Category: Old Masters

Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (France, 1824–1898) Jeune noir à l'épée (Young black boy with a sword) oil on canvas 105 x 73 cm. (41.3 x 28.7 in.) Painted in 1850 Collection of Musée d'Orsay, Paris, France In Jeune Noir à l'épée (Young Black Man with Sword), Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, then barely twenty-six, overturns aesthetic ...

Odilon Redon (France, 1840–1916) Le Bouddha (The Buddha) pastel on beige paper 90 x 73 cm. (35 3/8 x 28 3/4 in.) Painted around 1906–1907 Collection of Musée d'Orsay, Paris, France From the 1890s, at the invitation of his friend Armand Clavaud, Odilon Redon developed a passion for botany, Hinduism and Buddhism. He devoured Paul ...

Raphael or Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (Italy, 1483–1520) Madonna Bridgeland (The Bridgewater Madonna) oil on canvas 81 × 55 cm. (32 × 22 in.) Painted c. 1507 - 1508 Collection of Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh LIGHT-DARK IN THE BRIDGEWATER A Chiaroscuro Masterpiece by Raffaello When did artists first use light-dark technique in painting? In Art 101 courses, this ...

Eugène Delacroix (France, 1798–1863) La Mort de Sardanapale (The Death of Sardanapalus) oil on canvas 73.71 × 82.47 cm. (29.02 × 32.47 in.) Painted in 1844 Collection of Philadelphia Museum of Art, America Eugène Delacroix (France, 1798–1863) La Mort de Sardanapale (The Death of Sardanapalus) oil on canvas 392 × 496 cm. (154 × 195 ...

Jean Fouquet (France, c. 1420–1481) Pietà de Nouans-les-Fontaines oil on canvas 168 × 259 cm. Painted towards 1460-1465 Called Pietà when it's actually the moment when Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus lay Christ's body on the Virgin's lap. Fouquet's largest painting (168 × 259 cm), yet little known to the general public, this is a work ...

Marie Bashkirtseva (Russia, 1858–1884) Un meeting (A meeting) oil on canvas 193 x 177 cm. (75.9 x 69.6 in.) Painted in 1884 Collection of Musée d'Orsay At the end of the 19th century, women could cultivate themselves, admire and copy works of art, but were deemed incapable of creating. And in the French capital, the ...

John Peter Russell (Australia, 1858–1930) Fils du peintre jouant avec un crabe oil on canvas Painted c. 1904 - 1906 Collection of Musée des Beaux-arts de Morlaix In the late summer of 1886, on a windswept clifftop in Belle-Ile-en-Mer, John Peter Russell called out to Monet, "the Prince of the Impressionists", whose canvas on the ...

Marc Chagall (Belarus/France, 1887–1985) Les mariés de la Tour Eiffel (The Betrothed and the Eiffel Tower) oil on canvas 150 x 136.5 cm. Painted in 1938-1939 Collection of The Centre Pompidou, Paris, France When Marc Chagall painted "Les mariés de la Tour Eiffel" in 1939, the war was close at hand, and the artist didn't ...

René Magritte (Belgium, 1898–1967) L'Empire des lumières (The Empire of Light) oil on canvas 195.4 x 131.2 cm. Painted in 1954 Collection of Peggy Guggenheim, Venice Don't you find anything strange about this painting? It shows a house at night. The canvas is lit only by two lit windows upstairs and a street lamp, but ...

Gustave Caillebotte (France, 1848–1894) In A Cafe oil on canvas 153 x 114 cm Painted in 1880 Collection of Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen, France It was at the fifth Impressionist exhibition that Caillebotte presented this café scene, a painting of modern life. A life-size male figure dominates the scene. It's a model who's been painted ...