How the world's most famous paintings were created: Intriguing stories of great artists' paintings

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Grigory Landau, a journalist and philosopher, once said: "Art is a dialogue in which the interlocutor is silent." Painting is a subtle art, allegorical, emotional, giving freedom of interpretation. This is a whole world of unsolved secrets and unsolved mysteries. Let's try to open the veil of secrecy over the history of the creation of the most famous paintings by great artists.

#1. Saint George and the Dragon, Paolo Uccello, 1470

In fact, the artist has two versions of this painting. In this version, George defeats the dragon, which the Beautiful Lady is holding by the leash. The painting has a deep religious meaning. According to legend, a dragon settled in the lake of a city in Libya. The pagan emperor ordered beautiful girls to be sacrificed to him. When there were no young women left in the city, the emperor sent his own daughter to the dragon. The brave warrior George went to save her and defeated the dragon. The princess here symbolizes the persecuted Christian Church, the dragon - paganism, and George - the Christian faith. There are versions that George, later recognized as a saint, tramples not just paganism, but the devil himself, the "ancient serpent".

# 2. Jaime La Couleur, Cherie Samba, 2003

"J'aime la couleur" is a self-portrait of the artist. Here's how he reveals the meaning of his work: “Color is everywhere. I believe that color is life. Our head must rotate in a spiral to understand that everything that surrounds us is nothing more than colors. Color is the universe, the universe is life, painting is life."

# 3. Bath, Jean-Leon Gerome, 1885

Experts believe that this picture and a series of similar ones in the work of Jerome symbolize "white" snobbery. This can be seen from the dynamics of the figures depicted on the canvas. The white woman is the dominant subject, while the black woman is submissive.

#4. Garden of Earthly Delights, Hieronymus Bosch, 1490-1510

Hieronymus Bosch is one of the most mysterious artists in the world. The symbolism of his paintings is so confused that it is simply impossible to find a single explanation for the huge number of symbols depicted on them. This particular work got its name from the art critics who studied it. The original name remained unknown. Historians believe that the left panel of the triptych is heaven, the central one is modern sinful human life, and the right panel depicts hell. But the picture raises many more questions than it answers.

#5. Sharpie, Caravaggio, 1594

This work is not at all a caricature of the vice of dirty gambling. It is rather a calm narrative about which Caravaggio was well aware. After all, the artist himself led his life very frivolously and even violently. The plot boils down to describing an unfolding drama - a drama of deception and lost innocence. The naive youth was taken into circulation by experienced sharpers. The elder peeks at his cards and gives signs to another cheat.

# 6. Watson and the Shark, John Singleton Copley, 1778

The picture shows a case from real life. In 1749, in Havana, Brooke Watson, a 14-year-old cabin boy, decided to take a dip. A shark attacked him. The captain of the ship on which the boy served tries to save him by killing the shark with a harpoon. The captain succeeded only on the third attempt. Watson, in this unequal battle, lost his foot. All his life then he walked with a wooden leg. This did not stop him from becoming mayor of London. At the same time, he met the artist and told him this story. Which was the inspiration for John Copley.

# 7. Composition VIII by Wassily Kandinsky, 1923

From childhood, Kandinsky was fascinated by color. The artist believed that he had transcendental properties. Kandinsky wrote his compositions as a composer of a symphony. Each composition reflected the artist's vision in its own time period. Kandinsky used geometric shapes in his works, because he believed in their mystical properties. The colors of the figures reflected emotions.

#eight. Saturn Devouring a Son, Francisco Goya, 1823

By old age, Goya became deaf, and his health in general, both physical and psychological, deteriorated. It is with this that historians associate his writing a series of 14, as they were called "Gloomy Pictures". Which he painted inside on the walls of his house. "Saturn devouring a son" is one of them. This is a well-known ancient Greek myth about the titan Kronos (later the Romans renamed him Saturn). Cronus was told that he would be overthrown by his own son. And Saturn ate all of his newborn children. In Goya, Saturn is depicted as a terrible half-crazy old man who eats not a baby, but an adult child. There are many interpretations of the meaning of this canvas. But the most important thing is that the artist did not write it for the public. Perhaps in this way, Goya was trying to exorcise his own demons.

#nine. The Deer at Sharkey, George Wesley Bellows, 1909

The artist depicted a common scene from everyday life in New York in the early 20th century. A private fight club such as was usually located in poor neighborhoods. Outsiders who were not members of the club were called "deer" there. They received temporary membership in order to fight. Bellows painted the picture in such a way that when you look at it, you get the impression that you are among the spectators of the battle.

#ten. A Friend in Need, Cassius Marcellus Coolidge, 1903

"A Friend in Need" is the most popular film in the Dogs Playing Poker series by Cassius Marcellus Coolidge. This series was commissioned by Coolidge by Brown & Bigelow to advertise cigars. Although Coolidge's paintings were never considered true art by critics, they have since become iconic.

#eleven. The Potato Eaters, Vincent Van Gogh, 1885

Van Gogh wanted to portray the peasants as they really are. He wanted to show a completely different way of life, different from the upper classes. He later wrote to his sister and stated that The Potato Eaters was his most successful painting.

#12. The Raft of Medusa, Theodore Gericault, 1819

The canvas "Raft of Medusa" ("Le Radeau de la Méduse") depicts the aftermath of the collapse of the French naval frigate "Medusa". Some of the people fit into the boats, for the remaining 147 people a raft was hastily built. The boats were towing the raft. But, the captain, noticing that the raft was too heavy, ordered the ropes to be cut off. Almost one and a half hundred people were left to fend for themselves without food and water. For 13 days of their journey on a raft, with a ghostly hope of salvation, out of 147 people survived 15. Crazed from hunger and thirst, people ate each other and drank blood. France wanted to hush up this shameful story, but it was too blatant and it did not succeed.

#13. Barge Haulers on the Volga, Ilya Repin, 1873

This work is the most famous by Ilya Repin. The picture has become a cult. The work that the artist carried out was serious. Repin met all the barge haulers depicted in the painting personally. The artist wrote hundreds of sketches and spent 5 years on this work. Both historians and contemporaries consider the painting to be a direct condemnation of the hard work of the oppressed classes. Although, Repin always denied this opinion.

#fourteen. Susanna and the Elders, Artemisia Gentileschi, 1610

Susanna and the Elders is a biblical story from the Old Testament. During the reign of Emperor Nebuchadnezzar, the Jewish people fell into slavery to the Babylonians. Among them were Susanna with her husband Joachim. The woman possessed an unearthly beauty and two elders desired her. They threatened her that if Susanna was not kind to them, they would tell the people that she was an adulteress. The woman refused, and the elders complied with their threats. She was sentenced to death under Jewish law. But then the young prophet Daniel intervened. He came up with the idea of interrogating the men, first separately, and then together. Their versions did not coincide, the slander was revealed. Susanna was acquitted, and the elders were executed. It is very remarkable that the artist was only 17 when she painted this picture. For Artemisia herself, she became prophetic, for a similar story happened to her later.

#15. Gross Clinic, Thomas Eakins, 1875

The plot of this picture is based on an operation witnessed by Eakins. It was performed by one of the best surgeons in America, Dr. Samuel Gross. The operation was carried out in the classroom in front of the students for the purpose of teaching. The doctor showed how to treat the infection with a conservative operation, rather than amputation of the entire limb (which was standard at the time). The canvas depicts reality without embellishment: both the calm professionalism of Gross, and the suffering of the woman in the lower left corner. Researchers believe that the patient's mother. Critics and viewers rated the work, to the dismay of Eakins, extremely negative. People calmly contemplating the plots of bloody battles were not ready to contemplate the realism of a medical operation.

#16. The Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, Caspar David Friedrich, 1818

"Wanderer over the sea of fog" ("Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer") is a canvas where the artist remained true to his romantic style. In the picture, Friedrich depicted himself, standing alone with his back to the viewer on a dark steep rock. "The Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog" is a metaphor. It is about self-reflection, about an unknown future. Friedrich said about this work this way: "An artist must draw not only what is in front of him, but also what he sees inside himself." # 17. The Harvesters, Jean-Francois Millet, 1857

The painting Des glaneuses depicts three peasant women collecting the spikelets remaining after harvesting a field. The hard, humble work of the peasants evoked sympathy from the artist. It was these emotions that were expressed in the picture. But in society, the work drew negative criticism from the upper classes. France recently experienced a revolution and the nobility found this picture an unpleasant reminder that French society is built on the labor of the lower classes. And since at that time the working class outnumbered the upper class, they feared that the picture, somehow, might push the lower class to revolt.

#eighteen. The Scream, Edvard Munch, 1893

The Scream is one of the most mysterious masterpieces of world painting. Munch said that he once went out for a walk at sunset. The light of the setting sun dyed the clouds a blood red. And Munch suddenly heard, felt, as he put it, "the endless cry of nature." Another explanation could be the result of Munch's emotional state, as his sister had recently been sent to an insane asylum. This painting has been kidnapped many times. The plot can be considered prophetic: at the end of the 19th century, Munch described the catastrophes of the 20th century.

#19. The Great Wave off Kanagawa, Katsushika Hokusai, 1829 - 1833

The composition consists of three main elements: a stormy sea, three boats and a mountain. The snow-capped mountain is Mount Fuji, which the Japanese consider sacred. It is a symbol of national identity and beauty. Such games with space and bright colors, unusual for Asian painting. The picture symbolizes a person's fear of an indomitable element and a forced submission to it.

#twenty. The Starry Night, Vincent Van Gogh, 1889

"Starry Night" is a masterpiece that, having seen it only once, you will never forget it again. The artist painted it while in a hospital for the mentally ill. These vortex streams, huge stars … Some believe that Van Gogh depicted a view from the window. But the sick were not allowed to go out into the street, they were even forbidden to work in the ward. Vincent's brother asked the hospital management to give him a room so that he could write. Researchers believe that Van Gogh depicted in his painting such a phenomenon as turbulence - vortex flows from water and air. This cannot be seen, but the heightened perception of the artist helped him to see what is hidden from the eyes of ordinary mortals. 10 missing and new-found masterpieces by great masters. Based on materials