Auguste Raynaud | Awaiting his return

Auguste Raynaud (1854-1937) was a popular 19th-century Genre and portrait painter.

Born and raised in Lyon, Auguste Raynaud attended the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he studied with Danguin, Henri Lehmann and Félix-Auguste Clément.

In 1876, he moved to Lyon, rue de l'Annonciade, and presented a painting to the Société des Amis des Arts d'Avignon, entitled "Giotto, enfant dans la campagne du Tyrol".

Jules Breton | The painter of peasant life

Jules Adolphe Aimé Louis Breton (1827-1906) was a 19th-century French naturalist painter.

His paintings are heavily influenced by the French countryside and his absorption of traditional methods of painting helped make him one of the primary transmitters of the beauty and idyllic vision of rural existence.

He was one of the best known painters of his period in his native France as well as England and the United States.

Jules-Breton | The Song of the Lark, 1884 | Art Institute of Chicago

Victor Hugo: "Ti Auguro"

Ti auguro in primo luogo di amare e che, amando, tu sia riamato.

E se non è così, che sia breve il ricordo, e finito il ricordo che tu non conservi rancore.

Ti auguro che non sia così,

ma se così fosse, che tu sappia vivere senza disperazione.

Antonio Nunziante

Ginevra Cantofoli (Bologna, 1618-1672)

Ginevra Cantofoli è stata una pittrice Italiana dell'epoca Barocca.

Nata da Francesco Cantofoli ed Ottavia Buldrini, si avvicinò tardi alla pittura.

Studiò presso l'Accademia del disegno di Elisabetta Sirani e quindi operò presso la sua bottega.

Masaccio raccontato da Giorgio Vasari

Costume della Natura, quando ella fa una persona molto eccellente in alcuna professione, molte volte non la far sola: Ma in quel tempo medesimo, et vicino a quella, farne un’altra a sua concorrenza; a cagione, che elle possino giovare l’una all’altra nella virtù, e nella emulazione.

La qual cosa, oltra il singular giovamento di quegli stessi, che in ciò concorrono; accende ancora oltra modo, gli animi di chi viene dopo quella età, a sforzarli con ogni studio, et con ogni industria, di pervenire a quello honore, e a quella gloriosa reputazione, che ne’ passati, tutto ’l giorno altamente sente lodare.

William Bouguereau / Franz Liszt | Liebestraum (Dreams of Love)

Liebesträume (German for Dreams of Love) is a set of three solo piano nocturnes (S.541/R.211) by Franz Liszt published in 1850.

Originally the three Liebesträume were conceived as lieder after poems by Ludwig Uhland and Ferdinand Freiligrath.

In 1850 two versions appeared simultaneously as a set of songs for high voice and piano, and as transcriptions for piano two-hands.

Camille Pissarro | Jardin et poulailler chez Octave Mirbeau, Les Damps, 1892

Camille Pissarro (1830-1903) spent two weeks during September 1892 as the guest of the writer Octave Mirbeau and his wife Alice at their country home in Les Damps, a hamlet in the department of the Eure in northern France.

The artist eagerly anticipated the visit throughout the summer, both for the company, Mirbeau was among the most sensitive interpreters of his work and a fellow advocate of anarchist ideals, and for the splendid motifs to be found at Les Damps.

Camille Pissarro | Jardin et poulailler chez Octave Mirbeau, Les Damps, 1892 | Christie's