Giordano, Luca (1634-1705) La fucina di Vulcano (Vulcan’s Forge) c.1660 Oil on canvas, 192.5 x 151.5 cm Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg This early work by Luca Giordano manages to combine a mythological theme with a treatment worthy of a genre painting.…
David, Jacques-Louis (1748-1825) Sapho, Phaon et l’Amour (Sappho, Phaon and Cupid) 1809 Oil on canvas, 225.3 x 262 cm Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg David is considered the founder and leading light of Neoclassicism, which dominated art in the late 18th and…
Cézanne, Paul (1839-1906) Jeune fille au piano, Ouverture de Tannhaüser (Girl at the Piano, The Overture to Tannhauser) c.1868 Oil on canvas, 57.8 x 92.5 cm Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg Cézanne painted this work at Jas de Bouffan, an estate near…
Campin, Robert (c.1378-1444) The Virgin and Child by a Fireplace 1430s Oil on wood panel, 34.3 x 24.5 cm Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg This is the right wing of the Trinity Diptych (1430s). This altar diptych consists of two scenes, The Trinity…
Picasso, Pablo (1881-1973) Buveuse d’absinthe (Absinthe Drinker) 1901 Oil on canvas, 73 x 54 cm Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg Picasso produced this work in the autumn of 1901, during his second trip to Paris, when he was just 22 years old.…
Van der Heyden, Jan (1637-1712) Corner of a Library 1711 Oil on canvas, 77 x 63.5 cm Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid The present canvas had an inscription on the pedestal of the candelabrum which is partly lost and repainted, but which originally…
Géricault, Théodore (1791-1824) Le baiser (The Kiss) c.1816–1817 Charcoal, wash and gouache on brown paper, 20 x 27.4 cm Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid Having failed to win the Academy prize that would finance a study trip to Italy, in 1816 Géricault decided…