page_title: Pieter Coecke van Aelst
section_title: General
hierarchical_section_title: Pieter Coecke van Aelst / Work / General
caption_attribution_description: English: Triptych of the Descent from the Cross Português: Tríptico da Descida da Cruz (c. 1540-1545), por Pieter Coecke van Aels.
context_page_description: Pieter Coecke van Aelst or Pieter Coecke van Aelst the Elder was a Flemish painter, sculptor, architect, author and designer of woodcuts, goldsmith's work, stained glass and tapestries. His principal subjects were Christian religious themes. He worked in Antwerp and Brussels and was appointed court painter to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.
  Coecke van Aelst was a polyglot. He published translations into Flemish, French and German of Ancient Roman and modern Italian architectural treatises. These publications played a pivotal role in the dissemination of Renaissance ideas in Northern Europe. They contributed to the transition in Northern Europe from the late Gothic style then prevalent towards a modern 'antique-oriented' architecture.
context_section_description: Pieter Coecke van Aelst was a versatile artist and a master designer who devised projects across a wide range of different media, including panel paintings, sculptures, prints, tapestries, stained glass and goldsmith's work. No signed and few reliably documented paintings by Coecke van Aelst have survived.
  His drawings are an important witness to his skills as they are the only body of works by the artist, which are autograph. Approximately forty drawings are regarded as autograph, in addition to cartoons and cartoon fragments on which he likely worked with assistants.  A majority of his drawings are related to his tapestry designs.
  In his art Coecke showed his ambition to emulate contemporary Italian artists. From the later 1520s his works start to reveal the Italian influence, as is noticeable in his figures, which gain in monumentality, and the greater movement and drama in his compositions. His main model was Raphael and his circle. Coecke was likely already familiar with their compositions in Antwerp. However, when he traveled to Constantinople around 1533, he likely visited Mantua, where Raphael's leading pupil Giulio Romano was active at the time.  Romano possessed a large collection of Raphael's drawings and Coecke must have availed himself of the opportunity to study these in detail during his visit.  After his return to Flanders Coecke's style changed dramatically and approached the Italian models he had studied.
  Coecke operated a large workshop, which was organized in an efficient manner. He acted as an entrepreneur who provided his assistants with his original inventions, which were then turned into final works under his supervision.  The style that he created was widely imitated.
caption: Descent from the Cross
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