Bible Artists

Titian

c. 1488/90–1576

Italian

Titian (c. 1488/90–1576), born Tiziano Vecellio, was the leading painter of sixteenth-century Venice and one of the most influential artists of the Renaissance. His exceptionally long career included portraits and classical subjects as well as a large body of religious art. Titian transformed Venetian painting through his use of color and his increasingly...

Hendrik van den Broeck

c. 1530–1597

Flemish

Hendrik van den Broeck was a Renaissance artist whose religious work forms part of the history of Christian painting. Hendrik van den Broeck was a Netherlandish artist who pursued much of his career in Italy and is also known by Italianized versions of his name. He worked during a period when painters from northern Europe participated actively in Roman ar...

Rogier van der Weyden

c. 1399–1464

Netherlandish

Rogier van der Weyden (c. 1399–1464) was one of the most influential painters of the Early Netherlandish tradition. He became particularly renowned for religious paintings in which carefully observed human emotion gives biblical events unusual immediacy. Grief, compassion, fear, devotion, and wonder are communicated through faces and gestures as well as t...

Jan van Eyck

c. 1390–1441

Netherlandish

Jan van Eyck (c. 1390–1441) was one of the most important painters of the Early Netherlandish tradition. He developed an extraordinarily detailed style in which light, texture, architecture, landscape, inscriptions, and everyday objects could contribute to the meaning of a religious image. Van Eyck did not invent oil painting, as was once popularly claime...

Diego Velazquez

1599–1660

Spanish

Velazquez presented Jesus with restrained dignity and naturalistic physical presence.

Paolo Veronese

1528–1588

Italian

Paolo Veronese (1528–1588) was an Italian painter who became one of the leading artists of sixteenth-century Venice. He was especially admired for large compositions in which biblical events unfold within magnificent architectural settings. Veronese brought brilliant color and carefully organized groups of figures to religious narrative. His paintings fre...

Benjamin West

1738–1820

American-born British

Benjamin West was an American-born historical painter who became president of the Royal Academy and produced major biblical pictures for British patrons.

Francisco de Zurbarán

1598–1664

Spanish

Francisco de Zurbarán (1598–1664) was a Spanish Baroque painter known especially for religious works created for monasteries, convents, churches, and private devotion. He developed a direct style in which strongly illuminated figures often emerge from dark or restrained surroundings. Biblical subjects form an important part of his work, including the Annu...