Ramiro Ramírez Cardona, 1954 | Pittore surrealista

Ramiro Ramírez Cardona è nato a Chinchiná (Caldas), Colombia, in una famiglia di artisti autodidatti, scultori e pittori.

Per questo artista dotato di grande talento il corpo umano è di per sé, per sua essenza immediata, un sognatore, un creatore ed è attraverso il corpo, lo stesso corpo martoriato, che è diventato un essere che può comunicare con i sogni, le ambizioni, i dubbi e la solitudine. Copia Mantega, Velasquez, Tiepolo, Leonardo, che insegnano come l'uomo è e sarà l'espressione assoluta. Rappresenta meticolosamente persone reali di tutti i giorni.

Gustave Courbet | Stile pittorico

Gustave Courbet è considerato l'iniziatore ed il principale animatore del Realismo francese, movimento pittorico che tende ad una rappresentazione fedele della realtà, indagata con un linguaggio diretto e privo di abbellimenti.

In questo modo, i dipinti di Courbet sono caratterizzati da un'elevatissima verità di rappresentazione, che si sostanzia nella spontaneità dei soggetti e delle composizioni, senza imposizioni di alcun genere.

Il rifiuto di Courbet verso le messe in posa e le esigenze del decoro emerge ne "La filatrice", dove egli ritrae di nascosto sua sorella che, vinta dalla fatica, si addormenta.

In questo modo la realtà cessa di essere idealizzata ed acquisisce una dignità prima impensabile: nei quadri di Courbet, a essere degni di rappresentazione non sono solo il bello e l'armonico, così come imposto dai dettami della pittura romantica, ma anche quei momenti non «nobili», triviali, che facendo parte della quotidianità restano comunque in grado di qualificare l'arte.

Julius LeBlanc Stewart | Painter of the Belle Époque

Julius LeBlanc Stewart (September 6, 1855, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - January 5, 1919, Paris, France), was an American artist who spent his career in Paris.

A contemporary of fellow expatriate painter John Singer Sargent, Stewart was nicknamed "the Parisian from Philadelphia".

His father, the sugar millionaire William Hood Stewart, moved the family from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Paris in 1865, and became a distinguished art collector and an early patron of Marià Fortuny and the Barbizon artists.

Armand Guillaumin (1841-1927)

Armand Guillaumin, in full Jean-Baptiste-Armand Guillaumin, French landscape painter and lithographer who was a member of the Impressionist group.

Guillaumin was a close friend of the painter Camille Pissarro, whom he met while studying at the Académie Suisse.

Florence Blin, 1971

La pittrice Francese🎨 Florence Blin ha presentato il suo lavoro in oltre 10 mostre personali nelle città di Ajaccio, Lione, Shanberi, Valankon, Nizza, Cannes, Monaco e Parigi.

Ha partecipato al Festival di Arte Moderna del Mediterraneo.

Le sue opere sono offerte alle aste Druon e Parigi. Le opere della bolla sono state pubblicate sulla rivista internazionale di pittura "L'Aube".

El Greco | The Adoration of the Name of Jesus, 1579

The larger version of this picture is in the Escorial in Madrid, and was probably intended for King Philip II.

El Greco made small copies of several of his own pictures to keep in his studio, of which this is probably one.

The subject is thought to be an allegory of the Holy League, a military alliance between Spain, the Papacy and the Venetian Republic, which was formed to combat the rise of Islam and the Turks.

The Pope, the Doge of Venice and Philip II are shown kneeling in adoration of the name of Jesus, shown in the heavens as IHS, these being the first letters of Jesus in Greek (IHSOUS).

Charles Caryl Coleman | Capri, 1897

American painter Charles Caryl Coleman (1840-1928) was born in 1840. He was a landscape, portrait and figure painter who lived most of his life in Capri, Italy.

Coleman studied art with Andrew Andrews and W.H. Beard in Buffalo, NY in the 1850s.

He traveled to Paris to study for three years before returning to America in 1862 to enlist in the Civil War.

Robert Auer (Zagabria, 1873-1952)

Robert Auer è stato un pittore Croato della Secessione. Robert Auer nacque in una ricca famiglia di Zagabria da Ferdinando e Amelija Auer.

I suoi fratelli erano l'architetto Bela Auer e Koloman Auer, che ereditò un'attività di tipografia da suo padre. Robert ha frequentato una scuola tecnica prima di andare all'università a Vienna e Monaco.

Dopo gli studi, è stato coinvolto nella scena artistica di Zagabria, in particolare nei circoli che circondano il movimento della Secessione.

Gianni De Conno | Surrealist book illustrator

Gianni De Conno (Milan, 1957 - Milan, 26 agosto 2017) is an Italian painter.

In 1990 Gianni received the Gold Plate🎨 of Italian Illustrators Annual, in 1998, 2000 and 2001 the Communication Arts Award of Excellence, in 2002 the Stepan Zavrel prize for Children's Illustrator and the Silver Medal of the President of the Italian Republic for artistic merits.

Gianni De Conno is teaching in the main schools of illustration.

He has illustrated and published numerous books for children.

Gianni Strino, 1953 | Supper at Emmaus

Gianni Strino is considered to be a major representative of the modern Neapolitan aesthetic movement. His most notable qualities as a figure painter lie in his ability to penetrate beyond surfaces, and paint in depths.

Gianni Strino was born in 1953 in Naples, Italy.

For biographical notes -in english and italian- and other works by Strino see:

• Gianni Strino, 1953 | Figurative painter🎨

Pontormo | Pittore Manierista

Jacopo Carrucci (1494-1557), conosciuto come Jacopo da Pontormo, o semplicemente il Pontormo, è stato un pittore Italiano.

Avviò una sistematica opera di rinnovamento degli schemi compositivi della tradizione, talvolta spregiudicato, cercando di reagire al classicismo pittorico attraverso un'inesauribile vena sperimentale ed anticlassicista.

La sua complessa personalità, introversa e tormentata, ne fa il prototipo dell'artista malinconico e solitario.

Malcolm Liepke, 1953

Malcolm T. Liepke, American painter, was born and raised in Minneapolis.

As a student he hungered for 'classical' training rather than the 'conceptual' ideas being taught.

In a bold move, he left the Art Center College in Los Angeles and went to New York.

Charles William Mitchell | Hypatia of Alexandria, 1885

Charles William Mitchell (1854-1903) was an British Pre-Raphaelite painter from Newcastle.

A contemporary of John William Waterhouse, his work is similar in many ways.

His one famous piece was Hypatia, shown in 1885 and likely inspired by the Charles Kingsley serialized novel Hypatia, or New Foes with an Old Face. This painting is currently in the Laing Art Gallery.

Charles William Mitchell - Hypatia, 1885

Georg Pauli | Pittore simbolista

Georg Vilhelm Pauli (Jönköping, 2 luglio 1855 – Stoccolma, 28 novembre 1935) è stato un pittore Svedese, noto per i suoi affreschi ed i suoi soggetti maschili.

Egli scrisse inoltre dei libri relativi all'arte.

Il padre August Ferdinand Pauli (1815-1904) era un farmacista e un industriale.

La sua famiglia discendeva dal generale luogotenente Wilhelm Pauli, che a sua volta discendeva da una famiglia italiana che era partita dalla penisola sotto il patrocinio dell'imperatore Rodolfo II, all'inizio della guerra dei trent'anni, e poi era giunta in Svezia, dove venne accettata nella nobiltà nel 1625.

Caravaggio | Madonna of the Rosary / Madonna del Rosario, 1608

The Madonna of the Rosary is a painting finished in 1607 by the Italian🎨 Baroque painter Caravaggio🎨, now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. It is the only painting by Caravaggio that could be called a standard Baroque🎨 altarpiece.

The commissioner of the work is uncertain. As altarpiece it would have been commissioned for a Dominican church, given the presence of Saint Dominic and Saint Peter Martyr of Verona. The donor is included in the painting; at the left, dressed in black with a ruff, seeking protection under the cloak of Saint Dominic and peering out at the viewer.

According to some, the donor was Nicholas (or Nicholas) Radulovic, a rich merchant of Ragusa (now Dubrovnik in Croatia) and the first idea for the composition was a Madonna Enthroned with Saints Nicholas and Vito, then the subject was changed to reflect the wishes of the Dominicans.

Caravaggio | Maddalena in pianto / Magdalene Grieving, 1605-1606

According to some research, "Magdalene grieving" (1605-1606), would be a preliminary study for the character of one of the most famous works of the Lombard master conserved at the Musée du Louvre "The death of the Virgin" (1601-1605).

Commissioned in 1601 for the church of Santa Maria della Scala in Rome, The Death of the Virgin (c. 1601-1606) could not have been finished before 1605-1606.

After being refused by the monks, who found it unworthy of the church, it was replaced by a work on the same subject painted by Carlo Saraceni.

A work of light and shadow

The composition is arranged around the Virgin, the painting's central theme. The compact mass of the assemblage and the posturing of the figures guide the viewer's eye toward the abandoned body. The theatrical drape of blood-red cloth heightens the scene's dramatic effect. The painter makes use of the nuances of light and shadow to model the volumes of the objects, figures, and clothing.

Maya Green, 1957

Maya Green -born Maya Greenblat, is a Ukrainian-Jewish contemporary painter, graphic artist, illustrator and sculptor.

"I have been an artist my whole life.

Originally, i was born and raised in Ukraine and I first developed my love of art there. Since my childhood, I have been intrigued with the patterning of light and the interaction of color.

I studied at the School of Art in Ukraine.

Caspar David Friedrich | Pittore Romantico

Caspar David Friedrich fu un artista prolifico che produsse più di 500 opere.

Conformandosi con gli ideali romantici dell'epoca, il pittore intese i propri dipinti come pure deposizioni estetiche, quindi evitava accuratamente di assegnare titoli troppo prolissi o evocativi.

Infatti, è probabile che le opere con titoli più descrittivi, come accade ne Le tre età dell'uomo, siano state ribattezzate in occasione del successo postumo di Friedrich.

Friedrich Von Amerling (1803-1887)

Friedrich von Amerling è stato un pittore Austriaco.

Ritrattista, fu pittore di corte di Francesco Giuseppe d'Austria dal 1835-1880. È considerato, con Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller, il più grande ritrattista austriaco del XIX secolo.

Friedrich von Amerling fu figlio dell'orafo Franz Amerling e di Theresia Kargl.

Dal 1815-1824 frequentò l'Accademia di belle arti di Vienna e successivamente l'Accademia a Praga, fino al 1826.

Tra il 1827-1828 soggiornò quindi a Londra, dove venne influenzato dal ritrattista Sir Thomas Lawrence.

Successivamente visitò Parigi e Roma, per fare ritorno a Vienna, dove iniziò a lavorare per la corte e per le classi aristocratica e media austriache.

Johan Christian Dahl | Eruption of the Volcano Vesuvius, 1821

Johan Christian Claussen Dahl (24 February 1788 - 14 October 1857), often known as J. C. Dahl or I. C. Dahl, was a Norwegian artist who is considered the first great romantic painter in Norway, the founder of the "golden age" of Norwegian painting, and one of the greatest European artists of all time.

He is often described as "the father of Norwegian landscape painting" and is regarded as the first Norwegian painter ever to reach a level of artistic accomplishment comparable to that attained by the greatest European artists of his day.

He was also the first to acquire genuine fame and cultural renown abroad.

Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675)

It is believed Vermeer produced a total of fewer than 50 paintings, of which 34 have survived.

Only three Vermeer paintings were dated by the artist: The Procuress (1656; Gemäldegalerie, Dresden); The Astronomer (1668; Musée du Louvre, Paris); and The Geographer (1669; Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt).

Vermeer's mother-in-law, Maria Thins, owned Dirck van Baburen's 1622 oil on canvas The Procuress (or a copy of it), which appears in the background of two of Vermeer's paintings.

Il realismo romantico di Benedetto Lotti

Benedetto (Betto) Lotti (1894-1977) è stato un pittore ed incisore italiano, appartenente al movimento artistico del Novecento.

Benedetto (Betto) Lotti era figlio di Vincenzo, professore di disegno, preside e pittore, e di Vittoria dei Marchesi Curlo, entrambi liguri.

L’incarico statale del padre costringe la famiglia a numerosi spostamenti e ciò obbliga il giovane a frequentare gli istituti scolastici in diverse importanti città italiane.

Piero della Francesca (1422-1492)

Pièro della Francesca (o Piero dei Franceschi) - Pittore (Borgo S. Sepolcro 1406 o 1412 - ivi 1492); figlio di Benedetto dei Franceschi (cognome noto anche nella forma della Francesca, che poi si è imposta nella tradizione) e di Romana di Pierino da Monterchi, è uno dei più grandi pittori del Rinascimento dopo la generazione di Masaccio e dell'Angelico. Dopo una prima educazione con maestri di grammatica e di abaco, svolse il suo apprendistato artistico forse presso un pittore locale, Antonio di Anghiari, col quale risulta ancora collaborare nel 1436.

Adolf Kaufmann (Austrian painter, 1848-1916)

Adolf Kaufmann è stato un pittore Austriaco🎨 di paesaggi. Inizialmente autodidatta, completò studi con il pittore di animali, Émile van Marcke, a Parigi e ha intrapreso diversi viaggi di studio, in tutta Europa e Medio Oriente.

La sua residenza si alternava tra Parigi, Berlino, Düsseldorf e Monaco. Nel 1890 decise di stabilirsi a Vienna dove aprì uno studio nel quartiere di Wieden.

Nel 1900, insieme a Carl von Merode e Heinrich Lefler, aprì una "Scuola d'arte per donne".

Jeremy Lipking, 1975

Figlio del pittore ed illustratore Ronald Lipking, Jeremy Lipking è nato nel 1975, a Santa Monica, in California.

L'interesse di Lipking per l'arte è iniziato da bambino. Presto si iscrisse al California Art Institute, dove il suo talento nascente divenne evidente mentre si dedicava a studi seri. Ha rapidamente trovato la sua strada e lo stile etereo unico che lo ha reso famoso.

Ha cominciato i suoi studi formali non prestissimo, ma ha sempre avuto un forte senso del gusto, la componente più importante di una formazione artistica.

Lipking si è ispirato ai pittori storici che hanno unito la tradizione figurativa delle accademie europee d'arte del XIX secolo con particolare attenzione per il paesaggio naturalistico.

Kahlil Gibran | I am neither an artist, nor a poet / Non sono né un artista né un poeta..

Non sono né un artista né un poeta.

Ho trascorso i miei giorni scrivendo e dipingendo,

ma non sono in sintonia

con i miei giorni e le mie notti.

Sono una nube,

una nube che si confonde con gli oggetti,

ma ad essi mai si unisce.

I am neither an artist, nor a poet.

I have spent my days writing and painting,

but I am not in accord

with my days and my nights.

I am a cloud,

a cloud that mingles with objects,

but never becomes united with them.

Johannes Gabriel Jentzsch (German painter🎨, 1862-1930) - The Duet, 1923

Alda Merini | Yesterday I suffered pain / Ieri ho sofferto il dolore..

Ieri ho sofferto il dolore,
non sapevo che avesse una faccia sanguigna
le labbra di metallo dure,
una mancanza netta d'orizzonti.

Yesterday I suffered pain,

I did not know it had a bloodied face,

hard lips of metal,

a total lack of horizons.

Edouard Hamman (Belgian painter, 1819-1888) - Disillusion, 1851

Richard Bergh | Nordic Summer Evening, 1899-1900

A man and a woman gaze pensively at a quiet evening landscape. The glassy water of the bay reflects the soft twilight.

The light falls on the pair from the left.

The woman is wearing a long white dress, while the man, his arms crossed and resting a foot on the balustrade, is dressed in a dark suit. Quietly, the couple contemplate Nature.

The landscape reflects the calmness of their mood - or is there something more going on under the surface?

Is there not a sense of psychological or erotic tension between the two?

Between human civilization and Nature there is a boundary, here represented by the balustrade, with its human-like openings. The rowing boat in the centre of the image, moored to a jetty, may have a symbolic meaning. Perhaps it stands for the ties of marriage, for the juxtaposition of security and liberty, or a longing to escape culture for a while.

Richard Bergh (Swedish painter, 1858-1919)

Sven Richard Bergh was born in Stockholm at the end of 1858. He was the son of the Johan Edvard Bergh, who formerly spent time as a lawyer before devoting his life to his landscape painting and becoming an art teacher. His mother was also an artist and so their son was introduced to art at a very early age.

The family were wealthy and mixed with the cultural elite of Stockholm. Bergh studied at the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts in Stockholm.

He travelled on many occasions to France, often to escape the exacting academicism of that art establishment, where he visited the artist’s colony at Grez-sur-Loing just south of Fontainebleau. The colony was modelled on another famous Parisian artist colony at Barbizon, which was set up some thirty years earlier.

Pablo Neruda | Non t’amo come se fossi rosa di sale..

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,

or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.

I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,

in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

Non t’amo come se fossi rosa di sale, topazio

o freccia di garofani che propagano il fuoco:

t’amo come si amano certe cose oscure,

segretamente, tra l’ombra e l’anima.

Clemente Tafuri🎨 (Italian painter, 1903-1971)

Judith Leyster | Baroque Era painter

Judith Leyster (1609–1660) is the most famous female painter of the Dutch Golden Age.

Unlike many contemporary female artists, who concentrated on meticulously painting true-to-life flowers and insects, she ventured into more ambitious figure-based projects.

Competing with Frans Hals, Leyster chose remarkably similar themes: portraits, children playing, dancing musicians and a drinking actor.

She is also known for her innovative and evocative night scenes, in which she experimented with the subtle effects of light and dark.

Judith Leyster | Two Children with a Cat, 1629

Ivan Shishkin | Peredvizhniki Art movement

Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin (Ива́н Ива́нович Ши́шкин; 25 January 1832 - 20 March 1898) was a Russian landscape painter closely associated with the Peredvizhniki movement - a group of Russian realist artists who formed an artists' cooperative in protest of academic restrictions; it evolved into the Society for Travelling Art Exhibitions in 1870.

Shishkin (1832-1898) was born in Yelabuga of Vyatka Governorate (today Republic of Tatarstan), and graduated from the Kazan gymnasium.

Then he studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture for four years.

After that, he attended the Saint Petersburg Imperial Academy of Arts from 1856-1860, and graduated with the highest honours and a gold medal.

Franco Rispoli (Italian, 1921-1989) | Genre painter

Franco Rispoli was an Italian painter🎨, known for painting in the Genre style🎨, scenes from everyday life, such as markets, domestic settings, interiors, parties, inn scenes and street scenes.

Franco Rispoli was born in Naples in 1921 and died in 1989.

Sandro Botticelli | Vita privata

Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510) non si sposò mai e, a quanto pare, espresse una forte avversione per l'idea del matrimonio.

Un aneddoto racconta che il suo mecenate Tommaso Soderini, morto nel 1485, gli suggerì di sposarsi, al che Botticelli rispose che pochi giorni prima aveva sognato di essersi sposato, si era svegliato "colpito dal dolore" e per il resto della notte aveva camminato per le strade per evitare che il sogno si ripresentasse se si fosse addormentato di nuovo.

Il racconto si conclude in modo criptico dicendo che Soderini capì "di non essere un terreno adatto per piantare viti".

Johan-Laurents Jensen (1800-1856)

Johan Laurentz Jensen, spesso indicato come JL Jensen (8 marzo 1800 - 26 marzo 1856), è stato un artista Danese specializzato in pittura floreale.

Vita e formazione

Parallelamente ai suoi studi all'Accademia danese, divenne allievo di Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg e anche di Cladius Detlev Fritzsch.

Specializzato in pittura floreale, Jensen ha continuato la sua formazione a Parigi sotto i fratelli fiamminghi, Gérard e Cornelis van Spaendonck, e presso la fabbrica di porcellane di Sèvres, dove ha appreso l'arte della pittura floreale in miniatura.

Leopold von Stoll (1808-1889) | Still life of flowers painter

Leopold von Stoll was a flower painter of Dutch origin, who was primarily active in Austria.

Leopold von Stoll was born in 1808 in the Netherlands.

In 1828, he worked in Krakow and Warsaw.

From 1830-1834 lived in Saint Petersburg, where he held a job of a flower painter at the Imperial Botanical Garden.

In 1834, he came to Vienna and consequently gained there much popularity as a still-life (flower, fruits) artist.

From 1834-1869, he regularly participated in various exhibitions in that city (at the Academy of Fine Arts, the "Künstlerhaus", etc.).

Giovanni Carnovali, detto "Il Piccio"

Giovanni Carnovali (Montegrino Valtravaglia, 29 settembre 1804 - Coltaro, 5 luglio 1873) è stato un pittore Italiano.

Giovanni Carnovali, detto il Piccio, nato a Montegrino Valtravaglia (VA) il 29 settembre 1804, da una famiglia dalle umili origini, si trasferì in tenera età ad Albino, in provincia di Bergamo.

Herman Richir | Pittore accademico

Herman Jean Joseph Richir (1866-1942) è stato un pittore accademico Belga di scene allegoriche e mitologiche e ritrattista di grande talento.

Richir iniziò la sua carriera artistica all'Accademia d'Arte di Saint-Josse-ten-Noode/Sint-Joost-ten-Node, dove è stato formato dai rinomati insegnanti Gustave Joseph Biot e Charles Hermans.

Alla ricerca della perfezione artistica, nel 1884 si trasferisce all'Académie royale des Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles, dove affina ulteriormente le sue capacità sotto la tutela di Jean Francois Portaels.

Michele Cascella | Saint Germain en Laye, 1966

Michele Cascella🎨 (7 September 1892 - 31 August 1989) was an Italian artist🎨.

Primarily known for his oil paintings and watercolours, he also worked in ceramics, lithography, and textiles.

He exhibited regularly at the Venice Biennale from 1924 until 1942, and his works are owned by major museums in Italy and Europe, including Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume in Paris and Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna in Rome.

Margaret Sarah Carpenter (1793-1872) | Portrait / Genre painter

Margaret Sarah Carpenter (Salisbury 1793 - 13 November 1872 London), born Margaret Sarah Geddes, was a British painter🎨. Noted in her time, she mostly painted portraits in the manner of Sir Thomas Lawrence. She was a close friend of Richard Parkes Bonington.

• Early life

She was born in Salisbury, the daughter of Captain Alexander Geddes, who was of an Edinburgh family, and Harriet Easton. She was taught art by a local drawing-master. Her first art studies were made from the pictures at Longford Castle, belonging to Lord Radnor.

Umberto Boccioni (1882-1916)

Umberto Boccioni, (born October 19, 1882, Reggio di Calabria, Italy—died August 16, 1916, Verona), Italian painter, sculptor and theorist of the Futurist movement in art.

Boccioni was trained from 1898-1902 in the studio of the painter Giacomo Balla, where he learned to paint in the manner of the pointillists.

In 1907 he settled in Milan, where he gradually came under the influence of the poet Filippo Marinetti, who launched the Futurist movement, which glorified the dynamism of modern technology.

Boccioni adapted Marinetti’s literary theories to the visual arts and became the leading theoretician of Futurist art.

Daniel Del Orfano

Daniel Del Orfano, nato e cresciuto a Long Island, New York, dopo aver insegnato presso la prestigiosa Scuola Knox Boarding, è stato integrato nel sistema scolastico pubblico, dove ha insegnato arte a bambini di tutte le età.

Ma, anche se estremamente gratificante, questa non era la sua vera vocazione.

Nell'estate del 2005, fonda il "Laboratorio Rinascimento", con l'obbiettivo di espandere creativamente i suoi orizzonti.

Poiché la domanda di lavoro commissionato diventava sempre maggiore, Daniel inizia a guardare il suo stile espressivo, attuando le tecniche che enfatizzano il realismo.

Tiziano Vecellio | Ecce Homo, 1570-1576

Dimension: Height: 100.5 cm.; Width: 100.8 cm.

Medium: Oil on Canvas

Provenance: Royal Collection (Real Monasterio de El Escorial, Madrid, Sala Prioral)

Current location: Museo Nacional del Prado

Christ shown to the People: Ecce Homo, 1570-1576 depicts a passage from the Gospel of Saint John (19, 4-5) which recounts how after Christ had been whipped and crowned with thorns:

"Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in him.

Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe.

And Pilate saith unto them: Behold the man"!

Pierre-Auguste Renoir | L'ombrelle, 1878

In this radiant painting, Pierre-Auguste Renoir depicts the quintessential Impressionist subject of the fashionably attired Parisienne within a scene of abundantly flowering nature.

Painted in 1878 at the height of Impressionism, the variegated brushwork consisting of thick and swirling impasto and small dabs of spontaneous and audaciously applied paint, make L'ombrelle one of the artist's most experimental works of the latter part of that decade.

Marie Bashkirtseff | A meeting, 1884

When A Meeting was exhibited at the 1884 Salon of Paris, it was acclaimed by both the public and the press. But this success did not satisfy Marie Bashkirtseff at all, who was outraged that she did not receive a medal.

She wrote in her Journal:

"I am exceedingly indignant [...] because, after all, works that are really rather poor have received prizes"

and also

"There is nothing more to be done. I am a worthless creature, humiliated, finished".

Confident of her own talent, she denounces what seemed to her to be an injustice, but also expresses a fear: the fear of being forgotten. Marie was then only twenty-five years old, and knew already that she was condemned to die from tuberculosis; she died on 31 October that same year.

Edouard Vuillard | Young woman at the wind, 1899

Édouard Vuillard, in full Jean-Édouard Vuillard, (born November 11, 1868, Cuiseaux, France - died June 21, 1940, La Baule), French painter, printmaker, and decorator who was a member of the Nabis group of painters in the 1890s.

He is particularly known for his depictions of intimate interior scenes.

Vuillard studied art from 1886-1888 at the Académie Julian and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

In 1889 he joined a group of art students that included Maurice Denis, Pierre Bonnard, Paul Sérusier, Ker-Xavier Roussel, and Félix Vallotton.

They called themselves the Nabis (Hebrew for “Prophets”), and they drew their inspiration from the Synthetist paintings of Paul Gauguin’s Pont-Aven period.

Aime-Nicolas Morot | Le bon Samaritain, 1880

Author: Aimé-Nicolas Morot (French painter, 1850-1913);

Title: The Good Samaritan;

Medium: oil on canvas;

Dimensions: Height: 268.5 cm - Width: 198 cm;

Current location: Musée du Petit Palais, Paris.

Born into a modest, actively Republican family, Aimé Morot pursued an exemplary career after receiving an academic training in the studio of Alexandre Cabanel.

Winner of the Prix de Rome in 1873, he used his stay at the Medici Villa as an opportunity to explore the Roman countryside on horseback.

Edgar Degas | Conversation, 1882-1885

During the mid-1880s, Degas repeatedly explored the motif of two or three women leaning on a wooden railing - at the racetrack, on a pleasure boat, or before a landscape - absorbed in casual conversation..

"Degas was clearly intrigued by the visual possibilities of this moment of female intimacy", Jill DeVonyar and Richard Kendall have written, "making half a dozen variants of the composition with a range of outfits, headgear, and backgrounds" (op. cit., 2007, p. 66).

Renoir | Port de Marseille, le Fort Saint-Jean, 1906

In the early 1880s Pierre-Auguste Renoir made his first forays abroad; he had previously traveled no further from Paris than Normandy. The years of 1881-1884 however saw Renoir in a variety of disparate locations including Algeria, Italy and the French Riviera.

It was on these journeys that he stepped away from rendering purely figure-based compositions, rather creating an interesting series of landscapes to record his new surroundings.

There is no doubt that these travels deeply affected Renoir and his art, and indeed he would return repeatedly to the South of France, eventually choosing to settle permanently in Cagnes-sur-Mer in the early 1900s.

Caravaggio | The Lute Player / Suonatore di Liuto, 1595-1596

The Lute Player is an early work by Caravaggio, who sought above all to convey the reality and solidity of the surrounding world. We can already see the elements of the artist's style which were to have such a widespread influence on other artists.

The figure of a young boy dressed in a white shirt stands out clearly against the dark background.

The sharp sidelighting and the falling shadows give the objects an almost tangible volume and weight.

Caravaggio was interested in the uniqueness of the surrounding world, and there are markedly individual features not only in the youth's face but also in the objects which make up the still life: the damaged pear, the crack in the lute, the crumpled pages of the music.

The melody written on those pages is that of a then fashionable song by Jacques Arcadelt, "You know that I love you".

Caravaggio | The Lute Player | The Hermitage version, 1595-1596