P. John Burden, 1943 | Pittore simbolista

Di formazione classica come incisore e pittore in Gran Bretagna, l'artista visivo P. John Burden si è trasferito a Prince Edward Island nel 1976, dove ha continuato la sua carriera artistica e ha sviluppato una reputazione come designer di vetrate tradizionali, illustratore di libri ed artista grafico.

Il lavoro di John Burden include dipinti acrilici originali, acquerelli e stampe di artisti tradizionali e moderni.

La sua arte è simbolica o surrealista, utilizzando l'abilità rappresentativa di una vita di disegno, pittura e design.

John illustra anche libri per tutte le età e ha opere in collezioni in tutto il mondo.

Claude Monet | The Rain (La pluie), 1886-1887

"The Rain (La pluie)" was created in 1886-1887 by French impressionist painter Claude Monet (1840-1926).

• "Color is my daylong obsession, joy, and torment".
• "I'm not performing miracles, I'm using up and wasting a lot of paint.."

Georges de la Tour | The Cheat with the Ace of Diamonds, 1635

The only diurnal painting by Georges de La Tour in the Louvre along with the Saint Thomas, the Cheat illustrates a theme that was frequently taken up in the wake of Caravaggio.

The young man is subjected here to three major temptations according to 17th-century moral standards: gambling, wine and lust.

Another version with notable variations is known to exist, the Cheat with the Ace of Clubs (Fort Worth, Kimbell Art Museum).

Diego Rivera | Portrait of a Spaniard, 1912

The illustrious Salon d’Automne - from its inception the world’s leading avant-garde venue along with the Salon des Artistes Indépendants - opened its annual exhibition at the Grand Palais on October 1, 1912.

Displaying over seventeen hundred paintings and sculptures to an expectant Parisian public, it included a portrait section of nineteenth century paintings all executed by French artists and, most notoriously, a gallery of increasingly scandalous and rejected Cubist works such as La Maison Cubiste, a three dimensional installation that housed works by Duchamp, Léger, Gleizes and others.

Diego López García | Sevillana en su patio, 1918

Diego López García (Seville, February 22, 1875 - ibid, June 23, 1969) was a Spanish painter**. López García work in realistic style with techniques of impressionist** painting.

Jean Metzinger | Donna allo specchio, 1916

Donna allo specchio / Femme au miroir è un dipinto dell'artista Francese Jean Metzinger.

Questa forma sintetica distillata del cubismo esemplifica il continuo interesse di Metzinger, nel 1916, verso una minore attività superficiale, con una forte enfasi su piani astratti più grandi, più piatti e sovrapposti.

Il primato manifesto della configurazione geometrica sottostante, radicata nell'astratto, controlla quasi ogni elemento della composizione.

Il ruolo del colore rimane primordiale, ma ora è contenuto entro confini ben delineati rispetto a diversi lavori precedenti.

Pablo Picasso: "Love is the greatest refreshment in life"

All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.

Painting is a blind man's profession. He paints not what he sees, but what he feels, what he tells himself about what he has seen.

Youth has no age.

Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.

Love is the greatest refreshment in life.

A Lonely Road Is That I Walked | Poem by Pablo Picasso

I walk a lonely road, the one and only one I' ve ever known.

I don't know where it goes, but I keep walking on and on.

I walked the lonely and un trodden road for I was walking on the bridge

of the broken dreams.

Goodbye! | Poem by Pablo Picasso

I was thrown away to fend for myself in the stars unknown. Yet, there is no light there. You promised that eternity would not tear us apart. Yet, here I am, uncared for. I wanted to share my being with you. Yet, time after time, you refused me. Maybe I need you too much. Maybe you are my survival. I don't know why I still want you.

The light of the full moon is dull, for your face is not there to emphasise it. The glory of the sun is gone in waste, for you are not there to reflect it. You say it is only a matter of time. I ask, what is time? What is meaning in this world now.

Emile Claus (1849-1924)

Émile Claus (Vive-Saint-Éloi, 27 settembre 1849 - Astene, 14 gennaio 1924) è stato un pittore Belga.

Émile Claus nacque in un piccolo villaggio delle Fiandre occidentali, sulle rive della Lys, sedicesimo figlio di una famiglia di commercianti rurali. Sin da piccolo si appassionò al disegno e la domenica faceva tre chilometri a piedi per andare all'Accademia di Waregem (la città più vicina) per imparare a disegnare.

Ma il padre Alessandro e la madre Celestine Verbauwhede non erano affatto contenti ch'egli intraprendesse la carriera d'artista e lo inviarono come apprendista in Francia, in una panetteria di Lilla. Emile imparò il francese, ma non il mestiere del fornaio. Lavorò un poco anche alle Ferrovie del Belgio e come rappresentante.

Poi la svolta. Per lettera, il giovane Claus si appellò al famoso compositore Peter Benoit, che viveva nella vicina Harelbeke, affinché convincesse suo padre. E così avvenne. Claus poté iscriversi all'Accademia di Belle arti di Anversa.

Le Sette Virtù | Giotto | La Cappella degli Scrovegni

Tra le innumerevoli raffigurazioni, le allegorie dei Vizi e delle Virtù, poste in un finto zoccolo a specchi marmorei sulla parte inferiore delle due pareti laterali, sono sicuramente molto interessanti! Giotto le colloca in modo che figurino in rapporto sia le une con le altre, sia con il Giudizio Universale posto in controfacciata secondo un percorso che conduce a due destini ben precisi, l’Inferno o il Paradiso.

Giotto ha pensato alla disposizione delle figure predisponendo una sorta di percorso di salvezza, nel quale si possono curare i vizi tramite le virtù.

La figura posta all’inizio di questo 'percorso' è la Stoltezza, rappresentata da una donna vestita da giullare, giovane e stolta, incapace di distinguere il bene dal male. Quale virtù si contrappone alla Stoltezza? Ovviamente la Prudenza, che Giotto raffigura come una donna matura, intellettuale, seduta dietro ad una cattedra.

La Temperanza

Alfred Stevens | In the Studio, 1888

The beautiful sitters, art along the walls, open portfolio, and prominent mirror symbolize the artistic practice of Stevens, who was celebrated for his portrayals of chic and charming women.

On the easel is his painting of the biblical temptress Salomé (Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique, Brussels).

The female protagonists of In the Studio pose a counterpoint to the male-dominated French art world, which presented many barriers to women artists, and particularly those undertaking ambitious figural subjects.

Stevens encouraged the careers of a number of women pupils and colleagues, most notably the sculptor and actress Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923).| © The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti | Joan of Arc, 1882

Joan of Arc is the last painting upon which Rossetti worked, being finished within a few days of his death on 9 April 1882.

"Joan of Arc" is currently on display at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, England.

Rossetti was working on this painting while staying at a friend’s house at Birchington-on-Sea in an attempt to combat his declining health.

He passed away just a few days after completing it at just 53 years old.

It was found simply sitting on his easel.

This piece is based on a watercolor that he made almost twenty years prior.

Rossetti used Jane Morris, the artist, William Morris‘s wife, as his model for this piece.

This word had Merlin said from of old:-

That out of the Oak Tree Shade,

In the day of France's direst dule,

God's hand should send a Maid.

Dante Gabriel Rossetti | Book arts

Literature was integrated into the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood's artistic practice from the beginning (including that of Rossetti), with many paintings making direct literary references.

For example, John Everett Millais' early work, Isabella (1849), depicts an episode from John Keats' Isabella, or, the Pot of Basil (1818).

Rossetti was particularly critical of the gaudy ornamentation of Victorian gift books and sought to refine bindings and illustrations to align with the principles of the Aesthetic Movement.

Rossetti's key bindings were designed between 1861 and 1871.

When I See You | Poem by Pablo Picasso

I have always walked forth, not wanting anything more than what I had already had. I did not need anything at all. I had scoffed at everyone when they said that my life was incomplete.

That was till I had met you. You were the only one who had ever raised the felling of loneliness in me. you were the only one who ever made me realize that my life was always incomplete; and had always been.