Francesco Hayez - Susanna Al Bagno [1850]

As the story goes, a fair Hebrew wife is falsely accused by lecherous voyeurs. As she bathes in her garden, having sent her attendants away, two lusty elders secretly observe the lovely Susanna. When she makes her way back to her house, they accost her, threatening to claim that she was meeting a young man in the garden unless she agrees to make love to them. She refuses to be blackmailed, and is arrested and about to be put to death when a young man named Daniel interrupts the proceedings. After separating the two men, they are questioned about the details of what they saw, but disagree about the tree under which Susanna supposedly met her lover. The false accusers are put to death and virtue triumphs. The story was frequently painted from about 1500, not least because of the possibilities it offered for a prominent nude female. Some treatments emphasize the drama, others concentrate on the nude; a 19th century version by Francesco Hayez (National Gallery, London) has no elders visible at all.

Emilio Baz Viaud - Self-Portrait of the Adolescent Artist [1935]

Emilio Baz Viaud, Autorretrato del artista adolescente, 1935, originally uploaded by kraftgenie.

Born in Mexico City, Emilio Baz Viaud (1918 – 1991) was a little known painter whose work has only just started to be evaluated by experts. He studied architecture but was always interested in painting, and was a pupil of the artist Manuel Rodríguez Lozano, who guided him along the path to his real vocation as an artist. He did not give an individual exhibition until 1951, although he was featured in several collective exhibitions together with such eminent artists as Siqueiros and Diego Rivera. His meticulous technique in "trompe-l'oeil" style, achieved by applying oil paints to a dry surface, was praised by his colleagues and critics of the day, who unanimously compared his verism with the brushwork, to that of the great Renaissance masters such as Dürer and Boticelli. In the seventies he went through a period of abstract painting, but he is mainly known for his work done before 1955.

Juan Gris - Bananas

José Victoriano González-Pérez (March 23, 1887 – May 11, 1927), better known as Juan Gris, was a Spanish painter and sculptor who lived and worked in France most of his life. His works are closely connected to the emergence of the innovative artistic genre of Cubism, creating several of the movement's most distinctive works.
Born in Madrid, he studied mechanical drawing at the Escuela de Artes y Manufacturas in Madrid from 1902 to 1904, during which time he contributed drawings to local periodicals. From 1904 to 1905 he studied painting with the academic artist José Maria Carbonero. It was probably in 1905 that José González adopted the more distinctive pseudonym Juan Gris.

At first Gris painted in the analytic style of Cubism, but after 1913 he began his conversion to synthetic Cubism, of which he became a steadfast interpreter, with extensive use of papier collé. Unlike Picasso and Braque, whose Cubist works were monochromatic, Gris painted with bright harmonious colors in daring, novel combinations in the manner of his friend Matisse. He died in Boulogne-sur-Seine (Paris) in the spring of 1927 at the age of forty, leaving a wife, Josette, and a son, Georges.

Gabriel Metsu - The Old Drinker [c.1658]

On this minuscule panel, measuring just 22 x 19.5 cm, Gabriël Metsu painted with minute detail this everyday scene of an old man with his Gouda pipe and his pewter jar leaning on against a beer barrel. The old drinker looks rather the worse for wear; he sags rather than sits on the chair as he peers through his watery eyes, his chin unshaven, his collar open and his cap askew. Metsu presents the man with a direct honesty and realism that is not in fact harsh; the smile and the friendly eyes of the old drinker lend a certain sympathetic quality. In the seventeenth century, there was a belief that smoking and drinking in excess accelerated the aging process. Paintings of 'old drinkers' are often a reference to this idea. This work is perhaps a warning to avoid excessive indulgence in alcohol and tobacco.

Metsu shows the details of the drinker's surroundings with great finesse: the pewter jug, the felt buttoned coat, the fur trimming of the cap and the German stoneware pitcher. Beside the pitcher is a slate on which the number of beers is chalked up. The sign of a red deer is painted on the keg, a rather vague detail against a brown background. This was the trademark of the Amsterdam brewery 't Roo Hart (Red Deer). Around 1650 Metsu lived on Prinsengracht, near this brewery. The deer is a subtle aside in which the painter has quietly advertised his neighbour's business.

Rembrandt - The Jewish Bride [1667]

An elegantly dressed man and woman are in a vague, dark room. The man has lovingly placed his arm around the woman's shoulder and a hand on her breast. Very carefully she touches his hand with her fingertips. Both are staring straight ahead, they seem deep in thought. A few objects can be recognised in the obscure background: beside the woman is a plant in a pot and behind her an architectural fragment. The picture, called the 'Jewish Bride', was painted by Rembrandt in 1667.

It is fascinating to see how Rembrandt has employed different techniques in this painting. He has alternated broad strokes with fine lines, thick marks with dry, bristly strokes. The faces and hands have been quite smoothly painted, whereas thick clods of paint have been applied to the canvas for the clothing. In the thick layers of paint on the sleeve the print of the palette knife Rembrandt used to apply the paint is clearly visible. This is how he gave his canvases relief, a characteristic of Rembrandt's later work.

Maurice Lobre - Cabinet De Toilette De Jacques Emile Blanche [1888]

Maurice Lobre (1862 - 1951) was a French artist. He was born in Bordeaux and died in Paris. Lobre first gained recognition in the late 19th Century when his work was displayed at the Salon du Champ de Mars. In 1888 he received an honorary mention and a travel grant from the Salon. That summer he traveled to Normandy where he stayed with Jacques-Émile Blanche. By the this time, Blanche regularly hosted popular artists. Degas and Whistler were among his most prominent guests. When Europe descended into chaos in the summer of 1914, Maurice Lobre helped depict its atrocities.

J Theodore Johnson - Chicago Interior [1933-34]

The warmth from the radiator is almost palpable in this painting, contrasting with the snowy city seen through the window. The distinctive blue-tiled tower of the American Furniture Mart identifies the setting as Chicago, where artist J. Theodore Johnson (Oregon, Illinois, 1902 – Sunnyvale, California, 1963) and his wife, Barbara Salmon Johnson, came to attend an exhibition of the artist's work shortly after they had wed in New York in December 1931. The artist lovingly portrayed his beautiful young wife reading in their hotel room. The warm browns, yellows, and oranges raise the visual temperature, heightened further by hot touches of red in the drapery and in Mrs. Johnson's lips, cheeks, magazine, and chair. A heavy fur coat laid to dry by the radiator shows that Mrs. Johnson has recently come in to escape the frigid winds from Lake Michigan. Her husband was one of many artists who participated both in the Public Works of Art Project and in later Federal Art Projects.

[Oil on canvas, 71.2 x 86.4 cm]