Claude Lorrain (c. 1604 - 1682)

Lorrain was a French painter, draughtsman and etcher of the Baroque era. He spent most of his life in Italy, and is one of the earliest important artists, apart from his contemporaries in Dutch Golden Age painting, to concentrate on landscape painting. His landscapes are usually turned into the more prestigious genre of history paintings by the addition of a few small figures, typically representing a scene from the Bible or classical mythology. By the end of the 1630s he was established as the leading landscapist in Italy, and enjoyed large fees for his work.