Unknown Italian Artist - A Female Figure resting on a Sword [probably 18th century]

Unknown Italian Artist - A Female Figure resting on a Sword [probably 18th century], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

The figure rests on a sword and may represent Saint Catherine of Alexandria who was tortured on a wheel and then beheaded with a sword.This work has in the past been attributed to Solimena, but it may be Roman rather than Neapolitan.

[Oil on wood, 53.3 x 45.7 cm]

Corrado Giaquinto - Autumn

Corrado Giaquinto - Autumn, a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

Corrado Giaquinto (Molfetta, February 18, 1703 - Naples, 1765) was an Italian Rococo painter. He is described by some as an Italian Francois Boucher.

Theodoor Rombouts - Card and Backgammon Players, Fight over Cards [c.1620-30]

Theodoor Rombouts - Card and Backgammon Players, Fight over Cards [c.1620-30], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

In a tavern a card player has drawn a knife and is about to attack his victim, firmly grabbing his short hair. The victim, a fellow player from the other side of the table, cries out and seeks to ward off the blow with an open hand. The light falls harshly onto this brawl from the left, accentuating the drama of the tense situation.

The card players, the half-figure composition, the realism, and the stark contrast between light and darkness (chiaroscuro) are all elements borrowed from the Italian Baroque artist Caravaggio, whom Rombouts got to know during a prolonged stay in Italy. By making uncontrolled anger the main subject of the painting the Flemish painter draws on an ancient Dutch tradition for creating moralising depictions of the seven deadly sins. Wrath was one of them.

Jean-Leon Gérome - Pool in a Harem [c.1876]

Jean-Leon Gérome - Pool in a Harem [c.1876], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

Throughout his artistic career Gérome made numerous visits to the Orient - to Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Palestine and Sinai. His unfailing interest in the depiction of scenes from the life of the Muslim world gave him a reputation as an ethnographic artist, of which he was very proud. His orientalising compositions are often of great documentary value. Gérome produced very precise representations not only of exotic costume, architecture and interiors, but also of different ethnic types. In this painting we see a Turkish bath in a harem. In the centre, lit through a window in the ceiling, we see two white women and a dark-skinned slave; in the depth, by the pool, are the smaller figures of naked odalisques. With pedantic care Gérome painted the figures and the details of the setting: the smooth surface of the marble floor, the coloured tiles, the furniture and the clothing. The style of Gérome's oriental works, realistic in content and classic in technique, is often described as academic realism.

[Oil on canvas, 73.5 x 62 cm]

Barend Cornelis Koekkoek - Summer Wooded Landscape with a Castle [1851]

Barend Cornelis Koekkoek - Summer Wooded Landscape with a Castle [1851], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

Barend Cornelis Koekkoek (Middleberg, 1803 - Kleve, 1862) was one of the most important figures of the Dutch Romantic School. He became famous for his wooded and forest landscapes and his snow scenes, filled with large trees, winding paths, hilltops, ruins and of Meindert Hobbema and Jan Wijnants. Although Koekkoek wrote in his memoirs that he was interested in the simplicity of nature, the idyllic atmosphere of many of his landscapes was conceived in the spirit of Romanticism.

Koekkoek was born in Middelburg and received his earliest tuition from his father Johannes Hermanus Koekkoek (1778-1851) who specialised in marine subjects and river scenes. He then studied under Abraham Krayestein at the Middelburg Drawing Academy and at the Amsterdam Academy between (1825-1826). He first lived in Hilversum and later in Amsterdam, spending the summers in the wooded Beek and Ubbergen. In 1833, Koekkoek married Elize Therese Daiwaille who was also a painter and in 1834 they settled at Kleve. He published his Memoirs and Reports of a Landscape Painter in 1841 and in 1845, Koekkoek was commissioned by the King of Holland to paint a series of landscapes.

[Oil on panel, 50.8 x 62.2 cm]

Mary Cassatt - Little Girl in a Blue Armchair [1878]

Mary Cassatt - Little Girl in a Blue Armchair [1878], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

Inspired by Edgar Degas, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and other members of their circle, Cassatt (American, 1844 – 1926) embraced the Impressionists' commitment to forthright storytelling about inconsequential subjects. In a room crammed with haphazardly arranged furniture, the daughter of friends of Degas sprawls on an overstuffed chair while Cassatt's Brussels griffon rests on another. Although Cassatt's candid picture of a bored or exhausted child repudiates traditional portraits of charming little girls in proper poses holding faithful dogs, she was enraged when the American jury rejected it for display at the 1878 Exposition Universelle. Instead, she showed it with the Impressionists in 1879, the first of her four exhibitions with the group.

[Oil on canvas, 89.5 x 129.8 cm]

Anton Mauve - Morning Ride [1876]

Anton Mauve - Morning Ride [1876], a photo by Gandalf's Gallery on Flickr.

A group of horses descend at a leisurely pace from the dunes to the beach. It is a summer's day, around noon: the sun is high and shadows are short. Well-to-do, well-dressed equestrians are taking a relaxing ride on the beach at Scheveningen, a popular coastal resort of the day. At the foot of the dune are a number of bathing huts. These riding horses are an unusual feature in a piece by Anton Mauve. He normally painted workhorses and animals in their natural environment. He was particularly famous for his landscapes with sheep.

Antonij (Anton) Mauve was born in Zaandam, Netherlands in 1838 and died in 1888. [Oil on canvas, 45 x 70 cm]