The Thames and the City, Canaletto, 1847
Colours
"Personally, I experience the greatest degree of pleasure in having contact with works of art.
They furnish me with happy feelings of an intensity such as I cannot derive from other realms."
Albert Einstein
The Laughing Cavalier (1624) is a famous portrait by the Dutch Golden Age painter Frans Hals in the Wallace Collection in London, which has been described as “one of the most brilliant of all Baroque portraits”. The title is an invention of the Victorian public and press, dating from its exhibition in the opening display at the Bethnal Green Museum in 1872-75, just after its arrival in England, where it became famous, much reproduced in prints, and for long one of the best known old master paintings, at least in Britain. The unknown subject is in fact not laughing, but can be said to have an enigmatic smile, much amplified by his upturned moustaches.
Pieter Breughel’s “Netherlandish Proverbs
Landscape, Maurice de Vlaminck, French Fauvist Painter (1876 - 1958)
(Source: poboh)
John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836-1893)
The Lady of Shalott
The subject of the dead Lady in a boat or barge floating down the river inspired Edward Robert Hughes, William A. Breakspeare, John La Farge, and John Atkinson Grimshaw. This theme interested artists because of the sensuality suggested by dead Lady’s recumbent body and the decadent attraction of the union of death and beauty, sensuality and spirituality.
John Atkinson Grimshaw painted the dead Lady of Shalott floating down the river in her funeral barge after having done a similar painting, Elaine, in 1877. Both paintings convey the atmospheric stillness of the dead lady as she floats through the night.
Victorianweb.org
(Source: welovepaintings)
Albert Edelfelt (1854–1905) - Blanka Namur, Queen of Sweden
Aleksey Savrasov - Rooks Have Returned, 1871
(Source: welovepaintings)
Arkady Rylov - In the Blue Expanse [1918]
Jan Vermeer - Young Woman with a Pearl Necklace [c.1662]
John Constable - Salisbury Cathedral from Lower March Close [1820]
Constable frequently depicted Salisbury’s famous spire, which, at 404 feet, is the tallest in England. Piercing the air, the lofty steeple attracts attention to the atmosphere around it. One of Constable’s main interests was portraying the weather, a process he called skying.
When the Gothic cathedral was finished in the 1300s, its grounds were walled or enclosed; this Close forms a lush, marshy park. The couple strolling through the Close’s avenue of elms may be John Fisher, the Archbishop of Salisbury, and his wife. Their nephew, an archdeacon and art patron, was Constable’s closest friend. This personal souvenir, kept by the artist, freshly observes the sunshine dappling the lawn. With long shadows falling from the west, the time is early evening. The canvas was executed spontaneously on the spot, and its brown under-painted layer is still visible beneath the trees.
TIEPOLO DOMENICO - Head of a Philosopher with a Red Hat
(Source: welovepaintings)
Carl Spitzweg
(Source: welovepaintings)
Thomas Benham - The Days Catch [1890]
Leonardo da Vinci - Lady with the Ermine
Leonid Afremov - Foggy Park
