Education
Gran was one of the sons of Hofkochs Kaiser Leopold I. He was sponsored by the House of Schwarzenberg, which helped finance his studies and travels in Italy, where he studied primarily with Sebastiano Ricci in Venice and Francesco Solimena in Naples.
Career
His pictures ornament several public buildings in his native city. In addition to the Princely House of Schwarzenberg, he also painted for the House of Habsburg. 1727 he was appointed court painter.
From 1732, he used the title "Daniel le Grand," and from 1736, with the predicate "della Torre." In the absence of documentation, the verifiability of his nobility in the Registry of Vienna Gratialarchivs is doubtful.
More accurate is the master title and coat of arms of an imperial Fähnrich, Nikolaus Gran della Torre (ennobled on 12 May 1621) which successfully laid his claim and revived his title. A wrongful use of noble titles and predicates would have been unthinkable in the time and exposed the social position of the artist.
Towards the end of his career, his paintings appear increasingly less "Baroque" (in figural dimensions, illusionism). In 1894, in Vienna"s Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus (15th District), the Grangasse street was named after him.
Heinrich Kábdebo (1879), "Gran, Daniel", Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (Asian Development Bank) (in German) 9, Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, pp.
578–579
Eckhart Knab (1964), "Gran, Daniel Johannes", Neue Deutsche Biographie (Neue Deutsche Biographie) (in German) 6, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 739–741; (full text online)
Eckhard Knab: Daniel Gran. Herold, Wien/München 1977.
Johann Kronbichler: GRANDEZZA - Der Barockmaler Daniel Gran 1694-1757.
Saint Pölten 2007.
Views
Gran therefore can be seen as an important precursor of classicism.