Vlieghe, Hans

views updated

Vlieghe, Hans

PERSONAL: Male.

ADDRESSES: Office—Art History Department, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Blijde-Inkomststraat 21, Leuven B-3000, Belgium. E-mail[email protected].

CAREER: Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, professor of art history; Rubenianum, Nationaal Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, Antwerp, Belgium, research director, Centrum voor de Vlaamse Kunst van de 16de en de 17de Eeuw, associate curator.

WRITINGS:

IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION

Saints, two volumes, translated by P. S. Falla, Phaidon (New York, NY), 1973-74.

Rubens Portraits of Identified Sitters Painted In Antwerp (Volume 2 of Frances Huemer's Portraits), Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1987.

Flemish Art and Architecture, 1585-1700 Yale University Press (New Haven, CT), 1998.

(With Christopher Brown) Van Dyck, 1599-1641, Rizzoli (New York, NY), 1999.

(Editor, with others) Concept, Design & Execution in Flemish Painting, 1550-1700, Brepols (Turnhout, Belgium), 2000.

(Editor) Van Dyck, 1599-1999: Conjectures and Refutations, Brepols (Turnhout, Belgium), 2001.

OTHER

(With Carl van de Velde) Stadsversieringen te Gent in 1635 voor de Blijde Intrede van de Kardinaal-Infant, Oudheidkundig Museum van de Stad Gent, Adbij van de Bijloke (Gent, Belgium), 1969.

(With Erik Duverger) David Teniers der Aeltere: ein vergessener flaemischer Nachfolger Adam Elscheimers, Dekker & Gumbert (Utrecht, Netherlands), 1971.

Gaspar de Crayer: Sa vie et ses oeuvres (title means "Gaspar de Crayer: His Life and Work"), Arcade (Brussels, Belgium), 1976.

De Schilder Rubens, Het Spectrum (Utrecht, Netherlands), 1977.

(With others) Jan Boeckhorst, 1604-1688: Maler der Rubenzeit (title means "Jan Boeckhorst, 1604-1688: Painter of the Rubens Era"), Luca Verlag (Freren, Germany), 1990.

(With others) Lucas Faydherbe, 1617-1697: Mechels beeldhouwer & architect, Stedelijk Museum (Mechelen, Belgium), 1997.

SIDELIGHTS: An art history professor and researcher, Hans Vlieghe has written extensively on the art of Peter Paul Rubens and Flemish art of the sixteenth to the eighteenth century. One of his earliest books in English translation, the two-volume Saints, traces and explicates Rubens's paintings of saints. Vlieghe discusses the lives of specific saints depicted in the works, providing background on the history of each painting. Interpretations and comparisons to other works by Rubens are also provided. A contributor for Choice found that the first volume is informed by "high scholarly standards," and went on to note that it serves as "a basis for future research." Reviewing the same volume in the Times Literary Supplement, Marianne Haraszti-Takacs praised Vlieghe's "thorough" research in his catalogue of all the known pictures of saints by Rubens, from St. Adrian to St. Francis of Assisi.

Vlieghe turned his attention to a lesser artist in the 1976 Gaspar de Crayer: Sa vie et ses oeuvres, an analysis in French of this painter whose work was influenced by Rubens. Reviewing the book in Apollo, Eric Young found de Crayer to be merely "technically competent," and lacking "any spark of the genius" of Rubens. However, Young commented on Vlieghe's "commendable standard of accuracy and thoroughness."

Vlieghe surveys the art of the southern Netherlands during the end of Spanish rule in his Flemish Art and Architecture, 1585-1700. Here Vlieghe examines the development of painting in Antwerp through leading masters such as Rubens, Anthony Van Dyck, and other painters, as well as focusing on sculpture and architecture of the period. Reviewing the work in Art Bulletin, Zirka Z. Filipczak called Flemish Art and Architecture, 1585-1700 a "highly informative, well-organized, and solid survey," and stated "Vlieghe deserves genuine praise … for his accomplishments in that hardest of genres, the survey."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

AB Bookman's Weekly, January 21, 1974, review of Saints, Volume 2, p. 329.

Apollo, June, 1976, Eric Young, review of Gaspar de Crayer: Sa vie et ses oeuvres, pp. 531-32.

Art Bulletin, June, 2000, Zirka Z. Filipczak, review of Flemish Art and Architecture, 1585-1700, p. 357.

Choice, March, 1973, review of Saints, Volume 1, p. 82.

Times Literary Supplement, January 19, 1973, Marianne Haraszti-Takacs, review of Saints, Volume 1, p. 68.

ONLINE

CODART.com, http://www.codart.nl/ (February 2, 2005), "Dr. Hans Vlieghe."

Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Web site, http://sun.fwo.be/ (February 2, 2005), "Vlaanderen."

Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Web site, http://www.kuleuven.ac.be/ (February 12, 2004), "Hans Vlieghe."