Gustave Courbet, The Wave, 1870. Oil on canvas, 85.5 x 99.5 cm.
The Oskar Reinhart Collection, Winterthur
(via someghostsarewomen)
Francis Bacon, Study of a Dog, 1952
From the Tate Collection:
Bacon used a variety of strategies to represent what one commentator described as ‘the anguish of contemporary life’. Here we see his use of animals to evoke aggression, vulnerability or both. The image of the dog derived from Eadward Muybridge’s time-lapse photographs of animals in motion. Bacon smeared the paint to suggest what seems to be demented movement. In contrast the setting, depicted with an economy of means, was based on the sea front in Monte Carlo, where he had lived from 1946 to 1950.
(via d-r-o-s-s)
Francis Bacon, Portrait of Isabel Rawsthorne, 1966
From the Tate Collection:
This is one of the many paintings Bacon made of his friend, the artist Isabel Rawsthorne. He preferred to base such works on photographs of the subject rather than work from life.Intimate knowledge of the sitter was also essential. ‘What I want to do is to distort the thing far beyond the appearance, but in the distortion to bring it back to a recording of the appearance’, he said.
Francis Bacon, Study for a Portrait of Van Gogh IV, 1957
From the Tate Collection:
Bacon based this painting on a self-portrait by Vincent Van Gogh which he knew only from photographs, as it had been destroyed by wartime bombing. The painter seems solitary, while the dark shadows introduce a sense of foreboding or melancholy. Van Gogh epitomised the idea of the misunderstood artist, set apart from mainstream society. Bacon might also have been stimulated by the film Lust for Life, starring Kirk Douglas as Van Gogh, which had been released a year earlier. This film reinforced the idea of Van Gogh as a lonely genius.
(via sfmoma)
Dormition of the Virgin about 1350–60 Unidentified artist, Bohemian (Prague), mid 14th century, detail 3, MFA, Boston by renzodionigi on Flickr.
(via centuriespast)
Cy Twombly and his wife in their home in Rome, Italy, 1966. Photographs by Horst P. Horst. They appeared in Vogue’s Book of Houses, Gardens, People published in 1968. via Habitually Chic
Ettore Spalletti. Il colore e l’oro, rosa tenue , 2010. Colour impasto on wood, embossed frame, gold foil.
http://www.studiolacitta.it/English/Artists/EttoreSpalletti.php
