London Festival of Baroque Music Smith Square, a classical music venue originally built as a church in the Baroque period. Concerts also take place at Westminster Abbey. Other venues in the Westminster area have included St Margaret's Church, St Peter's Eaton Square, and Westminster School. The London Festival of Baroque Music presents concerts of music from the Baroque period, performed on period instruments. It specialises in inviting non-UK performers, often making their UK debut, as well as UK musicians. Ensembles who have appeared include Musica Antiqua Köln, Collegium Vocale Gent, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, the Bach Ensemble, Tafelmusik, Europa
Baroque painting passion instead of the calm rationality that had been prized during the Renaissance. Among the greatest painters of the Baroque period are Velázquez, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Rubens, Poussin, and Vermeer. Caravaggio is an heir of the humanist painting of the High Renaissance. His realistic approach to the human figure, painted directly from life and dramatically spotlit against a dark background, shocked his contemporaries and opened a new chapter in the history of painting. Baroque painting often dramatizes scenes using chiaroscuro light effects; this can be seen in works by Rembrandt, Vermeer, Le Nain and La Tour. The Flemish painter Anthony van