the history...

, spent many years on two visits, painting the best portraits of the Tudor period
Levina Teerlinc
Levina Teerlinc
Levina Teerlinc was a Flemish miniaturist who served as a painter to the English court of Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I....

, miniaturist and lady-in-waiting
Lady-in-waiting
A lady-in-waiting is a female personal assistant at a royal court, attending on a queen, a princess, or a high-ranking noblewoman. Historically, in Europe a lady-in-waiting was often a noblewoman from a family highly thought of in good society, but was of lower rank than the woman on whom she...
John Bettes the Elder
John Bettes the Elder
John Bettes the Elder was an English artist whose few known paintings date from between about 1543 and 1550. His most famous work is his Portrait of a Man in a Black Cap...

, engaged for decorative work at Whitehall
Whitehall
Whitehall is a road in Westminster, in London, England. It is the main artery running north from Parliament Square, towards Charing Cross at the southern end of Trafalgar Square...

from 1531–33; also a portrait-painter and minaturist
Gerlach Flicke
Gerlach Flicke
Gerlach Flicke , Latin name Gerbarus Fleccius, and at least once referred to as "Garlicke", was a German portrait painter who is known for his work in London as an artist of the Tudor court. Flicke was imprisoned in London and he made a portrait miniature whilst there...

, or "Garlicke" in some English records, German portraitist, in London from c. 1545 until his death in 1558.
Hans Eworth
Hans Eworth
Hans Eworth was a Flemish painter active in England in the mid-16th century. Along with other exiled Flemings, he made a career in Tudor London, painting allegorical images as well as portraits of the gentry and nobility. About 40 paintings are now attributed to Eworth, among them portraits of...

, in England from c. 1549; portrait-painter and recorded as a designer for the Office of the Revels
Steven van Herwijck
Steven van Herwijck
Steven Cornelisz. van Herwijck , was a Netherlandish sculptor and gem engraver famous for his portrait medallions and medals...

, portrait medallist, visited 1562, resident 1565 until his death in 1567.
Steven van der Meulen
Steven van der Meulen
Steven van der Meulen was a Dutch artist active c. 1543-1564. He gained prominence in England in the first decade of the reign of Elizabeth I as one of many Flemish artists active at the Tudor court...

, arrived 1560, naturalized 1562, and active to c. 1568
Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger
Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger
Marcus Gheeraerts was an artist of the Tudor court, described as "the most important artist of quality to work in England in large-scale between Eworth and Van Dyck" He was brought to England as a child by his father Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder, also a painter...

, Flemish Protestant refugee portraitist, who arrived as a child
George Gower
George Gower
George Gower was an English portrait painter who became Serjeant Painter to Queen Elizabeth I in 1581.-Life:Little is known about his early life except that he was a grandson of Sir John Gower of Stettenham, Yorkshire....

, English portraitist
Nicholas Hilliard
Nicholas Hilliard
Nicholas Hilliard was an English goldsmith and limner best known for his portrait miniatures of members of the courts of Elizabeth I and James I of England. He mostly painted small oval miniatures, but also some larger cabinet miniatures, up to about ten inches tall, and at least two famous...

, miniaturist and goldsmith to Elizabeth I from c. 1572
Hieronimo Custodis
Hieronimo Custodis
Hieronimo Custodis was a Flemish portrait painter active in England in the reign of Elizabeth I....

, Flemish exile active from 1589 until his death in 1593
Sir William Segar
William Segar
Sir William Segar was a portrait painter and officer of arms to the court of Elizabeth I of England who became Garter King of Arms under James I....

, portraitist and herald
Herald
A herald, or, more correctly, a herald of arms, is an officer of arms, ranking between pursuivant and king of arms. The title is often applied erroneously to all officers of arms....

; later Garter Principal King of Arms
Garter Principal King of Arms
The Garter Principal King of Arms is the senior King of Arms, and the senior Officer of Arms of the College of Arms. He is therefore the most powerful herald within the jurisdiction of the College – primarily England, Wales and Northern Ireland – and so arguably the most powerful in the world...

1607-1633
John de Critz the Elder, arrived from Flanders as a child, portraitist
Robert Peake the Elder
Robert Peake the Elder
Robert Peake the Elder was an English painter active in the later part of Elizabeth I's reign and for most of the reign of James I. In 1604, he was appointed picture maker to the heir to the throne, Prince Henry; and in 1607, serjeant-painter to King James I – a post he shared with John De Critz...

, English portraitist; also employed by the Office of the Revels; later serjeant painter under James I
Isaac Oliver
Isaac Oliver
Isaac Oliver was a French-born English portrait miniature painter.-Life and work:Born in Rouen, he moved to London in 1568 with his Huguenot parents Peter and Epiphany Oliver to escape the Wars of Religion in France...

, Hilliard's pupil and later rival
Rowland Lockey
Rowland Lockey
Rowland Lockey was an English painter and goldsmith. The son of Leonard Lockey, a crossbow maker of the parish of St Bride's, Fleet Street, London, Lockey was apprenticed to Queen Elizabeth's miniaturist and goldsmith Nicholas Hilliard for eight years beginning Michaelmas 1581 and was made a...

, another apprentice of Hilliard

Visitors

Pietro Torrigiano
Pietro Torrigiano
Pietro Torrigiano was an Italian sculptor of the Florentine school. According to Giorgio Vasari, he was one of the group of talented youths who studied art under the patronage of Lorenzo de' Medici in Florence....

, Florentine sculptor, on the run after breaking Michelangelo
Michelangelo
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni , commonly known as Michelangelo, was an Italian Renaissance painter, sculptor, architect, poet, and engineer who exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art...

's nose, made Henry VII's tomb and other monuments in an extended stay
Possibly Guido Mazzoni
Guido Mazzoni (sculptor)
Guido Mazzoni was an Italian sculptor and painter of the Renaissance period, working in Bologna, Naples and France.-Biography:...

, Florentine sculptor mostly in painted terracotta. He submitted alternative designs for Henry's tomb, and a painted terracotta bust by him may be of Henry VIII as a boy.
Michael Sittow
Michael Sittow
Michael Sittow, also known as Master Michiel, Michel Sittow, Michiel, Miguel and many other variants was a painter from Reval who was trained in the tradition of Early Netherlandish painting...

probably painted Henry VII and a picture of Catherine of Aragon for her mother, his employer
Possibly the Venetian Antonio Solario
Antonio Solario
Antonio Solario , also known as Lo Zingaro , Antonio de/da Solario etc, was an Italian painter of the Venetian school, who worked in Naples, the Marche and possibly England...

, who certainly painted an altarpiece for a London merchant in 1514
Girolamo da Treviso
Girolamo da Treviso
Girolamo da Treviso , also known as Girolamo di Tommaso da Treviso the Younger and Girolamo Trevigi, was an Italian Renaissance painter. Born in Treviso, he might have been a pupil of Pier Maria Pennacchi...

, hired mainly as a military engineer (who died in action), but also left a significant painting
Nicolas Bellin, or Niccolo da Modena, brought in from Fontainebleau
Château de Fontainebleau
The Palace of Fontainebleau, located 55 kilometres from the centre of Paris, is one of the largest French royal châteaux. The palace as it is today is the work of many French monarchs, building on an early 16th century structure of Francis I. The building is arranged around a series of courtyards...

for Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace was a Tudor royal palace, built by Henry VIII in Surrey, England; it stood from 1538 to 1682–3. Its ruins are in Nonsuch Park.- Background :Nonsuch Palace in Surrey was perhaps the grandest of Henry VIII's building projects...
Lucas Cornelisz. de Cock (1495–1552) Dutch portrait and history painter, probably in England ca. 1527-1532, before leaving for Italy
William or Guillim Scrots
William Scrots
William Scrots was a painter of the Tudor court and an exponent of the Mannerist style of painting in the Netherlands. He is first heard of when appointed a court painter to Mary of Habsburg, Regent of the Netherlands, in 1537...

, employed by Henry VIII from at least 1545 and retained by Edward VI until the king died in 1553
Antonis Mor or Antonio Moro, the Habsburg
Habsburg
The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...

portraitist, visited with Philip II of Spain
Philip II of Spain
Philip II was King of Spain, Portugal, Naples, Sicily, and, while married to Mary I, King of England and Ireland. He was lord of the Seventeen Provinces from 1556 until 1581, holding various titles for the individual territories such as duke or count....
Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder
Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder
Marcus Gheeraerts the Elder was a Flemish printmaker and painter associated with the English court of the mid-16th Century and mainly remembered as the illustrator of the 1567 edition of Aesop's Fables.-Biography:...

a Flemish Protestant refugee, stayed nine years, and left his son behind him.
Quentin Metsys the Younger
Quentin Metsys the Younger
Quentin Metsys the Younger was a Flemish Renaissance painter, one of several of his countrymen active as artists of the Tudor court in the reign of Elizabeth I of England...

or Massys
Cornelius Ketel
Cornelis Ketel
Cornelis or Cornelius Ketel was a Dutch Mannerist painter, active in Elizabethan London from 1573 to 1581, and in Amsterdam from 1581 to the early 17th century, now known essentially as a portrait-painter, though he was also a poet and orator, and from 1595 began to sculpt as well.According to...

stayed eight years, painting histories and portraits
Lucas de Heere
Lucas de Heere
Lucas de Heere was a Flemish portrait painter, poet and writer.De Heere was a Protestant and became a refugee from the Dutch Revolt against Philip II of Spain, who tried to suppress Protestantism...

Protestant refugee who returned to Flanders after ten years, when it was safe to do so
Joris Hoefnagel
Joris Hoefnagel
Joris Hoefnagel or Georg Hoefnagel was a Flemish painter and engraver, the son of a diamond merchant.He travelled abroad, making drawings from archaeological subjects, and was a pupil of Hans Bol at Mechlin...

, in England c. 1569-71 making drawings for Civitates Orbis Terrarum; painted A Fête at Bermondsey while in England
Federico Zuccari
Federico Zuccari
Federico Zuccari, also known as Federigo Zuccaro , was an Italian Mannerist painter and architect, active both in Italy and abroad.-Biography:Zuccari was born at Sant'Angelo in Vado, near Urbino ....

visited for six months, painting Elizabeth and Leicester

The Tudor Serjeant Painters

The holders of the office were:

John Browne, heraldic painter since 1502, appointed "King's Painter" in 1511/12, and as the first Serjeant Painter in 1527, when the imported artist Lucas Horenbout
Lucas Horenbout
Lucas Horenbout, often called Hornebolte in England, was a Flemish artist who moved to England in the mid-1520s and worked there as "King's Painter" and court miniaturist to King Henry VIII from 1525 until his death...

took over as "King's Painter" - now the superior position. Browne died in office in December 1532.
Andrew Wright, 1532–1544, about whom little is known
"Antony Toto", really Antonio di Nunziato d'Antonio, a Florentine pupil of Ridolfo Ghirlandajo
Ridolfo Ghirlandajo
Ridolfo Ghirlandaio was an Italian painter of the Renaissance, active mainly in Florence, the son of Domenico Ghirlandaio.-Biography:...

, from 1544, who died in office in 1554. He was the first Serjeant Painter who can be evidenced as an artist rather than an artisan. None of his paintings are known to survive, but his New Year gifts to Henry, presumably his own work, are documented as including a Calumny of Apelles
Apelles
Apelles of Kos was a renowned painter of ancient Greece. Pliny the Elder, to whom we owe much of our knowledge of this artist rated him superior to preceding and subsequent artists...

(1538/39) and a Story of King Alexander (1540/41). He had a Florentine colleague Bartolommeo Penni, brother of the much more distinguished Gianfrancesco
Gianfrancesco Penni
Gianfrancesco Penni , also known as Giovan Francesco, was an Italian painter, student of Raphael.Born in Florence to a family of weavers, Penni entered very early in Raphael's workshop, and collaborated with him for several works, including the famous Rooms of the Vatican Palace as well as the...

, Raphael
Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino , better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur...

's right hand man, and Luca, a member of the School of Fontainebleau
School of Fontainebleau
The Ecole de Fontainebleau refers to two periods of artistic production in France during the late Renaissance centered around the royal Château de Fontainebleau, that were crucial in forming the French version of Northern Mannerism....

. Both probably came to Henry from Cardinal Wolsey, as they first appear in the accounts just after Wolsey's fall in October 1529. "Toto" had been signed on in Florence in 1519 as an assistant to Pietro Torrigiano
Pietro Torrigiano
Pietro Torrigiano was an Italian sculptor of the Florentine school. According to Giorgio Vasari, he was one of the group of talented youths who studied art under the patronage of Lorenzo de' Medici in Florence....

, who in fact left England for good later that year. Toto and Penni spent most of their time after 1538 working on Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace was a Tudor royal palace, built by Henry VIII in Surrey, England; it stood from 1538 to 1682–3. Its ruins are in Nonsuch Park.- Background :Nonsuch Palace in Surrey was perhaps the grandest of Henry VIII's building projects...

, including elaborate stucco work for Henry's most advanced building, now vanished.
Nicolas Lizard (or Lisory), a French artist, held the post from 1554 to his death in 1571
William Herne or Heron, 1572 to 1580
George Gower
George Gower
George Gower was an English portrait painter who became Serjeant Painter to Queen Elizabeth I in 1581.-Life:Little is known about his early life except that he was a grandson of Sir John Gower of Stettenham, Yorkshire....

1581 until his death in 1596
Leonard Fryer 1596-1607, about whom very little is known, joined after the death of Elizabeth by
John de Critz the Elder
John de Critz
John de Critz or John Decritz was one of a number of painters of Flemish and Dutch origin active at the English royal court during the reigns of James I of England and Charles I of England...

from 1603.

Identification and attribution

Many surviving images have been badly worn over the years, or incompetently "restored". Inscriptions are often later than the paintings themselves, and may reflect wishful thinking; many anonymous Tudor ladies were identified as "Mary I", or, especially, one or other of Henry VIII's queens, by the owners of pictures. Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn ;c.1501/1507 – 19 May 1536) was Queen of England from 1533 to 1536 as the second wife of Henry VIII of England and Marquess of Pembroke in her own right. Henry's marriage to Anne, and her subsequent execution, made her a key figure in the political and religious upheaval that was the...

in particular has been said to be the subject of dozens of pictures; even now there is no certain image of her done from life, and the most plausible, is a later copy and among the least informative. The only probable portrait of Catherine Howard

Catherine Howard

Catherine Howard , also spelled Katherine, Katheryn or Kathryn, was the fifth wife of Henry VIII of England, and sometimes known by his reference to her as his "rose without a thorn"....

, a miniature by Holbein in the Royal Collection, is only identified by circumstantial evidence (see Gallery).

A well-known painting (left) was identified by George Vertue

George Vertue

George Vertue was an English engraver and antiquary, whose notebooks on British art of the first half of the 18th century are a valuable source for the period.-Life:...

in 1727 as Lady Frances Brandon

Lady Frances Brandon

Frances Grey, Duchess of Suffolk , born Lady Frances Brandon, was the second child and eldest daughter of Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk and Mary Tudor, Dowager Queen of France...

and her second husband Adrian Stokes, an attribution that stood unquestioned until the sitters were properly identified as Mary Nevill, Baroness Dacre

Mary Nevill, Baroness Dacre

Mary Fiennes, Baroness Dacre was the daughter of George Nevill, 5th Baron Bergavenny by his third wife, Mary, daughter of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham....

and her son Gregory Fiennes, 10th Baron Dacre

Gregory Fiennes, 10th Baron Dacre

Gregory Fiennes, 10th Baron Dacre was an English courtier.He was the son of Thomas Fiennes, 9th Baron Dacre and Mary Nevill...

and the artist as Hans Eworth in 1986.

Attribution to artists is even more challenging; not all artists signed their work, and those who did may not have done so consistently. Many pictures have been cut down, extended, or otherwise altered in ways that damage or destroy inscriptions. Artists' workshops often churned out copies of the master's work to meet the demand for portraits, as symbols of devotion to the Crown or simply to populate the fashionable "long galleries" lined with portraits.

Today, attributions are made on the basis of style, sitter, accepted date, and related documentation such as receipts or bills for payment and inventories of collections or estates. It is now generally accepted that the artist known as "The Monogrammist HE" is Hans Eworth, but other identifications remain elusive. Some of the most well-known images of the period, such as the portrait of Elizabeth I when a Princess, age 13, have been attributed to many artists over the years, but remain cautiously labelled "?Flemish School" in recent catalogues. Much scholarly debate also circles around identification of possible portraits of Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey

Lady Jane Grey , also known as The Nine Days' Queen, was an English noblewoman who was de facto monarch of England from 10 July until 19 July 1553 and was subsequently executed...

Payments

The royal accounts for the period survive, but are not always easy to interpret. Payments often covered expensive materials, and in many cases the wages of assistants had to be paid out of them. Some regular annuities, usually supplemented by payments for specific works, are given below. But recipients were expected to give works to the monarch, at New Year or on their birthday.

Royal annuities:

Lucas Hornebolte (scholarly dissention) £33 6s or £62 10s from 1525 "until his death"
Hans Holbein £30 (but he did more work outside the court)
Levina Teerlinc £40
Nicholas Hilliard received £400 as a gift in 1591, and an annuity of £40 from 1599; he typically charged £3 for a non-royal miniature.

The sums spent on metalwork, building palaces, and by Henry on tapestries, dwarfed these figures.

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