After a 4-year apprenticeship, Goya struggled to get further training. He spent two years in Rome, but on his return won his first major commission, for a huge fresco.
Velázquez
Paintings from Spain 1757-1775 which would have influenced the young Goya in his early career. Dominant among them was Anton Raphael Mengs, German painter in Rome!
An offshoot of still life paintings of food, it was never very popular, and most of these are decidedly odd. From Jan Brueghel the elder to
From Aesculapius to Zeus, key features of each of the major male deities in classical myths, and links to individual articles here.
Like eyes and the rest of the face, hands are most usually seen uncovered in figurative paintings. These paintings show gloved hands which have special purposes and meaning.
Paintings by Botticelli, Raphael, Velázquez, Gerard ter Borch, and Vermeer, including an unusual Madonna in which the Virgin Mary is writing the Magnificat.
From bizarre origins as his mother was consumed by fire, and he completed gestation in Zeus’ thigh, to his marriage to Ariadne on the island of Naxos.
Seldom shown in lead roles, superb paintings by masters including Botticelli, Blake, Renoir, and Velázquez, and one strange myth to finish.
Wisdom, crafts including weaving, and warfare, she’s a popular figure in paintings from Mantegna to Klimt, and a contestant in the Judgement of Paris.
Most popularly painted in his lovemaking with Aphrodite, Ares developed a life of his own in painted allegories, particularly those of Rubens.
