Favourite Paintings

Kadayi

Banned
Surfing the interwebs the other day I chanced across one of my favourite paintings (Pieter Bruegel's 'The Hunters in the Snow' 1565) and was curious as to what other (old school) paintings fellow Gaffers might like.


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What I really like about it is the composition coupled with the crazy level of detail. The contrast between the hunters with their dogs looking somewhat forlorn and bedraggled, against the villagers below playing on the frozen ice seemingly without a care in the world. You can actually see just how much detail in the painting in the link below which allows you to fully zoom in. Kind of incredible given it was painted over 450 years ago when notions of perspective and oil paints were relatively new things.


Anyway, would like to see what paintings you like.
 
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Hypatia (1885) by Charles William Mitchell, believed to be a depiction of a scene in Charles Kingsley's 1853 novel Hypatia[92][93]

Hypatia[a] (born c. 350–370; died 415)[1][5] was a Hellenistic Neoplatonist philosopher, astronomer, and mathematician, who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, then part of the Eastern Roman Empire. She was a prominent thinker of the Neoplatonic school in Alexandria where she taught philosophy and astronomy.[6] She is the first female mathematician whose life is reasonably well recorded.[7] Hypatia was renowned in her own lifetime as a great teacher and a wise counselor. She is known to have written a commentary on Diophantus's thirteen-volume Arithmetica, which may survive in part, having been interpolated into Diophantus's original text, and another commentary on Apollonius of Perga's treatise on conic sections, which has not survived. Many modern scholars also believe that Hypatia may have edited the surviving text of Ptolemy's Almagest, based on the title of her father Theon's commentary on Book III of the Almagest.

Hypatia is known to have constructed astrolabes and hydrometers, but did not invent either of these, which were both in use long before she was born. Although she herself was a pagan, she was tolerant towards Christians and taught many Christian students, including Synesius, the future bishop of Ptolemais. Ancient sources record that Hypatia was widely beloved by pagans and Christians alike and that she established great influence with the political elite in Alexandria. Towards the end of her life, Hypatia advised Orestes, the Roman prefect of Alexandria, who was in the midst of a political feud with Cyril, the bishop of Alexandria. Rumors spread accusing her of preventing Orestes from reconciling with Cyril and, in March 415 AD, she was murdered by a mob of Christians led by a lector named Peter.[8][9]

Hypatia's murder shocked the empire and transformed her into a "martyr for philosophy", leading future Neoplatonists such as Damascius to become increasingly fervent in their opposition to Christianity. During the Middle Ages, Hypatia was co-opted as a symbol of Christian virtue and scholars believe she was part of the basis for the legend of Saint Catherine of Alexandria. During the Age of Enlightenment, she became a symbol of opposition to Catholicism. In the nineteenth century, European literature, especially Charles Kingsley's 1853 novel Hypatia, romanticized her as "the last of the Hellenes". In the twentieth century, Hypatia became seen as an icon for women's rights and a precursor to the feminist movement. Since the late twentieth century, some portrayals have associated Hypatia's death with the destruction of the Library of Alexandria, despite the historical fact that the library no longer existed during Hypatia's lifetime.[10]

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Big fan of Zdzisław Beksiński. I see he was already posted above but w/e. If his art wasn't an inspiration for Dark Souls, I'll eat my keyboard.

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love beksinski, got into his shit when i was just out of high school

nothing inspired me more, i bought all his books

when he was murdered, my heart sank
 
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Some old stuff:


Toulouse-Lautrec
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Sorolla
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Dore
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Some new stuff:

Robert Kim
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Ruan Jia
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Nurzhan Bekkaliyev
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If you have ever been to the Natural History Museum in New York they have these full size dioramas to feature the animals. The backgrounds are all huge paintings and when I was there it didn't take me long to become greatly distracted by how good they were. Really under appreciated art.



edit here ya go... the creation of those backgrounds.

 
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I like the weird off-kilter perspective in pre/early-Renaissance paintings, before artists starting learning linear perspective. Gives them a surreal air.

Jan Van Eyck:
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Bernat Martorell:
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And I've always liked this odd style of portrait. Both of these by Domenico Ghirlandaio:
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Bit of an obvious one, but Vermeers Girl With a Pearl Earring 1665 is a fantastic piece. The sense of light falling really brings the subject to life and gives it a real timelessness.

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Tamara De Lempicka's 'Young Lady with Gloves' 1930


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Chanced across a poster of this from an exhibition when I was a student and always liked it, partly for the bold colours and stylisation and partly because there's something just plain optimistic about it as a piece.
 
That is an amazing piece, the story behind is quite interesting as well: -


I'd never actually looked into the story behind it, despite loving that painting since as long as I can remember. Adds a completely different level to it.

The other two paintings have a much more personal meaning for me, though I still love them as paintings in their own right.
 
I'd never actually looked into the story behind it, despite loving that painting since as long as I can remember. Adds a completely different level to it.

The other two paintings have a much more personal meaning for me, though I still love them as paintings in their own right.

Generally, I don't delve (I like a painting to just fire my imagination) and there are shades of Hopper to Christina's world in that regard, but I chanced across the background story a while back and thought I'd share.
 
Generally, I don't delve (I like a painting to just fire my imagination) and there are shades of Hopper to Christina's world in that regard, but I chanced across the background story a while back and thought I'd share.

Generally I'm the same, and yeah I've always thought it had a similar atmosphere to Hopper.

I like Rego and Beckmann too, but not sure I'd hang copies on my walls.
 
While it's extremely hard to find a good picture of it online you can always reference the GNR album of the same name as they used the artwork.

Appetite For Destruction by Robert Williams in 1978. Just love his style!


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