Claude Lorrain

In Claude's work, Nature stands eternally revealed." Thus Goethe expressed his admiration for the most celebrated landscape painter in the history of art. Claude Lorrain (1600-82), born in Lorraine, went to Rome as a thirteen-year-old and, except for minor journeys, was to remain there until his death. The history-laden Roman Campagna, and Latinum's soft, warm light, became his sources of inspiration in a genre of painting which, through him, first achieved autonomy, and of which he was the unrivalled master.