How a maidservant brings a protracted labour to a successful conclusion, the origin of the Milky Way, and an infant who strangles serpents for fun.
Reynolds
Who or what exactly is Cupid? How did a mischievous and rather obese infant come to represent love?
A life spent largely in poverty, working intensely, and creating some of the most innovative and visionary paintings of any artist before or since.
Two triple portraits of ladies of the nobility, which alluded to two quite racy paintings of drunken feasts, and a goddess with 8 breasts. What is going on?
How Sargent’s portrait of a young New York bride turned into a provocative account of The New Woman.
The pursuit of truth was not easy, and posed its own problems, which altered the look of paintings.
First shown at the Royal Academy when only 10, this true genius had a colourful but tragically short life.
Putting oil paint into bladders allowed painters to take it out for use outdoors. But adding some media caused paintings to age badly and fall apart.
Some of the most innovative narrative paintings, they also show the bigger picture of changing ideas and values.
We still associate brushmarks with sketchiness, speed of painting, spontaneity, bravura, and panache – and smooth paint surfaces, assembled from multiple layers and glazes, as being heartless mechanical essays in technique.
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