Agesandros, Plolydoros, and Athenodoros - Hellenistic Greek sculptors of the group known as the, Laocoon, showing the priest of Troy and his sons being strangled by a sea serpent.

Beardsley, Aubrey (1872-1889) was in Brighton, England. The family, of middle and upper middle class origins, was often nearly destitute. His father, Vincent, having lost his inherited fortune, worked irregularly at London breweries. Beardsley's mother, Ellen Pitt, provided a slender income by giving piano lessons. Both Beardsley and his sister, Mabel--who later became an actress--were considered artistic and musical prodigies.
     The artist's health was always fragile: at the age of nine, he had his first reported attack of tuberculosis, the disease which was to reduce him to an invalid several times and finally cause his death. When in 1884 his mother became too ill to care for him and his sister, they were both packed off to live with an aunt nearby. He attended Bristol Grammar School for four years as a boarder, indulging in his talents by drawing caricatures of his teachers. In 1889, he was sent to London as a clerk in an insurance office. His recovered mother soon followed and remained to nurse her son for the rest of his short life.
     Beardsley first published work was The Valiant, a poem in the June 1885 issue of Past and Present, the Brighton Grammar School magazine. Two years later his first reproduced drawings, a series of sketches, "The Jubilee Cricket Analysis," appeared in the same journal, and he provided the program book illustrations for "The Pay of the Pied Piper," his School's 1888 Christmas entertainment. In 1889 his prose piece "The Story of a Confession Album," was published in, Tit Bits, a Reader's Digest-type publication of the day. These and other works of juvenilia brought the artist little attention, however; increasingly frustrated by clerking, Beardsley sought entree into the art world. In a famous incident, the artist and his sister went uninvited to see the studio of painter Sir Edward Burne-Jones. They were sent away by a servant, but as they left, Burne-Jones spotted Mabel's red hair and asked them in. Impressed by the Pre-Paphaelite influenced drawings in Beardsley's portfolio, he recommended that the young artist attend night classes at the Westminister School of Art - the only formal training he ever received.
     The years 1893-94 were perhaps the most important in Beardsley's career. He was hard at work producing illustrations and covers for books and periodicals, including his first commission, J. M. Dent's edition of Malory's Morte D’Arthur (Beardsley had been introduced to the publisher in the summer of 1892). This massive work, issued first in 12 parts and later in volume form, contained over 300 different illustrations, chapter headings, and vignettes. Also in 1893 the artist formed an alliance with the person who was to catapult him to fame and prove his downfall –Oscar Wilde.
     In February of that year (1893), Wilde's scandalous play Salome was published in its original French version. An illustration inspired by the drama (reproduced in Joseph Pennell's article, "A New Illustrator: Aubrey Beardsley," in the inaugural issue of The Studio) was admired by Wilde and Beardsley was commissioned 50 guineas to Illustrate the English edition (1894). (Not content with art alone, Beardsley expressed an intense desire to translate the French text after Wilde found the translation by his intimate, Lord Alfred Douglas, to be unsatisfactory). This assignment was the beginning of celebrity but also of an uneasy, and at times unpleasant, friendship with Wilde, which officially ended when Wilde was tried and convicted of sodomy in 1895.
     Beardsley's fame was established for all time when the first volume, The Yellow Book appeared in April 1894. This famous Quarterly of Art and Literature, for which Beardsley served as art editor and the American expatriate Henry Harland as literary editor, brought the artist's work to a larger public. It was Beardsley's starling black-and-white drawings, title-pages, and covers which, combined with the writings of the so-called decadents a unique format, and publisher John Lane's remarkable marketing strategies, made the journal an overnight sensation. Although well received by much of the public, The Yellow Book was attacked by critics as indecent. So strong was the perceived link between Beardsley, Wilde, and The Yellow Book that Beardsley was dismissed in April 1895 from his post as art editor following Wilde's arrest, even though Wilde had in fact never contributed to the magazine.
Soon after he was let go from, The Yellow Book, Beardsley was approached by Leonard Smithers, a publisher intent on creating a rival periodical. Though (or perhaps because) Smithers was known for publishing pornography and erotica, Beardsley jumped at the chance, and so The Savoy was created, with Arthur Symons as editor. Beardsley found in, The Savoy an outlet for his writings as well as art. Under the Hill (his version of the Tannhauser legend) and, The Ballad of a Barber both appeared in numbers of, The Savoy. When publication ceased in December 1896, Beardsley continued to illustrate other authors' works for Smithers. Among these volumes were editions of Pope's, The Rape of the Lock, Ben Jonson's Volpone, and, The Lysistrata of Aristophanes). Smithers also issued Beardsley's own ,A Book of Fifty Drawings, the first collected album of his work.
     In the hope that the climate might improve his deteriorated condition Beardsley followed doctor's advice and traveled to the south of France. Realizing his short time left to live, he converted to Catholicism. During the night of 15-16 March 1898, exiled in the same country as Oscar Wilde, he died at the age of 25.

Beckman, Max (1884-1950) was a German painter. A member of the Berlin Secession from 1908 to 1911, he was impressionistic in his early style. A subsequent expressionistic phase was altered c.1917 by the savage New-Objectivity of George Grosz. Beckmann developed a richer, more personal, and more symbolic art in the 1920s. The power of his allegorical expression increased through the war years, which he spent in Amsterdam. Beckmann spent his last three years in New York City, where he taught at the Brooklyn Museum School. His well-known triptych, Departure (1932-35), is in the Museum of Modern Art, New York City.

Bellini, Giovanni (1430?-1516) was the founder of the Venetian school of painting, Giovanni Bellini raised Venice to a center of art that rivaled Florence and Rome. He brought to painting a new degree of realism, a new wealth of subject matter, and a new sensuousness in form and color.      Giovanni Bellini was born in Venice, Italy, in about 1430. Little is known about his family. His father, a painter, was a pupil of one of the leading 15th-century Gothic revival artists. Giovanni and his brother probably began their careers as assistants in their father's workshop.
     In his early pictures, Bellini worked with tempera, combining a severe and rigid style with a depth of religious feeling and gentle humanity. From the beginning he was a painter of natural light. In his earliest pictures the sky is often reflected behind human figures in streaks of water that make horizontal lines in narrow strips of landscape. The Agony in the Garden was the first of a series of Venetian landscape scenes that continued to develop for the next century. Four triptychs (a triptych is a set of three panels used as an altarpiece) in the Venice Accademia and two Pietas, both in Milan, are all from this early period. Bellini's St. Vincent Ferrer, altarpiece, which is still in the church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice, was painted in the mid-1470s.
     In his later work Bellini achieved a unique religious and emotional unity of expression. His method of using oil paint brought not only a greater maturity but an individual style. He achieved a certain richness by layering colors in new and varied ways.
     In 1479 Bellini took his brother's place in continuing the painting of great historical scenes in the Hall of the Great Council in Venice. During that year and the next he devoted his time and energy to this project, painting six or seven new canvases. These, his greatest works, were destroyed by fire in 1577.
     As his career continued, Bellini became one of the greatest landscape painters. His ability to portray outdoor light was so skillful that the viewer can tell not only the season of the year but also almost the hour of the day. Bellini lived to see his own school of painting achieve dominance and acclaim. His influence carried over to his pupils, two of whom became better known than he was: Giorgione (1477?-1510). A contemporary German painter wrote of Bellini in 1506: "He is very old, and still he is the best painter of them all." Bellini died in Venice in 1516.

Bernini,Gianlorenzo or Giovanni Lorenzo (1598–1680) was the Italian sculptor and architect, the dominant figure of the Italian Baroque. Working for the major patrons of his day, he produced brilliantly vital, dynamic sculpture in reaction against mannerist traditions and dramatic, impressive works of architecture enriched with sculpture. For Cardinal Borghese he produced marble, life-sized sculpture of David (pre-1620), Rape of Proserpine (1622), and Apollo and Daphne (1625; all in: Borghese Gallery, Rome). He designed churches, chapels, fountains, monuments, tombs, and statues for the popes. In 1629 he became architect of the present St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, designing interior details and the great, embracing, elliptical piazza in front of the church. His other Roman works include the Churches of Santa Maria della Vittoria (which houses his great sculpture the Ecstasy of St. Theresa) and Sant'Andrea al Quirinale, and the fountains of the Piazza Navona.

Bologna, Giovanni da (1524–1608) was a Flemish mannerist sculptor, born. Jean Bologne or Boulogne. He work in Florence and did most of his best work in Italy, contributing toward development is identified with the Italian Renaissance, he is best known for The Rape of the Sabines (Loggia dei Lanzi, Florence), with its spiraling forms, and Flying Mercury (Bargello, Florence).

Borromini, Filippo (1599–1677) born Francesco Castelli, was a sculptor and major Italian, baroque architect. His innovations in palace and church architecture were influential in Italy and Northern Europe. Among his buildings is San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Rome, noted for its undulating rhythm of architectural elements within a geometric plan. Borromini revolutionized architecture with his treatment of space, light, and geometric shapes.

Bosch, Hieronymus (1450-1516) was a sixteenth century Flemish painter, whose pictures have always fascinated viewers; but in earlier centuries it was widely assumed that his diabolic scenes were intended merely to amuse or titillate, most people regarded him as "the inventor of monsters and chimeras'.
     Philip II, though, collected his works more for education than for entertainment. A Dutch art historian in the early 17th century described Bosch's paintings chiefly as 'wondrous and strange fantasies… often less pleasant than gruesome to look at'. In the 20th century, however, scholars decided that Bosch's art has a more profound significance, and there have been many attempts to explain its origins and meaning. Some writers saw him as a sort of 15th century surrealist and linked his name with that of Salvador Dali. For others, Bosch's art reflects mysterious practices of the middle Ages. No matter what explanation and comprehension of his art might be, Bosch remains the most extravagant painter of his time. Bosch lived and worked in Hertogenbosch, the place from which he takes his name, a fairly quiet Dutch city.
     Bosch's ancestors settled in Hertogenbosch in the late 14th or early 15th century. Their family name, Van Aken, suggests that they originally came from the German town of Aachen. In 1430-31 appears the first reference to Bosch's grandfather, Jan van Aken, who died in 1454. Jan had 5 sons, at least four of them were painters; one of these, Anthonius van Aken (died c.1478), was the father of Hieronymus Bosch. He had two brothers and a sister; brother Goossen was also a painter. His training as a painter Bosch, most probably, received in the family. Some time between 1479 and 1481 Bosch married Aleyt Goyaerts van den Meervenne, evidently some years his senior. She came from a good family and had considerable wealth of her own.
     In 1486-87 Bosch's name appeared for the first time in the membership lists of the Brotherhood of Our Lady, with which he was closely associated for the rest of his life. This brotherhood was one of the many groups devoted to the worship of the Virgin, which flourished in the late Middle Ages. The Brotherhood of Our Lady of Hertogenbosch was a large and wealthy organization, it must have contributed significantly to the religious and cultural life of the city. They also commissioned works of art to embellish the chapel of Our Lady. Most of Bosch's family belonged to the Brotherhood, and were employed by them in various tasks. There is no documentary evidence that Bosch ever left his home town. One final entry in the accounts of the Brotherhood of Our Lady records Bosch's death in 1516.
     Numerous paintings bearing Bosch's name can be found in museums and private collections in Europe and the United States. Many of these are only copies or imitations of his original compositions, but over thirty pictures and a small group of drawings can be attributed to him with reasonable certainty. Except for his early works, however, the chronology of these paintings is difficult to determine with any precision.

Botticelli, Alessandro (1444/45 -1510) was born in Florence in 1444 or 1445, the fourth son of Mariano di Vanni Filipepi, a tanner. Alessandro's nickname was derived from the one given to his eldest brother Giovanni, who, because of his corpulence, was called "Il Botticello" (little barrel). It is believed that Botticelli was apprenticed as a goldsmith before being sent, probably in the beginning of the 1460s, to under the guidance of the Florentine artist, an former monk, Fra Filippo Lippi.
Since 1470, Botticelli ran his own workshop in Florence; and in 1472, he became a member of the St. Luke's Guild. His early woks were mostly small religious pieces In 1470, he was commissioned to paint (c.1470) for the Florentine Tribunate di Mercatanzia. In 1474, his first monumental work (1474) was mounted on a pillar in the Florentine church of Santa Maria Maggiore. He painted the Adoration of the Magi c.1475 (Uffizi Gal.; Florence), on which he depicted members of Medici clan, the ruling family of the Florence, also his (c.1476-1477) was well known. He had a lasting fame as a painter of Madonnas. Among his best are paintings are the panel painting, La Primavera and the canvas painting, The Birth of Venus c. early 1480s, commissioned by Pierfrancesco de Medici (Uffizi Gal. Florence, Italy).
In 1481, Botticelli was commissioned along with Domenico Ghirlandaio, Cosimo Rosseli and Pietro Perugino by Pope Sixtus IV to fresco the Sistine Chapel. In the 1490s, Botticelli became influenced by the Dominican monk, Savonarola, in whose sermons and writings he conjured up visions of the Apocalypse at the imminent turn of the century and warned people to repent and embrace asceticism. Botticelli's style became more severe and strict. In the late 1480s, the artist made illustrations for Dante's Divine Comedy.

Bounarotti, Michelangelo (1475 - 1564) was certainly the most representative artist of the Italian Renaissance. He also, as Leonardo da Vinci, was extremely versatile being equally capable as a poet, musician, sculptor, painter, engineer, and architect. He lived to the extraordinary age, for the time, of eighty-nine. He was not only a great master of High Renaissance classicism, but also was responsible for the development of Mannerism, a style, which became predominant in European art during the last three-quarters of the sixteenth century.
     Michelangelo di Ludovico di Lionardo di Buonarroti Simoni was born in 1475 in Caprese, in Casentino, a town not vary far from Florence. His family Buonarroti Simoni, is mentioned in the Florentine chronicles as early as the twelfth century. In 1488, at the age of thirteen, he entered the workshop of the great fresco master, Domenico del Ghirlandaio. But he also became strongly influenced by the earlier fifteenth painting of the Florentine painter, Masaccio. After less than a year as an apprentice under Ghirlandaio, Michelangelo moved to the "Academy," set up by Lorenzo the Magnificent, an informal sculptural studio lead by Bertoldo, a student of Donatello. From 1489 till 1492, he lived in the Palazzo Medici, where he studied "antique and good statues" and were he met humanists intellectuals of the Medici circle. The Neo-platonic ideas of this group seem to have had a lasting influence on Michelangelo and on his later work, such as in the Last Judgment fresco in the Sistine Chapel of the Vatican in Rome.
     Lorenzo the Magnificent died in 1492 and in 1494 the Medici were expelled from Florence. Afterwards, the misguided, puritanical religious views and rigid political ideals, promoted during the brief rule of the of the fanatical Dominican priest, Savonarola, also, to some degree, influenced the young Michelangelo, who left Florence and traveled through Venice, Bologna. During this first trip to Rome, Michelangelo was commissioned in 1489 by a French cardinal to sculpt a pieta' out of marble. Many believe that Christian ideals never have been more perfectly united with classical antique form, as in this work, which is now universally referred to as the Vatican Pieta'. After returning to Florence, Michelangelo was commissioned by the Signoria, (The city counsel) to sculpt the 14' tall, marble sculpture of David as a symbol of the city's republican strength. Shortly afterwards, in 1505, the artist was called to Rome by Pope Julius II to work on the pope's tomb. Apart from short periods of departure, Michelangelo remained in Rome thereafter until his death in 1564. Although only three of the forty life-size or larger figures were executed for the tomb, the grandiose project was never completed as conceived. Only after 40 years and 5 revised contracts later, was a much reduced version of the tomb complete by Michelangelo, which now still stands as a wall-tomb in the church of San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome.
     In 1508, Julius transferred the artist to paint the. Michelangelo accepted the commission, but right from the start he considered Pope Julius' plans altogether too simple. It was something unheard of for a patron, to allow his own plans to be completely changed by an artist. In this case, moreover, the change of plan meant that the work would have an entirely different meaning from the original one.
     Since he was not very familiar with the technique of fresco, he needed the help of several Florentine painters, as well as their advice. But his ambition to produce a work that would be absolutely exceptional made it impossible for him to work with others, and in the end he did the whole thing himself. This was something quite unprecedented. Not only was the work so vast in scale, but no artist hitherto had ever undertaken a whole cycle of frescoes without an efficient group of helpers. Michelangelo helped to create his own legend, complaining of the enormous difficulties of the enterprise. In his sonnet On the Painting of the Sistine Chapel, he describes all the discomforts involved in painting a ceiling, how he hates the place, and despairs of being a painter at all.
     Michelangelo's Last Judgment fresco, which is located on the altar was of the Sistine Chapel, is far from being an extension of the ceiling, this was entirely a novel statement. Between 2 projects about 20 years had passed, full of political events and personal sorrows. The mood of the Last Judgment is somber; the vengeful naked Christ is not a figure of consolation, and even the saved struggle painfully towards salvation. The work was officially unveiled on 31 October 1541.
     Michelangelo's last paintings were frescos of the Cappella Paolina just beside the Sistine Chapel, completed in 1550, when he was 75 years old. Although not completed until long after his death, the project was carried out essentially as he had designed it. In 1546, Michelangelo was appointed architect of St Peter's Basilica in Rome, which then was still under construction. The Basilica originally planned by the architect, Donato Bramante; but Michelangelo became ultimately responsible for the design of the dome and the exterior of the apse (the eastern sanctuary) end) of the of the structure. Michelangelo continued this work during most of his last years. Also during this late period, he also concentrated his efforts on carving two extraordinary, haunting and pathetic works in marble, one, the Rondanini Pieta,' he worked on through the six days before his death. He died on the eighteenth of February, 1564 and was buried in Florence according to his wishes in a tomb in the Franciscan Church of Santa Croce in Florence.
     Michelangelo's fame is as high today as it was in his own day. In the 20th century the unfinished creations of the great master evoked especially great interest, maybe because in the 20th century, "the aesthetic focus becomes not simply the created art object, but the inextricable relationship of the artist's personality and his work."

Bramante, Donato, (1444–1514) was the first great High Renaissance Italian architect. His buildings in Rome are the most characteristic examples of High Renaissance style. He favored central plans and a sense of noble severity. He designed much of Santa Maria Presso San Satiro, Milan, painting its choir in perspective to give the illusion of depth. From 1499 he was in Rome, where his works include the Tempietto in the courtyard of San Pietro in Montorio; the Belvedere Courtyard at the Vatican; and the original central plan for St. Peter's Basilica.

Brancusi, Constantine (1876–1957) was a Romanian sculptor. The radical, economical style of his abstract sculptures such as, The Kiss (1908), Sleeping Muse (1910), and the Portrait of Mlle Pogany (1923; Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris), caused much controversy. Bird in Space (1919; Mus. Mod. Art, N.Y.C.) exemplifies his simple forms and organic, symbolic characterization.

Braques, George (1882–1963) was a French painter. Among the developers of Fauvism, he later met Picasso, and the two explored form and structure, which in turn led to Cubism. Nude (1907–8; Cuttoli Coll., Paris), exemplifies the analytical stage of that movement, with its orderly decomposing of objects. After leading the way to collage, he produced works such as, The Table (Pulitzer Coll., St. Louis), that are more curvilinear in style.

Bruegel the Elder, Pieter (1525-1569) was an outstanding family of Flemish genre and landscape painters. He portrayed in vibrant colors the living world of field and forest in which lively, robust peasants work and play such as, The Harvesters (Metropolitan Mus. NYC) and Peasant Wedding (Vienna). Bosch’s influence is seen in The Fall of the Rebel Angels (Brussels). Bruegel also painted religious histories, parables, and rhythmic landscapes based on diagonal lines unfolding into the distance. Pieter Bruegel, the Younger, 1564–1637, often copied his father's works and was known for his pictures of the infernal regions. His brother Jan Bruegel, 1568–1625, called Velvet Bruegel, specialized in still life and landscapes. He occasionally supplied floral ornament for works from Ruben’s shop and shared his father's popularity.
     Bruegel’s Alpine sketches formed the basis of a number of elaborate landscape designs (dated from 1555 onwards), which were actually engraved by other artists. Cock was apparently pleased with Bruegel’s work for he was soon employing him on figure compositions as well. Of these, the serious of The Seven Deadly Sins (1556-7) For the rest of his life Bruegel was active as both a painter and designer of prints, and the two activities were closely linked.
     In 1563 Bruegel married Mayken, the daughter of Pieter Coeck and Mayken Verhulst Bessemers. His mother-in-law was also a painter, engaged in miniatures. Later, after the death of her son-in-law, she would give the first lessons in painting to his sons, Pieter and Jan. The couple settled in Brussels. In 1564 their first son, future painter (d. 1638) was born. At that time Bruegel acquired a patron and friend, Nicolaes Jonghelinck, a wealthy Antwerp merchant, who would eventually made a collection of 16 Bruegel’s works., ‘Velvet’ Bruegel (d.1625) was born.
During the last six years of his life Bruegel was much influenced by Italian Renaissance art, whose monumentality of form he found increasingly sympathetic. In September 1569 Bruegel died, and was buried in Notre Dame de la Chapelle, Brussels; in 1578 died Mayken Bruegel, the orphaned children were brought up by their grandmother. The surviving pictures of Bruegel are few in number – under fifty.
“Although Bruegel was famous in his own lifetime, the archaic tone of much of his imagery and his refusal to adopt the idealized figure style evolved by Italian Renaissance artists had, in sophisticated circles, an adverse effect on his reputation both during his life and after his death” (Keith Roberts). Bruegel’s works did not agree with current aesthetic theories of his time, but they wonderfully match to the tastes of our contemporaries.
     The Flemish Proverbs is an allegorical painting with the whole world of proverbs; among the others, Bruegel illustrates the following: “He blocks up the well after the calf is drowned”; “One shears the sheep, another the pig”; “One holds the distaff, which the other spins”; “The pig has been stuck though the belly”; “He throws roses to the swine”; “He brings baskets of light into the daylight”.
     Children’s Games. Children absorbed with their games and toys, as seriously as adults in their ‘grown-up’ businesses, is perhaps an allegory of the moral that adults are still children in the sight of God.

Brunelleschi, Filippo (b. 1377, Firenze, d. 1446, Firenze) was a Florentine architect and sculptor. He was one of the most famous of all architects - a Florentine hero on account of the celebrated dome (1420-36 he built for the city's cathedral - and one of the group of artists, including Alberti Donatello and Masaccio, who created the Renaissance style. He trained as a goldsmith and was one of the artists defeated by another great goldsmith/sculptor, Lorenzo Ghiberti (1401-02) for the new Baptistery doors; today both competition panels are in the Bargello Museum in Florence. The disappointment of losing is said to have caused Brunelleschi to give up sculpture and turn to architecture, but one important sculptural work of later date is attributed to him - a painted wooden Crucifix in the Dominican church of Santa Maria Novella (c. 1412).
     In 1418 Brunelleschi received the commission to execute the dome of the unfinished Gothic Cathedral of Florence. The dome, a great innovation both artistically and technically, consists of octagonal vaults, one inside the other. Its shape was dictated by its structural needs—one of the first examples of architectural functionalism. Brunelleschi made a design feature of the necessary eight ribs of the vault, carrying them over to the exterior of the dome, where they provide the framework for the dome's decorative elements, which also include architectural reliefs, circular windows, and a beautifully proportioned cupola. This was the first time that a dome created the same strong effect on the exterior as it did on the interior.
     In other buildings, such as the Medici Church of San Lorenzo (1418-28) and the foundling hospital called the Ospedale degli Innocenti (1421-55), Brunelleschi devised an austere, geometric style inspired by the art of ancient Rome. Completely different from the emotional, elaborate Gothic mode that still prevailed in his time, Brunelleschi style emphasized mathematical rigor in its use of straight lines, flat planes, and cubic spaces. This “wall architecture,” with its flat facades, set the tone for many of the later buildings of the Florentine Renaissance.
     Later in his career, notably in the unfinished Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli (begun 1434), the Basilica of Santo Spirito (begun 1436), and the Pazzi Chapel (begun c. 1441), he moved away from this linear, geometric style to a somewhat more sculptural, rhythmic style. In the first of these buildings, for instance, the interior was formed not by flat walls, but by massive niches opening from a central octagon. This style, with its expressive interplay of solids and voids, was the first step toward an architecture that led eventually to the baroque.
     Although he was not a painter, Brunelleschi was a pioneer in perspective; in his treatise on painting Alberti describes how Brunelleschi devised a method for representing objects in depth on a flat surface by means of using a single vanishing point.

Claez Heda, Willem (active 1637; died before 1702) was one of the great Dutch 17th century still-life painters.

Campin, Robert (1375/80 - 1444) previously known as the "Master of Flemalle," was born in Tournai (present day Belgium), where he qualified as a master in 1406/07.
     Along with Jan and Hubert van Eyck, Robert Campin may be considered the founder of the Netherlandish (Flemish) painting of the Early Renaissance. While the influence of the Limburg brothers and that of the art of the Burgundian court can still be discerned in his early work, such as, Betrothal of the Virgin and Annunciation, he soon turned to three-dimensional figural representation and experiments in perspective, especially in the years 1425-1430. In his later work he became increasingly obsessed with techniques of perspective. Perhaps his most well known work is the, Merode Altarpiece (Met. Mus. NYC.).

“Caravaggio” (1571 –1610), born as Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, was born in either Milan, or a town of Caravaggio near Milan, as the son of a ducal architect. His early training started in 1584 under Simone Peterzano, a little known pupil of, and continued till 1588.
     In 1592 Caravaggio went to Rome. His contact with Giuseppe Cesare d’Arpino (1568-1640), the most popular painter and art dealer in Rome at the turn of the century, brought him recognition. Through the art business Caravaggio met his first patron Cardinal Francesco Maria Del Monte, who not only held out the possibility of working independently, but also secured for him his first public commission: side paintings in the, San Luigi dei Francesi. For Cardinal’s Casino dell’Aurora he painted (c.1599-1600). Caravaggio is most known for his use of common types of figures and an intense use of chiaroscuro.
     From then on he was flooded by public commissions. Yet because of his violent temper he was constantly in trouble with the law. Since 1600, he is regularly mentioned in police records, is constantly under accusations of assault, libel and other crimes. In 1606, he became involved in murder and had to flee, finding refuge on the estates of Prince Marzio Colonna, where he painted (c.1606-1607).

Cassatt, Mary (1844-1926) was born into an affluent family in Pennsylvania on May 22 and she studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, one of the country's leading art schools. In addition to having regular exhibitions of European and American art, the faculty at the Academy encouraged students to study abroad. In 1865 Cassatt approached her parents with the idea of studying in Paris. Despite their initial objections, Cassatt's parents relented and allowed her to go.
     Mary Cassatt was the daughter of an affluent Pittsburgh businessman, whose French ancestry had endowed him with a passion for that country, she studied art at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia, and then traveled extensively in Europe, finally settling in Paris in 1874. In that year she had a work accepted at the Salon and in 1877 made the acquaintance of Degas, with whom she was to be on close terms throughout his life. His art and ideas had a considerable influence on her own work; he introduced her to the Impressionists; and she participated in the exhibitions of 1879, 1880, 1881 and 1886, refusing to do so in 1882, when Degas did not.
     She was a great practical support to the movement as a whole, both by providing direct financial help and by promoting the works of Impressionists in the USA, largely through her brother Alexander. By persuading him to buy works by Manet, Monet, Morisot, Renoir, Degas and Pissarro, she made him the first important collector of such works in America. She also advised and encouraged her friends the Havemeyers to build up their important collection of works by Impressionists and other contemporary French artists.
     Her own works, on the occasions when they were shown in various mixed exhibitions in the USA, were very favorably received by the critics and contributed not a little to the acceptance of Impressionism there. Despite her admiration for Degas, she was no slavish imitator of his style, retaining her own very personal idiom throughout her career. From him, and other Impressionists, she acquired an interest in the rehabilitation of the pictorial qualities of everyday life, inclining towards the domestic and the intimate rather than the social and the urban (Lady at the Testable, 1885; Metropolitan Museum, New York) with a special emphasis on the mother and child theme in the 1890s (The Bath, 1891; Art Institute of Chicago). She also derived from Degas and others a sense of immediate observation, with an emphasis on gestural significance. Her earlier works were marked by a certain lyrical effulgence and gentle, golden lighting, but by the 1890s, largely as a consequence of the exhibition of Japanese prints held in Paris at the beginning of that decade, her draughtsmanship became more emphatic, her colors clearer and more boldly defined. The exhibition also confirmed her predilection for print-making techniques, and her work in this area must count amongst the most impressive of her generation. She lived in France all her life, though her love of her adopted countrymen did not increase with age, and her latter days were clouded with bitterness.
     Cassatt was one of a relatively small number of American women to become professional artists in the nineteenth century when most women, particularly wealthy ones, did not pursue a career. Her decision to study abroad reflects the strong character she displayed throughout her career. When Cassatt settled in Paris, an artistic revolution was already underway in France. Changes were occurring in the way that artists showed their work to the public, and in the freedom artists had to choose their own subjects and styles. Cassatt's career developed against the backdrop of these changes.

Castagno, Andrea del (c. 1423-1457) was a Florentine painter. In c.1445 he began the Passion of Christ cycle of frescoes in monastery of Sant'Apollonia in Florence. Best known of these scenes is The Last Supper with its harsh perspective and metallic light. Donatello’s influence is seen in his later heroic figures of Dante and Patriarch in the Villa Pandolfini.

Cellini, Benvenuto (1500–1571) was an Italian Mannerist sculptor, metalsmith, and author. Under the patronage of Pope Clement VII, he made medals, jewel settings, caskets, vases, candlesticks, metal plates, and ornaments. His work, with its decorative quality and exquisite detail, is among the best of the period. Though most of his works have perished, the famous gold and enamel saltcellar of King Francis I of France and the gold medallion of Leda and the Swan (both: Vienna Mus.) still remain. His late Florentine sculptures include the bust of Cosimo I (Bargello, Florence) and Perseus with the Perseus and the Head of Medusa (Loggia dei Lanzi, Florence). Cellini was a true Renaissance man, and his autobiography (1558–62) is one of the most important documents of the 16th century.

Cézanne, Paul (1839-1906) was born into a family of Italian origin in Cesana Forinese. His father had established a felt hat business in Aix-en-Provence and later became a banker. In 1859 he bought a country house on the outskirts of Aix, the Jas de Bouffan, which was to be frequently represented in Cézanne’s paintings.
     Between 1852 and 1859 Paul Cézanne studied at the Collège Bourbon.. In 1856 Cézanne began to attend the evening drawing courses of Joseph-Marc Gibert at the Aix Museum. From 1859 to 1861 he studied law at Aix, entered his father’s bank. By April 1861 his father had finally yielded to Cézanne’s desire to make a career in art and allowed him to go to Paris to study at the Académie Suisse. In Paris Cézanne frequented the Louvre, met many of the future Impressionists. In September of the same year he was refused admission to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and went back to Aix, to the great relief of his father, who offered him a position in his bank. But in November 1862 Paul Cézanne went back to Paris and took up painting again.
     During his so called “dark” or “romantic” period (1862-70) Paul Cézanne often visited Paris and tried to be accepted at the Salon. The Franco-Prussian War drove him to L’Estaque near Marseilles. Paul Cézanne’s Impressionist period (1873-79) is connected with his staying at Pontoise and Auvers-sur-Oise in 1872, 1873, 1874, 1877 and 1881. He exhibited with the Impressionists in 1874 and in 1877. The canvases produced at L’Estaque (1880-83) and at Gardanne (1885-88) are usually referred to Paul Cézanne’s “constructive” period. In 1886 after his father’s death, Cézanne married Hortense Fiquet, with whom he had a secret liaison since 1870. She is said to look after the finished canvases, which Cézanne never took care to keep and abandoned as soon as he completed the painting. The same year Cézanne quarelled with Zola over the novel, L’Oeuvre in which the central figure, an unsuccessful and unbalanced painter, was identified with Cézanne.
     In 1887, after a long break, Cézanne participated in the exhibition of Les XX at Brussels. Towards the beginning of Paul Cézanne’s “synthetic” period (1890-1906) the younger generations of artists started to take an interest in him. His first one-man show was held in the Vollard Gallery in 1895. During these years the artist seldom visited Paris – his longest stays there took place in 1895, 1899 and 1904 – and produced many versions of canvases depicting Mount Sainte-Victoire, smokers, card-players and bathers, and painted still lifes and portraits. By 1901 Cézanne had become recognized. He often met with young artists who admired his work – Denis, Bonnard and Vuillard. In 1901 Denis painted Hommage à Cézanne. The future Fauvist Charles Camoin sought his advice, and in 1904 he was visited by Emile Bernard, an artist of the Pont-Aven school, with whom Cézanne corresponded extensively, expounding his views on art.
     In 1904 his paintings were shown for the first time at the Autumn Salon in Paris; and a year after his death, in 1907, a retrospective exhibition of his works was held there.

Chagall, Marc (1889–1985) was a was a Russian-born French painter and designer, distinguished for his surrealistic inventiveness. He is recognized as one of the most significant painters and graphic artists of the 20th century. His work treats subjects in a vein of humor and fantasy that draws deeply on the resources of the unconscious. Chagall's personal and unique imagery is often suffused with exquisite poetic inspiration.
     Chagall was born July 7, 1887, in Vitsyebsk, Russia (now in Belarus), and was educated in art in Saint Petersburg and, from 1910, in Paris, where he remained until 1914. Between 1915 and 1917 he lived in Saint Petersburg; after the Russian Revolution he was director of the Art Academy in Vitsyebsk from 1918 to 1919 and was art director of the Moscow Jewish State Theater from 1919 to 1922. Chagall painted several murals in the theater lobby and executed the settings for numerous productions. In 1923, he moved to France, where he spent the rest of his life, except for a period of residence in the United States from 1941 to 1948. He died in St. Paul de Vence, France, on March 28, 1985.
     Chagall's distinctive use of color and form is derived partly from Russian expressionism and was influenced decisively by French cubism. Crystallizing his style early, as in Candles in the Dark (1908, artist's collection), he later developed subtle variations. His numerous works represent characteristically vivid recollections of Russian-Jewish village scenes, as in I and the Village (1911, Museum of Modern Art, New York City), and incidents in his private life, as in the print series Mein Leben (German for “My Life,” 1922), in addition to treatments of Jewish subjects, of which The Praying Jew (1914, Art Institute of Chicago) is one. His works combine recollection with folklore and fantasy. Biblical themes characterize a series of etchings executed between 1925 and 1939, illustrating the Old Testament, the 12 stained-glass windows in the Hadassah Hospital of the Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center in Jerusalem (1962), and, The Rabbi of Vitebsk (Art Inst., Chicago). The National Museum of the Marc Chagall Biblical Message was opened in Nice, France, to house hundreds of his biblical works. Chagall executed many prints illustrating literary classics. A canvas completed in 1964 covers the ceiling of the Opéra in Paris, and two large murals (1966) hang in the lobby of the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City.

Christo (1935-) is a Bulgarian artist; who was born, Javacheff. His art has typically involved wrapping objects, giving them a temporary, artificial skin that both conceals and reveals, thus transforming the everyday into the ambiguous. His work includes, Running Fence (1976), a fabric curtain that ran 24 mi (38.6 km) through the California countryside; The Umbrellas (1991), 1,340 20-ft (6.1-m) Tall Blue Umbrellas in rice fields 70 mi (113 km) north of Tokyo; and 1,760 Yellow Ones in Tejon Pass, NW of Los Angeles.

Cimabue (c.1240 - after 1302), born as, Cenni di Peppi, called born in Florence, was the most famous Italian painter of his generation. He is mainly known as the teacher of Giotto, whom, according to the legend, Cimabue found when the latter was working as a shepherd, drawing a lamb on a flat stone, and took him to his workshop in Florence. Cimabue was the first artist to move away from the stylized and rigid conventions of Byzantine art. In doing this he actually paved the way for his pupil's naturalism, which in turn forms the basis of the Italian art. Cimabue is mentioned by Dante as having his reputation eclipsed by Giotto and is known to have been in Rome in 1272. He also worked in 1302on the mosaic figure of Saint John in the apse of Cathedral of Pisa and executed several important works in the Lower church of the Basilica of San Francesco at Assisi.

Cole, Thomas (1801-1848) was an American painter, one of the founders of Romantic landscape painting in the New World. He was born into an Anglo-American family in England in 1801. The family returned to the United States in 1818; until then young Thomas had received training in drawing and wood engraving. In the USA, he entered the Philadelphia Academy of Art in 1823.
     Later he settled in the Catskills on the Hudson and became a co-founder of the so-called Hudson River School, which established Romantic landscape painting in America. Direct, spontaneous landscapes painted in the wilderness of the Catskill Mountains brought rapid recognition and attracted New York buyers.
     In 1829 and 1841-1842 Cole traveled to Europe, he visited England, Switzerland and Italy, studying in particular the landscapes of European masters. On his return, having also absorbed philosophical and literary ideas, Cole introduced a new type of painting to America: the symbolic, moral landscape, as represented by the series on the themes of The Course of Empire (1832; New York, Historical Society) and The Voyage of Life (1839/40; Utica, Munson William Proctor Institute). These are fantastic, symbolic scenes full of unusual effects of grandiose space and theatrical contrasts of light. Not satisfied with great American nature any longer, Cole increases fantastic and mystical character by introducing Biblical and antique subjects. His late pictures do not attain the fine quality of his earlier atmospheric landscapes, they are rough and primitive, but are supposed to stun spectators with extremely pretentious surrealism.

Constable, John (1776-1837) was one of the major European landscape artists of the XIX century, whose art was admired by Delacroix and Gericault and influenced the masters of Barbizon and even the Impressionists, although he did not achieved much fame during his lifetime in England, his own country. John Constable was born in East Bergholt, Suffolk, on 11 June 1776, the fourth child and second son of Ann and Golding Constable. His father was a prosperous local corn merchant who inherited his business from an uncle in 1764. Constable was educated at Dedham Grammar School, where he distinguished himself more by his draughtsmanship than his scholarship. In 1793 his father decided to train him as a miller and, consequently, Constable spent a year working on the family mill, which helped him to determine his course of life: he would be an artist.
     In 1796-1798 he took lessons from John Thomas Smith and later from George Frost, who supported his love of landscape painting and encouraged him to study. In 1700 he entered the Royal Academy Schools. As a student he copied Old Master landscapes, especially those of Jacob van Ruisdael. Though deeply impressed by the work of Claude Lorrain and the watercolors of Thomas Girtin, Constable believed the actual study of nature was more important than any artistic model. He refused to "learn the truth second-hand". To a greater degree than any other artist before him, Constable based his paintings on precisely drawn sketches made directly from nature.
     He married Maria Bicknell in 1816 and they settled in London. After 1816 he changed the method of his work turning away from realistic agrarian landscapes. Now he was working mostly in his studio in London and had to work out the image from his memory, starting each picture from a full-size sketch. The sketches enabled his memory to develop gradually until everything he could remember about the scene was satisfactorily suggested. At this point he would begin the finished painting. Although he never was popular in England, some of his works were exhibited in Paris and achieved instant fame. In 1829 he was finally elected a Royal Academician. He died on 31st of March, 1837 working on his last picture.

Corot, Camille (1796-1875), at the age of 26 he abandoned a commercial career for art, and from the first showed a strong vocation for landscape painting. He lived in Paris, but traveled about France making sketches from nature and from these he composed in his studio. In addition to his journeys in France, he visited England, the Low Countries, Switzerland, and Italy three times (1825-28, 1834, and 1843). Throughout his life Corot found congenial the advice given to him by his teacher Achille-Etna Michallon `to reproduce as scrupulously as possible what I saw in front of me'. On the other hand he never felt entirely at home with the ideals of the Barbizon School, the members of which saw Romantic idealization of the country site as a form of escapism from urban banality, and he remained more faithful to the French Classical tradition than to the English or Dutch schools. Yet although he continued to make studied compositions after his sketches done direct from nature, he brought a new and personal poetry in the Classical tradition of composed landscape and an unaffected naturalness which had hitherto been foreign to it.
     Through he represented nature realistically, he did not idealize the peasant or the labors of agriculture in the manner of Millet and Courbet, and was uninvolved in ideological controversy.
     From 1827 Corot exhibited regularly at the Salon, but his greatest success there came with a rather different type of picture -- more traditionally Romantic in its evocation of an Arcadian past, and painted in a misty soft-edged style that contrasts sharply with the luminous clarity of his more topographical work.
     Late in his career Corot also turned to figure painting and it is only fairly recently that this aspect of his work has emerged from neglect -- his female nudes are often of high quality. It was, however, his directness of vision that was generally admired by the major landscape painters of the latter half of the century and influenced nearly all of them at some stage in their careers. His popularity was (and is) such that he is said to be the most forged of all painters (this in addition to an already prolific output).
     In his lifetime he was held in great esteem as a man as well as an artist, for he had a noble and generous nature; he supported Millet's widow, for example, and gave a cottage to the blind and impoverished Daumier.

Courbet, Gustave (1819-77), The painter Courbet started and dominated the French movement toward “realism.” Art critics and the public were accustomed to pretty pictures that made life look better than it was. Courbet, against much opposition, truthfully portrayed ordinary places and people.
     Gustave Courbet was born on June 10, 1819, to a prosperous farming family in Ornans, France. He went to Paris in 1841, supposedly to study law, but he soon decided to study painting and learned by copying the pictures of master artists. In 1844 his self-portrait, Courbet with a Black Dog, was accepted by the Salon, an annual public exhibition of art sponsored by the influential Royal Academy.
     In 1848 a political revolution in France foreshadowed a revolution in art, as people in the arts became more open to new ideas. Courbet's early work was exhibited successfully in 1849. That same year he visited his family in the countryside and produced one of his greatest paintings, The Stone-Breakers, followed by Burial at Ornans in 1850. Both were quite unlike the romantic pictures of the day because they showed peasants in realistic settings instead of the rich in glamorized situations. In 1855 he completed a huge canvas, The Artist's Studio, and, when it was refused for an important exhibition, Courbet boldly displayed his work himself near the exhibition hall.

Daguerre, Louis (1789–1851) was a French scene painter and physicist, inventor of the daguerreotype. Known first for his illusionistic stage sets, he was also the inventor, with C.M. Bouton, of the diorama (pictorial views seen with changing lighting). The daguerreotype, a photograph produced on a silver-coated copperplate treated with iodine vapor, was developed with J. Nicéphore Nie’pce and ceded to the Academy of Sciences in 1839.

Dali, Salvador (1904–1989) was a Spanish painter, writer, and member of the surrealist movement. He was born in Figueras, Catalonia, and educated at the School of Fine Arts, Madrid. After 1929 he espoused Surrealism , although the leaders of the movement later denounced Dalí as overly commercial. Dalí's paintings from this period depict dream imagery and everyday objects in unexpected forms, such as the famous limp watches in, The Persistence of Memory (1931, Museum of Modern Art, New York City). Dalí moved to the United States in 1940, where he remained until 1948. His later paintings, often on religious themes, are more classical in style. They include Crucifixion (1954, Metropolitan Museum, New York City) and The Sacrament of the Last Supper (1955, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.).
     Dalí's paintings are characterized by meticulous draftsmanship and realistic detail, with brilliant colors heightened by transparent glazes. Dalí designed and produced surrealist films, illustrated books, handcrafted jewelry, and created theatrical sets and costumes. Among his writings are ballet scenarios and several books, including The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí (1942) and Journal d'un génie (1964; Diary of a Genius, 1965)

Daumier, Honoré (1808-1879) was born in Marseilles into the family of a glazier, who was fond of poetry and even wrote his own verses. In 1814, the family moved to Paris. Daumier started to study art in 1822 under the renowned artist and archaeologist Alexandre Lenoir. The financial situation forced Daumier to earn his living as a delivery boy, while at his spare time he sketched at the Louvre. About 1828, he learned the technique of lithography and began to work for small publishing houses. After the revolution of 1830 in the atmosphere of freedom of speech in France the role of mass media grew and the art of political satire flourished. In 1830, Daumier started to work for Philipon’s Caricature and Le Charivari. Satire against the king Louis-Phillip
    A biting political cartoonist, Daumier contributed satirical drawings to various Paris weeklies for most of his career. Nearly all of Daumier’s cartoons were done with lithography. History of France and Europe, social and political relations, and statesmen, find a place in his works. According to his contemporaries he had an amazing memory and capability to capture the essence of the model, its plastics, mimics, gestures. His series of sculpture portraits of French deputies is amazing.
     At the end of the 1840s, Daumier’s interests shifted to painting, though he continued to issue many lithographs. His paintings however differ from his graphic works not only by techniques and artistic media but also by different subjects. His lithographic works embrace many themes; yet there is no irony expressed in his paintings. They remain fully sympathetic with his characters.
Other paintings by Daumier have subjects more characteristic of Romanticism. The numerous canvases and drawings of the adventures of Don Quixote, from Cervantes’ sixteenth novel, show the fascination this theme had for him. Daumier worked much, he left more than 4000 works of graphics, 300 paintings, 800 drawings, 1000 woodcuts and sculptures. But despite this titanic work he could not make ends meet all his life. He died in the house that had been presented to him by Corot. Corot secretly bought Daumier a house, and wrote to him, “My old comrade – I have a little house for which I had no use at Valmondois near the Isle-Adam. It struck me that I could offer it to you and, as I think it is a good idea, I have registered it in your name at the notary’s. It is not for you that I do this, it is merely to annoy your landlord”. It was a simple gesture, and it gave Daumier a few serene and tranquil years.
     Daumier, “one of the few Romantic artists who did not shrink from reality”, remained in his day practically unknown as a painter.” During his lifetime he found no public for his work. Only a few friends encouraged him and, a year before his death, arranged his first solo exhibition. Thus his pictures had little impact during his lifetime.
     Daumier’s paintings are closer to the art of the 20th century than to his own: they are sketch-like and very expressive. Only in 1901, at Daumier’s posthumous exhibition the world discovered this name for itself.

da Vinci, Leonardo (1452 -1519) was the embodiment of the Renaissance ideal of the universal man, the first artist to attain complete mastery over all branches of art. He was a painter, sculptor, architect and engineer besides being a scholar in the natural sciences, medicine and philosophy.
     He was born on the 15th of April, 1452 as an illegitimate son of the notary Ser Piero di Antonio da Vinci and his mother, a peasant woman Caterina, in a small town called Vinci, near Empoli, Tuscany. The first four years of his life were spent in a small village near Vinci with his mother. After 1457, he lived in his father's family, which soon moved to Florence. At the age of 15 he became an apprentice of the Florentine painter and sculptor and although in 1472 he entered the San Luca guild of painters in Florence, which would indicate that he had attained a degree of professional independence, he remained with Andrea del Verrocchio until 1480. Verrocchio, it is said, was so impressed by the implications of his pupil's genius that he gave up painting. (c.1478-1480). Unfortunately, it was to be repeated with many of his works: many of them were never finished.
     In 1482, Leonardo moved to Milan in the hope of obtaining the patronage of the ruler of the city Ludovico Sforza, also known as Ludovico Moro for his dark coloring. Leonardo offered his services as a military engineer, sculptor and painter.
     In 1483, he was commissioned to make a large altar piece (1482-1486) for the Franciscan Confraternity in the Church of S. Francesco Grande. Another version of this picture was created later. Being the court painter, sculptor and engineer, worked on the equestrian statue of Francesco Sforza (father of Ludovico, “Il Moro”), which was created as a huge clay model of the horse; but the project was never cast in bronze. Leonardo painted his Last Supper (c.1495-1498) for the refectory of the Dominican Monastery Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, which is considered the first work of High Renaissance. His representation of the theme has become the epitome of all Last Supper compositions. Unfortunately, he experimented with the paint and this led to the damage of the fresco, the paint began to crumble almost after the fresco was finished. See one of the contemporary. In the mid- to late- 1480s, when Leonardo was attempting to establish himself as a court artist, he seemed to have started on his huge range of scientific researches, which included botany, anatomy, medicine, architecture, military engineering, geography etc. We know about his studies by the enormous amount of his drawings which were left. He was writing the Treatise on Painting, a collection of practical and theoretical instructions for painters, all his life.
     In 1499, after the defeat of Ludovico Sforza by the French, Leonardo left Milan. After short journeys to Mantua and Venice he returned to Florence. There he was working on a commission for the Servite monastery, which probably was (c.1502-1516). In 1502 he was employed by General Cesare Borgia as an architect and military engineer, with whom he traveled, mainly in Central Italy, studying terrain.
     In 1503 Leonardo returned to Florence again and, in response to a commission from Francesco del Giocondo, started on a portrait of his wife Lisa del Giocondo (1503-1506), which was to become the most famous picture in the world, now known as the Mona Lisa, although the portrait was not finished in time and never delivered to the client. Leonardo received more important commissions, he was to paint the Grand Council Chamber in the Palazzo Vecchio, the seat of government of Florence. The wall-painting, which Leonardo left unfinished in the spring of 1506 and which was destroyed in the middle of the XVI century depicted the of 1440, when Florentine forces, together with their papal allies, defeated their Milanese opponents near the town of Anghiari. At the same time Michelangelo also was commissioned to create a painting on the opposite wall of the same hall (the so-called Battle of Cascina), which was never finished either.
     In 1506-1512, Leonardo lived mostly in Milan under the patronage of the French Governor of the town Charles d'Amboise. During these years (c.1505-1510), he worked on an equestrian statue for General Giangiacomo Trivulzio, which was never realized and continued his anatomical studies. But, he never received any major commissions comparable to those already carried out by and Michelangelo for Leo X.
     In 1516, Leonardo received an invitation from French King to go to the French court, which he accepted. He was given residence in Cloux, not far from the King's residence in Amboise, and was appointed "the first painter, engineer and architect to the King". But his only obligation was to converse with the 22-year old King, who visited him almost daily. Leonardo died on the 2nd of May, 1519 in Cloux and was buried in the Church of St. Florentine in Amboise. Leonardo's reputation in his life-time was immense, and it was acknowledged visibly not only in the work of the foremost painters of the time in Florence: Andrea del Sarto and, above all, - but also in Milan and northern Italy - by n Parma, and by in Venice.

Degas, Edgar (1834-1917) was born into the family of bankers of aristocratic extraction. His mother died in 1847, so the boy's father, Auguste de Gas, and grandfather, Hilaire de Gas, were the most influential figures in his early life. Despite his own desire to paint he began to study law, but broke off his studies in 1853. He frequented Félix Joseph Barrias’s studio and spent his time copying Renaissance works. In 1854-1859 he made several trips to Italy, some of the time visiting relatives, studying the Old Masters; he painted historical pictures and realistic portraits of his relatives. By 1860 Degas had drawn over 700 copies of other works, mainly early Italian Renaissance and French classical art.
     In the troubled post-war years Degas undertook his longest journey. In 1872 with his younger brother René, he traveled to New York and New Orleans, where his uncle, his mother's brother, Michel Musson, ran a cotton business. Degas stayed in Louisiana for 5 months and returned to Paris in February 1873.
     After his return from America, Degas had closer contact with dealers such as Durand-Ruel, in an attempt to bring his work to public attention independently of the Salon. In 1874 Degas helped organize the 1st Impressionist exhibition. He always found the term “Impressionism” unacceptable – mainly, perhaps, because he did not share the Impressionists’ over-riding interest in landscape and color. He did not care to be tied down to one method of painting. Nonetheless, Degas was to participate in all the group exhibitions except that of 1882. Degas used the group and the exhibitions high-handedly to promote himself. His strategy seems to have been to show off his own diversity at the exhibitions, for he always entered works that were thematically and technically very varied.
     Since late 1860s Degas frequently painted jockeys and race horses. Among other reasons they were easier to sell. Degas’ ballerinas have determined his popular image to his day. The rapid worsening of his eye condition caused him to avoid all society; he drew pastels, modeled statues in wax and extended his art collection. In 1909-1911, due to failing eyesight, he stopped work completely. After Degas’ death about 150 small sculptural works were found in his studio, and unsurprisingly his subjects tended to be race horses or dancers.

Delacroix, Ferdinand Victor Eugene (1798-1863) was the most vivid representative of French Romanticism, was born on 26 April 1798, the forth child of Charles Delacroix, Foreign Minister under the Directory and Prefecture of Marseilles. There is some reason to believe that his real father was Talleyrand (1754-1838), the famous diplomat, whom Eugene Delacroix resembled in character and appearance.
     Charles Delacroix died in 1805. In 1814 Eugene’s mother followed, leaving him an orphan at the age of 16. In 1816 he entered l'Ecole des Beaux-Art. In 1822 his was accepted for the Paris Salon, and subsequently acquired by the state. At the 1824 Salon Delacroix presented, a work that is a personal reaction to the genocide practiced by Sublime Porte against the Greeks. This work placed Delacroix firmly among the Romantic painters. He spent the summer of 1825 with Bonington in England, who acquainted him with English literature and inspired him to paint lithographic prints of the scenes from the Shakespeare plays, Macbeth and Hamlet. He also produced lithographs of heroes from the writings of Sir Walter Scott and Lord Byron. In 1828 he published a series of seventeenth lithographs illustrating Goethe’s Faust.
     In 1832 Delacroix spent 6 months in North Africa, in the retinue of the Count Charles de Mornay, Ambassador to the Sultan of Morocco, abd er-Rugman. The life and customs of the Arabs fascinated him and were to inspire many paintings.
     In 1838-1844 he decorated the library of the Chambre des Deputes and the Chambre des Pairs in the Palais du Luxembourg, as well as the Chapel of the Holy Sacrament at Saint-Denis. He also continued to exhibit at the Salon. In 1850-51 he decorated the ceiling of the Apollo Gallery in the Louvre. In 1855 he exhibited forty-eight paintings at the Universal Exposition in Paris. On his eighth attempt, he was made a member of the Academy. His health worsened, he could no longer work and spent much time in the country. He dies on the thirteenth of August 1863 he died.

del Ghirlandaio, Domenico (1449-1494) born, Domenico di Tommaso Bigordi, was one of the most popular Florentine artists of his time. His father managed a jewelry business, in which the young Domenico began his career as a goldsmith. His nickname, Ghirlandaio, means "garland-maker" and is reality to the fact that his specialty was the manufacture of silver or gold crowns or diadems, which were popular among the young women of Florence of the time.
     In the 1460s, thanks to the patronage of the Vespucci family, Ghirlandaio was able to work independently. The Vespucci commissioned him and his workshop to paint various frescoes, such as his great Last Supper (1480) for the refectory of Church of the Ognissanti in Florence. In 1475 he worked in the nearby Tuscan town of San Gimignano, where he painted frescos for the Collegiate Church there. Later in 1481-82, he and many other significant Italian painters were commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV to paint a series of frescoes of the Life of Christ and the Life of Moses for the wall area, located under the windows of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. In these frescoes, he developed a more mature, naturalistic style, in which many figures are seen skillfully arranged within more complex compositional formats. The prestige of this work led to many other commissions upon his return to Florence, including the decoration of the Sala dei Gigli in Palazzo Vecchio (1483) and frescos and an altarpiece for the Sassetti family chapel in the Church of Santa Trinità (1483-1485). (Much of the detailed work and the detailed realism of figures of the shepherds that he painted in his altarpiece of the Adoration of the Shepherds for the Sassetti Chapel reflect the influence of Hugo van der Goes,' Portinari Altarpiece, which had recently arrived in Florence.
     In the late 1480s, Ghirlandaio painted a number of interesting portraits, the most remarkable of which is that of the Grandfather and Young Boy; never before had such careful attention been paid to ugly, even disfiguring detail. Ghirlandaio's creativity reached its culmination with the work that he did for the Tornabuoni Chapel of the church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence, (1485-1490). This work was commissioned by Giovanni Tornabuoni, a partner in the Medici bank. The Chapel contains fifteen frescoes of the Life of St. John the Baptist and the Life of the Virgin and was completed in 1490 by Ghirlandaio's workshop, which he managed together with his brothers David and Benedetto. The most famous of his many pupils was the great Michelangelo Bounarotti, who specifically gained his knowledge of fresco painting from Ghirlandaio. This skill became particularly relevant, when in 1508 Pope Julius II asked Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel Ceiling.
     About 1480, Ghirlandaio married Costanza di Bartolommeo Nucci (d. 1485). From her he had two sons, Bartolommeo, born in 1481, who entered the Camaldolese Order; and (1483-1561), who was, like his father, a painter. In 1488, the artist took Antonio di ser Paolo di Simone Paoli as his second wife. Domenico died suddenly, of a malignant fever, at the age of forty-five years.

della Francesca, Piero (1420?-92) was one of the great artists of the early Italian Renaissance, Piero della Francesca painted religious works that are marked by their simple serenity and clarity. He was also interested in geometry and mathematics and was known for his contributions in these fields.
    Although the date and place of Piero della Francesca's birth are not definite, it seems likely that he was born in about 1420 in Sansepolcro, Italy. His father was a well-to-do tanner and shoemaker, and Piero's varied accomplishments indicate that he received a good education. He probably studied painting with one of several skilled artists of the Sienese school who lived in Sansepolcro.
     By 1439 Piero was working with Domenico Veneziano on frescoes for the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence. His experience and contacts in Florence, where he would have seen the works of such sculptors, artists, and architects as Donatello, Brunelleschi, and Masaccio, which had a profound influence on Piero's style. Piero was skilled in perspective, and his paintings are also known for the care with which he rendered the landscapes that provide the backgrounds for his figures. Throughout his life he maintained his ties with Sansepolcro, but he traveled widely.
     In addition to Florence, he also worked in Rimini, Arezzo, Ferrara, and Rome. For Count Federigo da Montefeltro he painted a diptych, or two-panel painting, that portrays the count and his wife and was probably done in honor of their wedding. Another notable accomplishment of Piero's was a series of frescoes entitled The Legend of the True Cross. In the last years of his life Piero apparently ceased painting to pursue other interests, including writing. He wrote a treatise on painting and others on geometry and applied mathematics. It is said, but not proved, that he lost his sight toward the end of his life. Piero died in Sansepulcro on Oct. 12, 1492.

del Pozzo, Andrea was a lay brother of the Jesuit order and one of the greatest painters of illustionistic ceiling paintings in the Roman baroque period. His greatest work is the illustionistic ceiling painting (quadratura) called, Triumph of St. Ignatius (1691-1694) for the nave ceiling of the church of San Ignatio in Rome.

del Verrocchio, Andrea (1435-1488) born, Andrea di Michele Cione, was one of the finest, Early Renaissance, Florentine sculptors.. After his training under the goldsmith Giuliano del Verrocchio, whose name he adopted, he went on his own, trying himself and achieving success in different fields of fine arts: in jewelry, sculpture and painting, but it was in the field of sculpture that he excelled most. The works of Donatello had great impact on him. Verrocchio left works in marble, terra-cotta, silver and bronze, which show his brilliance as a modeler as well as a carver. Little is known about his early work. It was not until 1472 that he made his mark as a leading master of his generation with his sepulchral monument in Old Sacristy the Medici church of San Lorenzo in Florence, Italy. The culmination of his achievements was the bronze group of the Christ and John the Baptist (1467-83), which he did for the sanctuary of Or San Michele in Florence.
     From about 1475, Verrocchio’s workshop in Florence became a kind of academy of arts: a number of important painters were trained there, in particular Lorenzo di Credi and Leonardo da Vinci. Thus in the painting of Verrocchio’s, Baptism of Christ (1475), which is considered to be the finest representation of the subject in Early Renaissance Florentine art, evidence is clearly apparent, especially in the handling of the face of the kneeling angel, of the assistance of Leonardo, at that time active in Verrocchio’s workshop. The last work by Verrocchio was a bronze equestrian statue - the monument to a Venetian army commander Colleoni. In his will, Colleoni had requested such a statue and, by way of encouragement had left a sizable fortune to the Republic of Venice. The monument is not a portrait, but an idealization of the personality of a successful war leader. Verrocchio died in Venice in 1488.

Demuth, Charles (1883–1935) was an American painter, who was born in Lancaster, Pa. Known for his translucent watercolors of fruits and flowers. Demuth was one of the first painters to draw inspiration from the geometric shapes of technology. Because of that influence, he and the American painter/photographer, Charles Sheeler are often referred to as Prescionists.

di Bondone, Giotto (1266-1337) was an Italian painter and architect, born in Vespignano, near Florence. He was the most innovative artist of his time. Modern historians have seen Giotto as the revolutionary, who altered the course of painting in Western Europe, striking out of the Gothic and Byzantine styles towards the creation of a style that introduced a sense of naturalism, which later became a foundation of Italian Renaissance art. Giotto's earliest work may have been connected with the making of mosaics for the Florence Baptistry.
     Giotto was a citizen of Florence, though he also worked in Assisi, Rome, Padua, Milan and Naples. His art and evident business shrewdness made him sufficiently prosperous. He married twice, supported eight children and provided handsome marriage dowries for his two daughters. His most significant still extant works are his fresco series in the Arena Chapel in Padua, Italy; the Navicella mosaic in Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome; the cycles of frescos depicting scenes from the life of St. Francis in the upper church of the Basilica of St. Francis in Assisi, (the attribution of the latter to Giotto is greatly doubted today, though his influence is strongly evident); and his frescoes for the Bardi and Peruzzi Chapels in the Florentine church of Santa Croce.
     In 1334 Giotto was appointed master of works for the city of Florence and of the city's great cathedral. (He was aided in this work by the sculptor, Andrea Pisano (1270-1349). Giotto added marble sculptures to the facade of the Cathedral and designed the campanile, (bell tower), which has since been much altered. For the last two years of his life, Giotto worked in Milan and is believed to have died there in 1337 at the age of seventy. Later. Michelangelo, and other great Florentine artists, carefully studied and drew from Giotto's extant drawings and frescoes.

Donatello (c.1386-1466) born, Donato di Niccolo di Betto was a Florentine sculptor, a major innovator in early Renaissance art, who was born, Florence as Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi. He assisted Lorenzo Ghiberti in Florence with the Ghiberit's masterful Eastern Doors for the Baptistery of Florence. His sculptures developed from Gothic forms such as, the marble David (Bargello, Florence) to strong, humanistic expression as in, the marble sculpture of St. Mark (Orsanmichele, Florence). He developed a shallow relief technique (schiacciato) with which he achieved effects of spatial depth. In Rome he studied ancient monuments that influenced his sculpture. Donatello headed a vast workshop in Padua (1443-53). His late Florentine masterworks include the Magdalen (originally placed in the Florentine Baptistery) and the pulpits of San Lorenzo. Later, Donatello worked in Padua, Italy, producing, as well as the great bronze figures for the high altar of the basilica of St. Anthony, the great equestrian, commemorative bronze of the condotierri (mercenary general) Erasmo da Narni, known as Gattamelata of c.1445-50.

Duchamp, Marcel (1887-1968) was born on 28 July 1887, in Blainville, near Rouen, France, into the family of a well to-do-notary. Both parents respected and encouraged cultural activities; four of their children became artists - Raymond Duchamp-Villon (1876-1918), sculptor, Suzanne Duchamp, poetess and artist, better known under the name of Crotti, Marcel Duchamp himself, and the half brother of the three, Gaston, painter, who is known as Jacques Villon.
     In 1904, Marcel came to Paris to join his two elder brothers, who had given up law and medicine in favor of artistic careers. Marcel entered the Académie Julian, but did not attend classes much. Between 1906 and 1910 Duchamp was influenced by many different styles, but the one that influenced him most was, Fauvism.
     In 1911-13, he was a member in the painters' group known as the "Golden Section", together with Roger de la Fresnaye, Fernand Léger, Jean Metzinger, Juan Gris, Alexander Archipenko, and others. Using cubist techniques Duchamp tried to show movement on canvas, which makes him close to Futurists. Doubling, overlaying images fix different phases of the movement of a figure on canvas, as in King and Queen Surrounded by Swift Nudes of 1912. The major work, Nude Descending a Staircase, shown at the Salon des Indépendants, aroused sharp criticism even among the Cubists, to say nothing about the general public. In 1913, the picture was the most talked about at New York Armory Show; it scandalized the American public to such a degree that it made the artist popular overnight. While most of the viewers were outraged with the exhibited pictures, especially with the Nude, the others were sincerely delighted by the European break with academic and traditional art.
     In his works of 1914-15 the complicated structures are pushed out by laconic, rigid mechanical forms, which created contradicting correlations of volume and flatness. When Duchamp arrived in NY in 1915, he was pleasantly surprised to find that he was a famous man. On his arrival, he met Walter and Louise Arensberg, who became his main patrons and collectors. (Walter Arensberg's impressive collection of modern art, including all of the numerous Duchamp works, is in the Philadelphia Museum of Art today.)
In the United States, Marcel Duchamp soon became the center of the circle of painters around the Stieglitz gallery. The group had adopted an anti-art attitude and was thus a movement parallel to the Zurich Dadaism.
     In 1913-14 putting painting aside, Duchamp exhibited his first ready-mades – manufactured banal objects of every-day life, which taken out of place and their prime usage, demonstrated abilities of abstract forms. Was it the search for new forms in art or just a wish to make scandals? Difficult to say. But they were definitely to demonstrate Duchamp's profound contempt for the bourgeois conception of art. In 1917 at the exhibition of a new Society for Independent Artists, Duchamp submitted a urinal, entitled the, Fountain; but rather than signing it with his own name, he used the pseudonym, “R. Mutt.”
     After 1923 Duchamp actually left art and devoted himself to playing chess, art critic and literary activities. Together with Katherina Dreier he founded the Société Anonyme for the propagation of modern art in America; preference was given to anti-traditional, cubist, futurist and dadaist works. From 1942 to 1944, together with and André Breton, he edited the surrealist periodical "VVV", in New York.
     Attempts to understand Duchamp's works have resulted in multiple books and magazine articles. "Duchamp himself calmly tolerated all interpretations of his art, even the most far-fetched, since he was interested in them as the creations of the people who formulated them, although not necessarily as the truth." His experiments in the field of optical illusions, cinema, moving constructions and ready-mades paved the road for new artistic forms such as op-art, kinetic art, installation. At the end of his life Duchamp became an idol of the new generation of avant-garde American artists.

Dürer, Albrecht (1471-1528) was a German painter and graphic artist and one of the greatest of the High Renaissance artists of Northern Europe and within the entire history of art.
     Albrecht Dürer was born on 21 May, 1471 in Nuremberg, south Germany, son of a prosperous goldsmith Albrecht Dürer the Elder (1427-1502), and Barbara Holper. His early training was in drawing, yet woodcutting and printing, which were to remain his main and favorite media throughout his artistic career. From 1486 through 1489, he was apprenticed in the workshop of a Nuremberg artist. Later he traveled significantly. In 1490 he left his native city for four year, probably initially visiting Cologne and possibly the Netherlands. He, then, traveled to Italy twice in 1494-95 and again in 1505-07, visited Venice and Bologna, and perhaps Florence and Rome. Outside of Florence, his genius was mostly known through his engravings; and artists in Italy were soon drawing on them for ideas. In 1495 he established his own workshop in Nuremberg.
     His best known works are his 18 engravings of the Apocalypse cycle, the most interesting of which is, the Four Horsemen (1498). During his journey he met many famous Netherlands painters such as intellectual curiosity. He wrote and published theoretical works: Manual of Measurement (1525); Various Instructions for the Fortification of Towns, Castles and other Localities (1527). Dürer died on 6 April 1528 in Nuremberg and was buried in St. John’s churchyard. His Four Books on Human Proportion were published in October. Dürer is the most universal, the most balanced and the greatest of all German artists of any period.

“El Greco,” (1545/50-1614), born Domenicos Theotocopulos, was the most unusual painter in 16th-century Europe, El Greco combined the strict Byzantine style of his homeland, Greece, with influences received during his studies in Venice and the medieval tradition of the country where he worked, Spain.
     El Greco, “the Greek,” by the Spaniards, was born in Candia, on the island of Crete. Nothing is known of his parentage. He was trained as icon-maker in a monastery; he then went to Venice (soon after 1560), where became his greatest mentor. El Greco, however, obtained very little influence from his master; but some influence is noticeable from the painters, Bassano, Baroccio, Veronese, and Tintoretto. However, on the whole his works are very individual and distinct. In 1570, El Greco went first to Parma, Italy, where he worked as an apprentice, and, then, on to Rome. He severely criticized Michelangelo’s great last Judgment fresco in the Sistine Chapel and offered to produce a better composition. But on the whole the work of Michelangelo and that of the Central Italian Mannerists stimulated him. The works of his Italian (1560s--1575) period are very different in style from his later work in Spain. Around 1576, he traveled to Spain. After an unsuccessful start, settled in Toledo in 1580, the old capital and, then, a major center of artistic, intellectual, and religious life in 16th-century Spain. He remained in Toledo until his death.
     In 1586 he painted his famous, Burial of Count Orgaz (c.1586) for the church of St. Tomé, the success of which brought him a great number of commissions for the Church, such as the decoration of the new church of St. Domingo el Antiguo. He also became a popular portraitist.
     El Greco was a proud and independent man, who, even while in Spain, insisted upon always signing his work with by his Greek name. He rented the palace of Marquis Viliena, (now the Museum of El Greco in Toledo), collected a valuable library, and was very successful in law suites against the church administration. He was a man of eccentric habits and ideas, of tremendous determination, extraordinary reticence, and extreme devoutness. Yet he was valued and respected by the intellectuals of Toledo. El Greco was buried in the Church of St. Tomé.
     El Greco did not have followers, and his art was forgotten for 300 years. The re-discovery of his painting was a sensation; he became one of the most popular masters of the past. El Greco is now regarded as one of the most important representatives of European art.

Emperor Hadrian (76-138 CE.) was a Roman emperor (reigned 117-138), who was born in Spain. His name in full was Publius Aelius Hadrianus. A ward of Trajan, Hadrian distinguished himself as a commander and as an administrator. He was chosen as Trajan's successor. Hadrian's reign was vigorous and judicious. Abandoning the aggressive policy of Trajan in Asia, he withdrew to the boundary of the Euphrates in Palestine. In 132 CE. he put down the insurrection of the Hebrew leader Bar Kokba with great severity. Hadrian traveled extensively in the empire, stabilizing government and adorning the cities In Germany he built great protective walls, and in Britain he had Hadrian's Wall built.. Hadrian had a great love of architecture and is credited with contributing considerably to the design of the great temple of the Pantheon in Rome, dedicated to all the cosmic gods. He also patronized the arts; his regard for the youth Antinoüs was recorded by sculptors and architects. As his successor he chose Antoninus Pius.

Estes, Richard (1936–) is an American painter, who was born in Evanston, Illinois. One of the best-known American exponents of Photorealism, Estes is noted for his street scenes.

Fiorentino, Il Rosso (1495–1540), another significant Florentine painter, who developed the Mannerist style, He is known for his distorted treatment of space, as seen in, The Daughters of Jethro (Uffizi). As court painter to King Francis I of France, he worked at the royal Chateau of Fontainebleau, helping to develop the French Mannerist School of Fontainebleau.

Fragonard, Jean-Honoré (1732–1806) was one of the most significant French 18th century Rococo painters. Influenced by Boucher, he was admitted to the Académie Royale in 1765 for Coresus and Callirrhoë (Louvre). Thereafter, he painted polished, delicately erotic scenes of love for the court of Louis XV. Representative works are Love's Vow and The Swing (both: Wallace Coll., London) and the Music Lesson (Louvre). He is esteemed for the freedom of his brushstroke, the vitality of his portraiture and landscapes, and his virtuosity in depicting the gaiety and charm of the age of Louis XV.

Frederic, David Casper (1774-1840) was the most significant German Romantic landscape painter and one of the greatest exponents in European art of the symbolic landscape.
    He studied at the Academy in Copenhagen (1794-98) and subsequently settled in Dresden, often traveling to other parts of Germany. Friedrich's landscapes are based entirely on those of northern Germany, and are beautiful renderings of trees, hills, harbors, morning mists, and other light effects based on a close observation of nature. Some of Friedrich's best-known paintings are expressions of a religious mysticism. In 1808 he exhibited one of his most controversial paintings, The Cross in the Mountains (Gemaldegalerie, Dresden), in which--for the first time in Christian art--an altarpiece was conceived in terms of a pure landscape. The cross, viewed obliquely from behind, is an insignificant element in the composition. More important are the dominant rays of the evening sun, which the artist said depicted the setting of the old, pre-Christian world. The mountain symbolizes an immovable faith, while the fir trees are an allegory of hope. Friedrich painted several other important compositions in which crosses dominate a landscape.
     Even some of Friedrich's apparently non-symbolic paintings contain inner meanings, clues to which are provided either by the artist's writings or those of his literary friends. For example, a landscape showing a ruined abbey in the snow, Abbey with Oak Trees (1810; Schloss Charlottenburg, Berlin), can be appreciated on one level as a bleak, winter scene, but the painter also intended the composition to represent both the church shaken by the Reformation and the transitoriness of earthly things.

Gainsborough, Thomas (1727-1788) was one of the greatest English landscape and portrait painters. He was born in Sudbury, Suffolk in the family of a clothier. He showed an aptitude for drawing early and first was encouraged by his mother, who was a woman of well-cultivated mind and excelled in flower-painting. He used to spend a lot of time outdoors, drawing. In 1740, at the age of 13 he was sent to London to study art. He spent several years working in the studios of different artists, one of whom was Hubert Gravelot, a draughtsman and engraver, another one was a scene-painter and illustrator Francis Hayman. He first did not have many commissions there and had a lot of time to indulge in his favorite pursuit, to draw landscapes.
     In 1760 Gainsborough decided to move to Bath, where it was possible for him to have portraits commissioned by the much wealthier and nobler persons. Bath, famous for its mineral waters, was the principal lounging place for persons of wealth and leisure in winter. Gainsborough became well-known there in his first year after moving and since then always had a lot of sitters. His portraits combine the elegance with his own characteristic informality. In 1768 he became one of the foundation members of the Royal Academy, at which he exhibited annually until 1784, when he retired after the disagreement over the hanging of his pictures at the exhibition.
     In 1774 Gainsborough moved to London. He was an established master by then. He died from cancer on the 3rd of August, 1788 and was buried in Kew.

Gauguin, Paul (1839-1906) was born into a family of Italian origin in Cesana Forinese. His father had established a felt hat business in Aix-en-Provence and later became a banker. In 1859 he bought a country house on the outskirts of Aix, the Jas de Bouffan, which was to be frequently represented in Cézanne’s paintings.
     Between 1852 and 1859 Paul Cézanne studied at the Collège Bourbon and it was there that he formed a friendship with Emile Zola, with whom he shared an interest in literature. In 1856 Cézanne began to attend the evening drawing courses of Joseph-Marc Gibert at the Aix Museum. From 1859 to 1861 he studied law at Aix, entered his father’s bank. By April 1861 his father had finally yielded to Cézanne’s desire to make a career in art and allowed him to go to Paris to study at the Académie Suisse. In Paris Cézanne frequented the Louvre, met Pissarro and Guillaumin and, later on, Monet, Sisley, Bazille, and Renoir. In September of the same year he was refused admission to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and went back to Aix, to the great relief of his father, who offered him a position in his bank. But in November 1862 Paul Cézanne went back to Paris and took up painting again.
     During his so called “dark” or “romantic” period (1862-70), Paul Cézanne often visited Paris; he met with Monet and the future Impressionists, and tried to be accepted at the Salon. The Franco-Prussian War drove him to L’Estaque near Marseilles. Paul Cézanne’s “Impressionist” period (1873-79) is connected with his staying at Pontoise and Auvers-sur-Oise in 1872, 1873, 1874, 1877 and 1881; he worked with Pissarro and exhibited with the Impressionists in 1874 and in 1877. The canvases produced at L’Estaque (1880-83) and at Gardanne (1885-88) are usually referred to Paul Cézanne’s “constructive” period. In 1886 after his father’s death, Cézanne married Hortense Fiquet, with whom he had a secret liaison since 1870. She is said to look after the finished canvases, which Cézanne never took care to keep and abandoned as soon as he completed the painting. The same year Cézanne quarelled with Zola over the novel L’Oeuvre, in which the central figure, an unsuccessful and unbalanced painter, was identified with Cézanne.
     In 1887, after a long break, Cézanne participated in the exhibition of Les XX at Brussels. Towards the beginning of Paul Cézanne’s “synthetic” period (1890-1906) the younger generations of artists started to take an interest in him. His first one-man show was held in the Vollard Gallery in 1895. During these years the artist seldom visited Paris – his longest stays there took place in 1895, 1899 and 1904 – and produced many versions of canvases depicting Mount Sainte-Victoire, smokers, card-players and bathers, and painted still-lifes and portraits. By 1901 Cézanne had become recognized. He often met with young artists who admired his work – Denis, Bonnard and Vuillard. In 1901 Denis painted Hommage à Cézanne. The future Fauvist Charles Camoin sought his advice, and in 1904 he was visited by Emile Bernard, an artist of the Pont-Aven school, with whom Cézanne corresponded extensively, expounding his views on art.
     In 1904 his paintings were shown for the first time at the Autumn Salon in Paris; and a year after his death, in 1907, a retrospective exhibition of his works was held there.

Gaulli (1639-1709) was an Italian painter, called Baciccia or Baciccio. He was noted for his airy, illusionistic frescoes, his figures of children, and his fine portraits. He was influenced by the style of Pietro da Cortona, Correggio, and the late works of Bernini. Adoration of, The Triumph of the Name of Jesus (Il Gesù, Rome) is his most noted work. Others are Four Cardinal Virtues (Sant' Agnese, Rome) and a Self-Portrait (Uffizi Gal. Florence).

Gentileschi, Artemisia (c.1597–c.1651) was the daughter of Tuscan Baroque painter, Orazio Gentileschi (c.1562–1647). She is most known for her spirited executions such as, Judith and Holofernes (Uffizi) and Mary Magdalen (Pitti Gall., Florence). Artemisia was the first woman painter in the western tradition to become professionally successful.

Géricault, Jean Louis Andre’ Théodore (1791-1824) was born into a wealthy Rouen family in 1791. He studied with the painters Carle Vernet (1758-1836) and Pierre Guérin (1774-1833) in Paris, and in 1816-1818 traveled to Italy. The Old Masters influenced him more than any contemporary artist. Already in his early works Géricault strays away from the Neo-Classical canons, which dominated in the French art of the time. His ‘mounted officers’ of 1812, Musée du Louvre, Paris and of 1814, Musée du Louvre ‘display violent action, bold design, and dramatic color, and evoke powerful emotion,’ the traits characteristic of the newly born Romanticism.
     On his return to Paris, Géricault exhibited Raft of the Medusa at the 1819 Salon. Although it received the gold medal, it also caused a political scandal because of its subject. The potential sinking of the frigate Medusa took place in June 1816, near the West African coast. The crew left 150 passengers to their fate on a raft. When, two weeks later, the raft was found, there were only 15 survivors, 5 of them died after rescue. The case was silenced by the government; and when, a year later, it became public knowledge and caused criticism of governmental negligence and corruption, related to the instance. To achieve accuracy, the painter used a model of the raft and carefully studied real corpses. In this huge canvas, about 5 x 7 meters, Géricault mixed Realism and Romanticism. The combination of idealized figures and realistically depicted agony, the absence of ‘classical’ composition and ‘heroic’ references, and the gigantic size and graphic detail of the canvas, aroused violent debates between artists devoted to either the Neoclassical and Romantic camp. The painting had a seminal influence on the further development of Romanticism.
     Between 1820-22 Géricault visited England, where he made lithographs of the misery and poverty, which was widespread on the streets of London. In 1822-23 he also concentrated on producing portraits of patients at La Salpetrière, the madhouse in Paris. Théodore Géricault died tragically early after falling from a horse.

Ghery, Frank (1929-) was born in Canada and has become a naturalized U.S. citizen. In 1954, he graduated from USC and began work full time with Victor Gruen Associates, where he had been apprenticing part-time while still in school. After a year in the army, he was admitted to Harvard Graduate School of Design to study urban planning. When he returned to Los Angeles, he briefly worked for Pereira and Luckman, then rejoined Gruen where he stayed until 1960.
     A project in 1979 illustrates his use of chain-link fencing in the construction of the Cabrillo Marine Museum, a 20,000 square foot compound of buildings which he "laced together" with chain-link fencing. These "shadow structures" as Gehry calls them, bind together the parts of the museum.
     For a time, Gehry's work used "unfinished" qualities as a part of the design. As Paul Goldberger, New York Times Architecture Critic described it, "Mr. Gehry's architecture is known for its reliance on harsh, unfinished materials and its juxtaposition of simple, almost primal, geometric forms...(His) work is vastly more intelligent and controlled than it sounds to the uninitiated; he is an architect of immense gifts who dances on the line separating architecture from art but who manages never to let himself fall."
     He did a monument to mark the centennial of the Sheet Metal Workers' International Association. It was built by 600 volunteers from the union in the cavernous central hall of the National Building Museum (formerly known as the Pension Building) in Washington, D.C. The 65 foot high construction was galvanized stainless steel, anodized aluminum, brass and copper.
     The most significant work of Ghery to date is his Postmodern/Deconstructionist Guggenheim Museum of Art (1997) in Bilbao, Spain designed with the aid of computerized calculations to determine the shapes of its surface of bent titanium.

Giacometti, Alberto (1901–1966) was Giacometti was the son of a famous Swiss painter. He moved to Paris in 1922, where he began his study of sculpture with Antoine Bourdelle. a pupil of Rodin. During the 1920s he began experimenting with forms of free association taught by Surrealist movement. During the 1930 he then began a painful search for the means to re-present the human figure in its real situation in space. His ideas on that he developed in the late 1930s, were moving in directions similar to those of the major philosophers in France, particularly Maurice Merleau-Ponty andjean-Paul Sartre, both of whom developed fresh theories of perception that influenced the post-World War II artists. Associated with Surrealism, he is known for his bronze sculptures of elongated human figures such as, Man Walking (Albright-Knox Gall., Buffalo).

Giorgione (1477/8-1510) was born as Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco. Although only some twenty paintings still exist that are generally associated with him, of which only about six are attributed to him without doubt, his originality was so powerful that these few works have come to represent not only the first stage in the Venice High Renaissance, but a new trend in Italian art as well. Surviving documentation of his life and work is sparse. He was associated with the humanist circle of the poet Bembo and with a sophisticated group of private patrons, for whom he painted generally small-scale pictures. Giorgione's only public commission in Venice were paintings, now lost, for the Doge's Palace and frescoes, which are now almost completely destroyed by nature, on the exterior of the Fondaco dei Tedeschi, an important trading center, in Venice. Giorgione died in Venice from an outbreak of plague in 1510, while he was only in his early thirties.

Goya y Lucientes, Francisco de (1746-1828) was born in a very poor village called Fuendetodos, near Saragossa, in Aragon, on 30 March 1746. Goya’s father was a gilder in Saragossa and it was there that Goya spent his childhood and adolescence.
     He began his artistic studies at the age of 13 with a local artist, José Lusán, who had trained in Naples and who taught Goya to draw, to copy engravings and to paint in oils. In 1763 and 1766, he competed unsuccessfully for a scholarship of the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid, probably working in the studio of the Court Painter, who was also from Saragossa. To continue his studies he went to Rome at his own expense. In April of 1771 he participated in a competition held by the Academy of Parma introducing himself as a pupil of Francisco Bayeu. By the end of 1771, Goya was back in Saragossa, where he received his first official commission, the frescoes in the Cathedral of El Pilar.
     In 1773 Goya married Josefa Bayeu, sister of Francisco Bayeu. In 1774, the German artist summoned Goya to Madrid to paint cartoons for tapestries for the Royal Factory of Santa Barbara. It is possible that Goya first met Mengs in Rome, since many years later he wrote that it was Mengs who made him return to Spain. In any event, it was Mengs who started him on his career at court. Under the direction first of Mengs, and later of Francisco Bayeu and Mariano Maella, Goya executed over 60 tapestry cartoons between 1775 and 1792.
     In 1780, Goya was elected a member of the Royal Academy of San Fernando. In 1780-81, he worked on the frescoes of El Pilar in Saragossa. On his return to Madrid he received the royal invitation to paint one of seven large altarpieces for the newly built church of San Francisco el Grande. The King’s opinion of his work must have been favorable, because in 1785, a year after the paintings were first shown to the public, Goya was appointed Deputy Director of Painting in the Academy. In 1786, he became a court painter.
     Among Goya’s early admirers and most important patrons during a period of 20 years were the Duke and Duchess of Osuna, who commissioned not only portraits of themselves and a family group but also a number of paintings to decorate their country residence near Madrid, the Alameda Palace, known as El Capricho. Among other paintings for the Duke of Osuna are two altarpieces, commissioned in 1788 for the chapel of his ancestors, St. Francis Borgia, in Valencia Cathedral.
     In 1783-85, Goya painted a number of portraits of the influential persons of his time: the portrait of the Chief Minister of State, the Count of Floridablanca, in which Goya himself appears; the family portrait of the Infante Don Luis, the King’s brother, with himself again in the picture; the court architect, Ventura Rodriguez. In 1785, he was commissioned for a series of portraits of offices of the Banco Nacional de San Carlos. In these early official portraits, Goya adopted conventional eighteenth century poses.
     The death of Charles III in 1788, and the outbreak of the French Revolution, brought to an end the period of comparative prosperity and enlightenment in Spain during which Goya had reached maturity. Under the rule of the weak Charles IV and his unscrupulous Queen, María Luisa, Spain fell into political and social corruption, which ended with the Napoleonic invasion of Spain. Under the new regime Goya reached the height of his career as the most fashionable and successful artist in Spain. The new King raised him to the rank of Court Painter in 1789.
     During a visit to Andalusia towards the end of 1792, Goya was struck down by a long and serious illness of which the effect, as he wrote even a year later, made him, ‘At times rage with so ill a humor that he could not tolerate himself’. The nature of the illness is not known for certain but it caused temporary paralysis and partial blindness and left him permanently deaf, so that henceforth he could only communicate by writing and sign language. He returned to Madrid in the summer of 1793.
     After the death of Francisco Bayeu in 1795, Goya succeeded his former teacher as Director of Painting in the Academy (but resigned for reasons of health two years later), and in 1799 was appointed First Court Painter. In 1799, Goya published the series of 80 etchings called Los Caprichos, bitter caricatures of life. Despite the veiled language of Los Caprichos they were withdrawn from sale after a few days.
     From the time of their ascension until 1800, Charles IV and María Luisa sat for him on many occasions, and many replicas were made of his portraits of them. He painted them in various costumes and poses, ranging from the early decorative portraits in full regalia in the tradition of Mengs to the simpler and more natural compositions in the manner of Velázquez.
     Goya was 62 years old when the Napoleonic invasion of Spain started in 1808, and Spain was subjected to six years of war and revolution. Goya was in Madrid during the tragic events of two and three May 1808 when the population rose against the French and the uprising was savagely repressed.    Meanwhile, with thousands of other heads of families, Goya swore allegiance to the French King, Joseph Bonaparte. During the war he was occupied with portraits of family groups and private citizens. At the time he made his personal record of the war in expressive and fearful drawings Desastres de la Guerra, (“Disasters of War”), which were later used for a series of eighty-two etchings, which were published only in 1863.
     On the restoration of King Ferdinand the Seventh of Spain in 1814, Goya resumed his office as First Court Painter. The portraits of Ferdinand were Goya’s last royal portraits, he went out of favor and fashion. From now on Goya was chiefly occupied with paintings for private patrons, for friends and for himself. He continued to record his observations and ideas in drawings. During this period Goya received two important ecclesiastical commissions for St. Justa and St. Rufina, painted in 1817 for the Seville Cathedral.
     As a result of the revolution of 1820 Ferdinand VII was forced to recognize a constitution, but already in 1823 the French army restored the Spanish king to absolute power, and the persecution of the liberals was renewed with greater violence than ever before. Goya, who had made his last appearance at the Academy on 4 April 1820 to swear allegiance to the Constitution, went into hiding early in 1824. After the declaration of amnesty Goya left Spain. Except for two short visits to Madrid in 1826 and 1827, the painter remained in France, mainly in Bordeaux, for the rest of his life. He died in Bordeaux on 16 April, 1828.

Greenough, Horatio (1805–1852) was an American sculptor and writer, born in Boston. As a writer, he heralded modern concepts of functionalism in architecture. As a sculptor, he is famous for a colossal statue of George Washington (Smithsonian Inst. Wash. DC.).

Grunewald (c. 1470/80-1528) was born, Mathis Neithart or Nithart and later called himself Gothart, somehow became erroneously known as, Grünewald. Grünewald was a German painter, who born in 1470/80 supposedly in Würzburg. Grünewald, besides, is the most important representative of Northern painting at the turn of the 16th century. In 1509, he became court painter to archbishop Uriel von Gemmingen at Aschaffenburg, and supervised the rebuilding of the palace there. In 1516, he started on a fixed income at the court of the elector Albrecht von Brandenburg, where he worked as a painter and architect and also as a designer of fountains. He had to leave the post in 1520 because of his Lutheran convictions. His greatest work is The Isenh3eim Altarpiece of c. 1510-15 (Musee’ Unterlinden; Colmar, Germany).

Hanson, Duane (1925-96) was an , American sculptor, who was born in Alexandria, Minn. A member of the superrealist movement of the late 1960s and early 70s, Hanson produced life-sized tableaux of realistic figures