Peter Paul Rubens | Study of Two Heads, 1609

Artist: Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish Baroque Era painter, 1577-1640)

Title: Study of Two Heads

Date: ca. 1609

Medium: oil on panel

Dimensions: Height: 69.9 cm (27.5 in); Width: 52.1 cm (20.5 in)

Current location: Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Rubens painted studies of heads after live models and artistic sources, creating a cast of characters that served in turn as models for figures in religious and mythological works.

Sergio Cerchi, 1957

Sergio Cerchi è nato a Firenze, città' in cui tuttora vive e lavora. Le figure e le geometrie compongono la sua visione del reale, contrassegnata da una spinta etica che esprime valori non solo artistici, ma filosofici, storici e psicosociali.

Dai primi lavori pittorici con paesaggi e vedute, si è evoluto verso evocazioni "cubiste" e rielaborazioni del proprio vissuto, che hanno radicalmente mutato l' impianto materico e coloristico.

Soggetti e sfondi si moltiplicano nella sua pittura come su di un pentagramma musicale, sfumando orizzonti piani e volumi, in cui figure e particolari emergono leggibili e composti in modo affatto originale.

Cromie di colori ad olio, dalle calde tonalità' di rossi carminio, mescolati a sfumature ocra, a verdi antichi e blu con sapienti ombreggiature di grigi luminosi, danno corpo ad elementi petrosi, scultorei, emblematici delle materie e sostanze dei più grandi maestri dell'arte dai Primitivi al Rinascimento, di cui si nutre appunto la poetica e la pittura di Sergio Cerchi.

Édouard Manet | The Grand Canal, Venice (Blue Venice) 1874

French painter Édouard Manet (1832-1883) visited the Grand Canal Venice in September 1875 with his friend and fellow painter from outside the Impressionist circle James Tissot, who had settled in London after the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71.

Although the watery splendour of Venice has inspired many great artists, Manet found it hard to settle, but in spite of this he managed to paint one of his most dashingly Impressionist art works.

Edouard Manet | Venice-The Grand Canal (Blue Venice), 1874 | Collections of the Shelburne Museum, Vermont

Claude Monet | Palm trees at Bordighera, 1884 | Metropolitan Museum of Art

Monet first visited Italy’s southern coast with Renoir in December 1883. Shortly thereafter, he returned alone to paint, writing his dealer that working "à deux" was constraining.

This scene and The Valley of the Nervia reflect Monet’s excitement at the new motifs offered by the region’s palm trees and mountains. For this view, he ventured from his hotel in Bordighera and looked across the Bay of Ventimiglia toward the Alps on the French border.

The dazzling colors challenged him to "dare to use all the tones of pink and blue", although what he truly needed was a "palette of diamonds and jewels". | © The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Gustav Klimt | Lady with Fan, 1917

A young lady dressed in a Chinese robe stands before us.

She wears makeup and her hair is pinned up.

We encounter her in intimate circumstances - otherwise she would surely not show so much skin in front of a stranger.

Her robe has slid down from her shoulder and her naked breast is only just concealed by a Chinese fan - the central motif to which the painting owes its title.

The identity of the woman is unknown.

Shortly after its creation, the painting was also exhibited under the title of Dancer (Tänzerin).

Mihály Munkácsy (1844-1900)

Mihály Munkácsy (Mukačevo, 20 febbraio 1844 – Endenich, 1º maggio 1900) è stato un pittore Ungherese.

Mihály Lieb, suo vero nome, fu un pittore accademico, attivo a Parigi e a Budapest negli anni fra il 1870 e il 1890. Studiò nel 1863 a Budapest e nel 1864 a Vienna.

Espose al Salon di Parigi nel 1870 ottenendo un successo inaspettato. In una trentina d'anni riuscì a produrre circa seicento quadri nei generi più disparati: ritratti, nature morte, paesaggi, scene di genere, interni borghesi, composizioni storiche e religiose.

Alcuni di essi sono di dimensioni assai grandi (100 m² per l'Apoteosi del Rinascimento, oggi al Museo di Belle arti di Vienna, più di 60 m² e un centinaio di personaggi per La conquista del Paese, oggi nella sede del Parlamento Ungherese).

Purtroppo la maggior parte delle sue opere si è deteriorata per l'impiego di un fondo di colore al bitume, la cui ossidazione ha cominciato ad annerirle gravemente subito dopo la loro realizzazione.

Renoir | Enfants dans le jardin de Montmartre, 1895

"Towards 1883 there was a kind of rupture in my work. I had come to the end of Impressionism and reached the conclusion that I could neither paint nor draw. In a word, I had reached a dead end…”. (Renoir to Vollard, cit. after H. Grabers, p. 235f.)

In the early 1880s, Renoir fell into a crisis, which led him disengage himself from his Impressionist style. Thereupon he travelled to Italy, where he studied closely the painters of the Renaissance, especially Raphael.

Enthused by their techniques, he began to introduce new pictorial elements into his works. He moved closer to the classical style and again set great store by the human form and most especially a finely detailed painting style - which is easily recognised in “Le Grand Baigneuses” of 1884.