François Gall - Eugenie Nude from Back, Studio at Villa Brume

François Gall - Eugenie Nude from Back, Studio at Villa Brume, originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

[Oil on canvas, 27 x 22 cm]

Gerrit Adriaenszoon Berckheyde - View of the Ratshuis in Amsterdam [1670]

Gerrit Adriaenszoon Berckheyde - View of the Ratshuis in Amsterdam [1670], originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

Gerrit Adriaenszoon Berckheyde (Haarlem, 1638 - Haarlem, 1698) was a Dutch artist of the 17th century, active in Haarlem, Amsterdam, and The Hague and best known for his cityscapes.

Christened as an infant in June 1638, he was the younger brother and student of Job Adiaenszoon Berckheyde, as well as studying under Frans Hals. During the 1650s the two brothers made an extended trip along the Rhine to Germany, stopping off at Cologne, Bonn, Mannheim and finally Hiedelberg. The brothers were ultimately unable to adapt to court life and so returned to Haarlem, where they shared a house and studio.

[Oil on canvas, 53 x 63 cm]

Achille Lauge - Bouquet of Roses in a Glass

Achille Lauge - Bouquet of Roses in a Glass, originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

Achille Lauge (Arzens, August 29, 1861 – Cailhau, June 2, 1944) was a French painter. He attended the Fine Arts in Toulouse from 1876 to 1881, while he was doing an internship at a pharmacy in the city. Around 1905, noting the failure of the Pointillist technique that he had practiced for almost twenty years and pressed by want, he adopted a less strict and technical. This painting was sold by Sotheby's on May 8, 2008 for $97,000.

[Oil on canvas, 46 x 38.2 cm]

The Le Nain Brothers - Four Figures at a Table [c.1643]

Le Nain Brothers - Four Figures at a Table [c.1643], originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

This peasant scene is characterised by a sombre dignity, the colours confined to shades of grey and brown contrasted with white, and the food at the table is no more lavish than the colouring. The figures to the right and left, perhaps mother and daughter, look directly from the painting, as though in mute appeal. The older woman rests her hand on the tablecloth, the younger holds a clay pot. The composition is focused on the still life in the centre, consisting of the jug, a bowl and the bread that the boy seated at the table prepares to cut.

The painting was formerly thought to be one of several copies that survive of this composition by Le Nain, but cleaning and restoration revealed that it is probably the original from which the copies derive. X-ray photographs show that it is painted over a portrait of a bearded man in a ruff wearing costume datable to about the 1620s which may also be the work of one of the Le Nain brothers. The large collar of the boy in the painting, however, is of the 1640s.

[Oil on canvas, 44.8 x 55 cm]

Peter Solow - Interior [1986]

Peter Solow - Interior [1986], originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

An artist's life was far from Peter Solow's (born 1952) mind when he was a boy growing up in Manlius, New York, outside Syracuse, the son of a technical writer and an English teacher. "I'd been drawing since I was tiny, soldiers and horses, the typical stuff," he said. "I had a propensity for it, a facility that most kids don't have." His hobby, however, became his vocation when he was in high school, after a blade broke off the lawnmower while he was cutting the grass and he suffered a seriously lacerated leg. Laid up for several weeks, the boy spent "hours and hours on my own just drawing. That was the hook."

[Acrylic on canvas, 142.2 x 178 cm]

Diego Velazquez - Christ in the House of Martha and Mary [c.1618]

Diego Velazquez - Christ in the House of Martha and Mary [c.1618], originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

The story of Christ in the house of Martha and Mary is taken from the New Testament (Luke 10), and is seen here through an opening in the wall. When Martha complained to Christ that while Mary sat listening to him she was left to serve the meal alone, Christ replied: 'Mary has taken that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.' The foreground figures, in contemporary dress, may symbolise a latter-day Martha and Mary. The composition is influenced by Flemish paintings and engravings which combine kitchen scenes with biblical subjects.

[Oil on canvas, 60 x 103.5 cm]

Edward Cucuel - Bathers

Edward Cucuel - Bathers, originally uploaded by Gandalf's Gallery.

This painting was sold by Sotheby's on May 30, 2008 for GB £84,500.

[Oil on canvas, 80.2 x 80.2 cm]