Vincent van Gogh | Landscape under a stormy sky, 1889

Van Gogh's dramatically atmospheric Paysage sous un ciel mouvementé is one of the finest of the artist's Arles landscapes.

Painted amidst the most fruitful period of the artist's career, when his canvases were flooded with rich passages of densely-painted color, the composition depicts a verdant field under threat of an explosive rainstorm.

Van Gogh creates a scene of intense anticipation here, replete with psychological drama as the laborers hurry to finish their work before the heavens rain down upon them.

Vincent van Gogh | Landscape Under a Stormy Sky, 1889 | Sotheby's

Butterflies | Van Gogh series, 1889-1890

In May 1889, Van Gogh began work on Green Peacock Moth which he self-titled Death's Head Moth.

The moth, called death's head, is a rarely seen nocturnal moth.

He described the large moth's colors "of amazing distinction, black, grey, cloudy white tinged with carmine or vaguely shading off into olive green".

Behind the moth is a background of Lords-and-Ladies.

Vincent van Gogh | Emperor moth, 1889 (detail) | Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

Camille Pissarro | Hoarfrost, young peasant girl making fire, 1888

"Gelée blanche, jeune Paysanne faisant du feu" is one of Pissarro’s great masterpieces.

Painted in 1888 at the peak of the artist’s engagement with Neo-Impressionism and conceived on a grand scale, it is a brilliant rendering of light and atmosphere.

The subject is a cold winter’s morning, the low sun casts shadows across the meadow and in these shadows the night’s frost lingers; against this backdrop a young woman and a child build a fire, the smoke rising with a heat that shimmers and eddies across the frozen landscape.

Camille Pissarro | Hoarfrost, young peasant girl making fire / Gelée blanche, jeune Paysanne faisant du feu, 1888 | Museum Barberini

Luigi Cima | Verist painter

Luigi Cima (1860-1944) was an Italian painter, considered one of the most fortunate and appreciated representatives of the “verism” of the late nineteenth century, and in any case an absolute protagonist of the artistic world of Belluno.

Luigi Cima was born in Villa di Villa, current municipality of Mel (Belluno) on January 5, 1860.

After completing his technical studies in Feltre, he moved to Venice to enroll at the Academy of Fine Arts, where he attended the courses of Eugenio De Blaas.

Giovanni Segantini | The Two Mothers / Le due madri, 1889

"The Two Mothers" is an 1889 oil painting by Giovanni Segantini (Italian painter, 1858-1899).

This work is a product of the Divisionist technique and measuring 301x162.5 cm.

It is part of the collection of the GAM - Galleria d'Arte Moderna in Milan.

Presented at the inaugural Milan Triennale in 1891, alongside "Maternità" (Maternity) by Gaetano Previati (1858-1899), "Le due madri" is one of Segantini's most celebrated and talked-about works, and affirmed the revolutionary new technique known as Divisionism.

Giovanni Segantini | Le due madri, 1889 | olio su tela; 301x162.5 cm | GAM - Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Milano

Gaetano Previati | Maternity, 1890-1891 | From Scandal to Masterpiece

The "Maternity" is a monumental painting in which the Italian symbolist painter Gaetano Previati (1852-1920) interpreted the theme of Christian tradition in a secular way.

The painting was completed between 1890 and 1891 resides at the GAM - Gallery of Modern Art in Milan.

The "Maternity" has a complex and tormented genesis, not only due to the difficulties connected with the unconventional interpretation of a great theme, but also because of the high costs of making a painting of monumental dimensions (177 x 411 cm) .

A fundamental work, the painting represents a turning point in Previati's career and a manifesto of the new divisionist painting.

Gaetano Previati | Maternità, 1890-1891 | GAM - Galleria d'Arte Moderna di Milano

Vincent van Gogh | Two peasant women digging in field with snow, 1890

Van Gogh was fascinated with the labour and life of peasants, as expressed in art and literature.

In his paintings and drawings, he prominently featured working men and women.

He believed that to truly capture ‘the heart of the people’, an artist must immerse himself in their world.

He saw labourers as simple, kind-hearted and courageous people, often holding them in higher regard than those he termed "civilized".

Vincent van Gogh | Two peasant women digging in field with snow, 1890 | Kunsthaus Zürich

Giovanni Segantini | L’angelo della vita (Dea cristiana), 1894

The Angel of Life (Christian Goddess) was commissioned in 1891 or shortly before by the banker Leopoldo Albini, together with the Pagan Goddess, now exhibited alongside it.

The two works were intended to form a diptych on the theme of women, a mystical mother in the case of the painting considered here, a worldly and lustful vision in the other.

The two figures are portraits of the family nanny, Baba, and of her son Gottardo (painted from memory, since he must have been twelve years old at the time).

Giovanni Segantini | L’angelo della vita (Dea cristiana), 1894 (detaglio) | GAM - Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Milano