All pictures were taken by the author during his visit to The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Texts sourced from exhibit label scripts and museum publication excerpts.

Matisse: The Red Studio

Henri and Amelie Matisse spent the first six months of their married life in Ajaccio, Corsica, where Matisse encountered the Mediterranean sun and sea for the first time. The experience transformed his painting and palette, with realistic description giving away to compositions built primarily on color. The parklike property of this former olive farm was on of Matisse’s favorite sites in Ajaccio; here, his representation of light dissolves details such as the trunks of the olive trees and the door at the top of the stairway.

“Where I got the color red—to be sure, I just don’t know,” Matisse once remarked. “I find that all these things . . . only become what they are to me when I see them together with the color red.” This painting features a small retrospective of Matisse’s recent painting, sculpture, and ceramics, displayed in his studio. The artworks appear in color and in detail, while the room’s architecture and furnishings are indicated only by negative gaps in the red surface. The composition’s central axis is a grandfather clock without hands—it is as if, in the oasis of the artist’s studio, time were suspended.

Large Red Interior depicts a corner of Matisse’s house in Vence, France, where he lived and worked from 1943 to 1949. It shares with The Red Studio the art-within-art device that had remained a constant for Matisse throughout the decades. Only now, however, does the radical flatness of the 1911 painting return.

In many ways, this composition is the antithesis of The Red Studio. Matisse describes the room in clear material details and renders the works of art as virtually blank. In addition to showing a model and a work in progress, it presents a view that vividly brings together indoors and outdoors. Encompassing the full height of the room from the zigzagging floorboards to the scalloped ceiling, Studio, Quai Saint-Michel conveys the closeness of Matisse’s small quarters during the war years, when he spent winters at his Paris apartment.

This is the sole painting in which Matisse depicted the exterior of his Issy studio. The view through the window shows the studio nestled in the surrounding trees (painted blue, like the dressing table, wall, and sky). The studio’s distinctive pitched roof and chimney are also reimagined as blue, while the yellow of the building’s exterior links it to the objects on the table. In one flat plane, Matisse connects inside and outside, home and work, life and art.

This painting was made a few months after Matisse moved into the Issy studio and is his only still-life composition that portrays the wood-paneled walls naturalistically, albeit in blue. A distinctive wooden table occupies the center of the composition. A pot of geraniums and a cloisonne Japanese jar grace the table, across which a floral fabric is draped. The true star of the painting, the flowing textile pulls the real flowers of the geranium and the painted flowers of the ceramic into its own decorative hum.

Appendix I: Collection 1880s-1940s

In this painting, the three classical graces gathered at a water source are depicted as a series of solid, sculptural forms that diverge from the modern language of flattened abstraction with which Picasso was also experimenting during this moment. With their terracotta skin and fluted white garments, the women resemble the earthenware vessels in which they gather water, or columns from the ancient world, offering a reassuring link to tradition after the chaos of World War I.

Dance (I) marks a moment in Matisse’s career when he embraced a reductive approach to painting, seeking the expressive potentials of fundamental elements: line, color, and form. Across this monumental canvas Matisse used only four naturalistic colors: blue for the sky, green for the ground, and black and pale pink in rendering the five figures. When it was painted, its simplification of the human body and radical elimination of perspective were attacked as inept or willfully crude, but Matisse felt that it evoked “life and rhythm.”

Although images of women and children are frequent in the history or art, depictions of pregnancy are rare. Klimt was among the many artists of his time who combined archaic traditions–here Byzantine gold-leaf painting–with a modern psychological subject. The artist’s preoccupation with formative drives like sex and death paralleled Freud’s explorations of the psyche.

The terra-cotta shades and heaviness of the figures in Two Nudes derive from Picasso’s interest at the time in the ancient Iberian sculpture of his native Spain. Like the woman in Demoiselles, with whom she shares a chiseled nose and dark, hollow eyes, the nude seen here holds open a curtain and gazes toward, as though inviting us in.

“Painting from nature is not copying the object.“ Cezanne wrote, “it is realizing one’s sensations.” In this work the artist demonstrates that a still life can be more than an imitation of life–it can be an exploration of seeing and of the very nature of painting. Here, some areas of canvas are left bare, and others, like the drape of tablecloth, appear unfinished. Rules of perspective, too, are broken: the right corner of the table tilts forward and is not aligned with the left side.

Appendix II: Collection 1940s-1970s

Hantai executed this work using his signature method of “pilage”, or folding: he knotted parts of an unstreteched canvas, brushed on paint, and then, once they acrylic had dried, untied the surface to reveal interplays of paint and ground. What looks like a playful image is in reality the chance of outcome of a highly technical procedure. Hantai developed an approach that combined features from diverse art movements, including Surrealism’s automatism–in which conscious control is surrendered–and Pop’s and Minimalism’s elimination of traces of the artist’s hand.

Titled after the ancient Greek goddess of the earth, Gaea is composed of floral colors and organic, somersaulting shapes that reflect the artist’s abiding fascination with the natural world and its primeval origins. Though she painted abstractly, Krasner rejected the notion that her painting was devoid of content—she “wouldn’t dream of” creating a painting from a fully abstract idea, she said. In works like this one, titled after the Earth goddess of the ancient Greeks, the artist claimed to be “drawing from sources that are basic.”

The ghostly scaffolding, swooping calligraphic lines, and blue and yellow washes of this painting most likely depict the view from Sekula’s downtown New York studio, which she shared with composer John Cage and choreographer Merce Cunningham. “Looking outside my window,” wrote the Swiss painter and poet, an immigrant to the United States, “I think of all the contemporary American poets and artists who represent their outlook on this strange country and I find myself beginning to realize that I shall be one of them. I shall begin to speak of … a future that we begin to feel underneath the current of war and strife and uncertainty.”

All pictures were taken by the author during his visit to The Met Fifth Avenue, New York. Texts sourced from exhibit label scripts.

Winslow Homer: Crosscurrents

The Cotton Pickers is Homer’s most monumental representation, in form and content, of life for the newly emancipated in Reconstruction-era Virginia. Two sensitively rendered laboring women appear poised between their past, present, and future. The work’s complexity–of figural characterizations–is grounded in themes of conflict and struggle as well as those of uncertainty and opportunity. Its title and the women’s portrayal suggest a post-slavery economy in which little had changed for many.

In the years after Civil War, Homer often explored women’s new roles in society, especially their access to leisure. This representation of a quintessentially modern subject–women at the beach–confounded critics when it was first exhibited, in New York in 1870. Some viewers focused on issues of decorum and class, criticizing the women’s state of undress–even though they are wearing typical bathing costumes in the era–and one described them as “exceedingly red-legged and ungainly.” A disquieting sense of voyeurism and mystery imbues the scene, amplified by the strong light and strange shadows, suggesting deeper meanings below the surface.

Homer often represented the arduous labor of North Atlantic fishermen, based on this experiences at Cullercoats and amplified by observations made around his home on the coast of Maine. In one series of paintings, he explored the inherent dangers of fishing in the Grand Banks, the rich waters southeast of Newfoundland. The meeting of these currents provides a fertile environment for fish, but it also makes the area one of the foggiest places on earth. This painting is infused with tensions as the solo fisherman gazes toward the safety of the distant schooner and considers his ability to reach it before the fog, looming on the horizon, settles.

Many of Homer’s images of the Bahamas evoke the idea of the islands as a paradise created especially for tourists. Enjoying local fruits was perceived as a fundamental luxury of the visitor experience. This vibrant watercolor, a rare still life by the artist, offers a complete sensory experiance–ripe citrus, bright green leaves, and fragrant blossoms are bathed in warm sunlight.

Homer’s attention to inclement weather in this watercolor distinguishes it from the more idyllic tropical images he produced during a previous trip to Bahamas, in 1884-85. Dark clouds threaten, while several tall palms are lashed by violent winds. This detail combined with the tempestuous weather may evoke the geopolitical turmoil elsewhere in the Caribbean that year, specifically in Cuba and Puerto Rico. The weather events depicted here and in Homer’s images of storms off the coast of Maine represent important precursors to the turbulence of The Gulf Stream.

In Homer’s epic saga set along the Gulf Stream, a Black man faces his possible demise on the deck of a distressed boat, while threatened by sharks and a watersprout. This painting is the culminating expression of various deeply personal and universal themes that Homer explored across his career, particularly the conflict between humans and the natural environment. The Gulf Stream is also rich with geopolitical implications. Homer acknowledged the expanded imperial ambitions of the United States beyond North America with the addition of key elements. Sprayed across the ship’s deck are stalks of sugarcane–the Carribean commodity central to the economy of empire and directly linked to the swift ocean current of the title, which enabled its trade, and the devastating history of transatlantic slavery. Homer interweaves these complicated narratives in a painting that confronts human struggle, personified by a stoic survivor, against the relentless power of nature.

Appendix: 19th and Early 20th Century European Paintings

Thaulow (Norwegian, 1847-1906) earned great success with his depictions of the rivers and byways of Northern France. This canvas shows the village of Picquigny, near Amiens on the river Somme, where the Norwegian painter worked for several weeks in the late autumn of 1899. The composition adopts a downward vantage point that emphasizes the eddying water and its ever-changing colors, reflections and illumination.

Despite the seemingly rapid brushwork and the summary treatment of detail, this painting was preceded by at least two drawings and an oil sketch. This is Manet’s last portrait of his wife; it was painted at Bellevue, a suburb of Paris, where they spent the summer of 1880.

In addition to the girls’ manifest charm, Renoir undoubtedly counted on the notoriety of Mendes’ bohemian parents to gain attention: their father was a Symbolist poet and publisher, and their mother was the virtuoso pianist Augusta Holmes. Renoir completed the commission in a matter of weeks and immediately exhibited the large canvas in May 1888, but the response to his new manner of painting, with its intense hues and schematized faces, was unenthusiastic.

All pictures were taken by the author during his visit to The Art Institute of Chicago. Texts sourced from exhibit label scripts and museum audio guide.

Original draft as of September 7, 2019.

Manet painted Boating in 1874, the same year the Impressionists organized their first exhibition. Unlike many Impressionist works, Boating was not painted outdoors to capture a fleeting moment; Manet actually reworked significant sections in his studio.

Manet packed this slice-of-life scene to the point of confusion, layering customers, the waitstaff, and a performer’s reflection within the limited frame. The barmaid is drinking beer and the idea that she is taking time away from her job and patrons seems incredibly modern. Manet very likely made quick sketches on the spot and reworked it back in his studio, as a result of a more calculated method. With this Manet announced himself in a strong way at the Vie Moderne gallery in 1880 as a painter of modern life.

This exuberant still life features a plate of oysters, a bottle of champagne, and their various accessories. The subject (especially the Japanese fan) and daringly cropped composition, and fluid paint handling signal Manet’s fashionable modernity.

This picture of a woman fixing her hair speaks to Manet’s interest in the activities and accouterments of women’s grooming and styling. Unfinished and unsigned, it was purchased by Berthe Marisot after Manet’s death.

Manet’s sympathetic portrayal of his wife Suzzanne. However, the surface of the painting is strikingly different from contemporaneous depictions of chic young Parisiennes. Like all of Manet’s late portrait of Suzzanne, the painting remained a private work, was retained by the artist’s widow until financial circumstances forced her to sell it.

In the Conservatory presents a richly ambiguous scene: the two figures’ left hands almost touch. It also remains unclear whether Manet painted the couple in an actual conservatory or created a semblance of one expressly for this and other paintings of this period. This painting was exhibited with Boating at the 1879 Salon, where the two formed a modern pair.

While this painting presents slushy environment and all elements of romance and flirtations, you find it suggests something else, not caring, and indifference. The end result is so narrative but at the same time unyielding in its narrative. Although this painting did not give Manet the universal praise when exhibited in 1879, it becomes foundational for a lot of his later works.

While the mug of beer and the wooden bar attached to the reader’s illustrated journal suggest a Parisian cafe, the scene was in fact composed in Manet’s studio. The backdrop is not a real garden at all, but one of Manet’s own paintings. By 1880, Manet has become less mobile due to illness, and can no longer make it out to the cafes, parks and other Parisian scenes. Instead he resorted to recreating the scenes in his studio.

The woman reading is a modern woman; she has a mug of beer, she is by herself, and she is concentrated in possibly what she is gonna to consume next. Manet said this is the type he would like to show in all his beauty and all of their grace and glamour.

The model poses in near profile against an artificial verdant backdrop. The composition recalls Manet’s other pictures of fashionable Parisiennes in flowery settings.

Manet painted this sun-drenched picture in summer 1881. His bright palette and exuberant brushwork create a scene that hardly qualifies as hideous — which is how he described his own garden. Manet is largely confined to the house during this period, discouraged by his illness and frustrated by perpetual bad weather.

A lighthearted still life. This brings together several of Manet’s favorite motifs. The hat-like egg-washed bread sits askew on a porcelain plat. His wife’s cat, Zizi, emerges from the right edge.

图片和文字均来源于网络。图片附原图链接；文字段落末尾均表明作者或出处。

Part 2: 徐芒耀 | 艾轩 | 李自健 | 王宏剑 | 谢东明 | 刘小东

徐芒耀

“我画这个系列还有一种心理，也就是针对一种言论，这种言论认为，既然照相机已可以把我们眼之所见记录下来，那么写实的绘画已经失去其存在的必要。我正是要反对这种说法，因为幻觉和梦境是照相机无法捕捉的，但画笔可以记录，而且它从某一方面也表现了现代人生存的内在焦虑，甚至是某种真实中的荒诞。”（徐芒耀）

“人们一向以来认为梦是一种虚无缥缈的东西，但徐芒耀却将这种虚无缥缈以写实的手法表现出来，这种荒诞感直接地刺激着人们的大脑，徐芒耀认为在梦意识中对梦境的现象总是确信无疑的，否则你醒来时就不会常常对它心有余悸了。”（焦点 · 艺术）

“达利及马格利特的超现实主义作品也对徐芒耀的油画创作产生了很大的影响，特别是马格利特的油画作品对徐芒耀的影响极大。在徐芒耀油画作品中，细腻写实的手法和荒诞离奇的画面感似乎和马格利特如出一辙。作品中的荒诞、怪异、甚至以超写实的手法表现梦境中的场景。这些具有现代观念的写实油画无不充满着当代性的意味。”（婷婷）

其他作品（非本书收录）：

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艾轩

“我始终喜欢一种感觉——忧郁。我甚至陶醉在一种忧郁的情怀中。”（艾轩）

“艾轩风格的最大特点是借景抒怀。他画西藏高原的景色和孤独的人物，主要是为了抒发自己内心世界的感情。因此，他的作品与其说是西藏风情画，毋宁说是他内心的独白。在这一幅幅画中，都有艾轩的影子。沉默无语和静静思考，无名的孤独感渗透在画中人物和整个画面气氛之中。独自一人在望无际的草地、雪野、荒原，他（她）们生活在与大自然融为一体的世界里。”（邵大箴）

“出现在艾轩作品中的人物，现实中他们也许存在，也许不存在，但是在画布上的表现却是虚无的，重新解构和创作的，是艾轩个人意念的体现。……仔细看下去，画中的那些眼神，纯粹而宁静，充满着渴望。”（刘娇）

其他作品（非本书收录）：

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李自健

“画家对人物的刻画深情而又细腻，对小女孩可爱纯真之态表现的显露无遗，川流的小溪进一步衬托了人物的宁静优美，整体氛围的营造也有力的烘托了古老的羌族寨落民风淳朴、古韵犹存的地域特色。”（站酷）

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王宏剑

“中西方在绘画的空间理念上有很大的差异。比如，对典型的西方创作思维来说，水就是水，天空就是天空；而中国画却不是这样，常常会用一朵云来代表一片天空，用一条船来暗喻一片汪洋。……我会大量地布白，从画外下功夫，使用空间语意来增加油画的想象空间。”（王宏剑）

“油画《阳关三叠》的画面中没有王维诗中把酒话别的浪漫场面，没有“客舍青青柳色新”的优雅环境。观众看到的是：破晓时分，在天寒地冻的北方大地上，一群疲惫不堪的农工们整夜露宿于候车场，有人还怀抱着孩子。……作者似乎抓住了王维诗中最后一句“西出阳关无故人”来点明主题，勾画出一幅当代农民生活的另一个层面——背井离乡去寻找新生活。”（宋涤）

“画家虽然没有对环境做过细的描绘，只有一块阔大的天空与映照在万川之上的冷月，暗喻了边塞的苍凉与荒漠、遥远与寂寥，以此反衬出远征者的自信与勇气。……鲜活的细节，肃穆的气氛，精炼地把意蕴首先提供给感觉和情感，引导欣赏者自己去审视那些与情感相融的思想和观念……”（照片馆）

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谢东明

“艺术有几种，一种是直接干预现实生活的，当代艺术偏重这一点，比如看见一些现象，去批判去介入，会去说出自己的态度，但是我觉得这个世界上还有另外一种艺术，这种艺术是把他的理想表达在他的作品中。”（谢东明）

“谢东明的绘画手法是在写实范围中强调书写性和表现性，他画画从来都是站着，拿着大笔在大画布前饱蘸颜料浑身反复舞动，粗放的笔痕朝着四面挥洒，形体在疾速狂放的笔触覆盖中变得有力和厚重。他的造型能力很强，以大笔饱和而纯艳的色彩、过瘾的涂抹 、似农人用大镐刨大地般的够劲。”（杨飞云）

其他作品（非本书收录）：

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刘小东

“刘小东的绘画既不是客观的描摹，也不是主观的抒情。他的办法是把日常场景和日常物品这些外在的物质世界，随机地转换为个人直觉到的内在现实，让画面成为积攒和陈列我们时代生活形态的场所。”（宋晓霞）

“刘小东十年来始终坚信油画艺术的表现力，……他在用笔和造型之间达到了一种高度的融洽，下笔即是造型，塑造即是对物象的真切感受。他的笔法十分强烈，表达了他面对形象所生发的激情。这种笔法本身的力量使他的画永远显得非常饱满，一股内在的生命力从画中涨溢出来。”（范迪安）

“画家以‘照相’式的视角展开描绘，展现了一群被现实生活中所忽略的小人物，用他们的喜怒哀乐、他们最日常的生活状态，提示人们对关注现实的关注。”（李怡芸）

“以往的中国美术大都以社会化的”公有现实”为素材，表达了为社会所共识的意识形态与美感。……刘小东的绘画显然是以个人的叙述为基础的，他的视点是现场参与者，他本人和画笔与画中的人物共处在一个生活情境之中，需要面对相同的生存处境。他的绘画记录了自己观察和目击到的现实生活，叙述的纪实性使他在现实主义的传统中修正了个人与现实的关系。 ”（宋晓霞）

其他作品（非本书收录）：

图片和文字均来源于网络。图片附原图链接；文字段落末尾均表明作者或出处。

Part 1: 靳尚谊 | 詹建俊 | 张祖英 | 何多苓 | 杨飞云 | 王沂东

靳尚谊

“年轻女人体是世界物体中最复杂、最美、最难的造型，尤其色彩最难，皮肤的感觉说不出来，它有生命，比其他任何物体都复杂。”（靳尚谊）

“靳先生的人体大的色彩单纯得很，里面包含着的变化又很微妙。两个人体，一个偏绿，冷一点，另一个偏黄，暖一点，而这两个色块本身又都是漂亮的灰颜色，内部的变化又更微妙，整体的大色块于是就单纯而不简单。很整。”（戴士和）

“靳尚谊的人体作品都有一种独立的完美性，体现了东方人优雅含蓄的人体美感，和西方人体艺术经常可见的狂野和肉感有明显区别。……《双人体》是一件难度很高的人体艺术佳作。画家精心地处理轮廓线的完整，突出形体的整体感，衬托出肌肤的质感，表达了油画艺术的古典美。”（张超风《文化造就艺术：中国艺术文化巡礼》）

“除了充分运用肖像创作中的色彩及笔墨技法外，他着力通过边线整体的洒脱处理和环境的有机结合，把复杂的人体造型简约和单纯化，把复杂的色彩变化统一在安静的基调中，形成一种纯洁、崇高之美，达到洗练、流畅、纯净的境界。”（张祖英）

“黄宾虹的山水画非常厚重，有独到之处，用浓密的墨色来表现自然的滋润和苍浑，笔墨的层次很丰富，代表了中国山水画的一个高峰。我画这件作品也是尝试去做油画民族化的实验，也就是用水墨和油画相结合的实验。在这种实验中去表现中国艺术的民族文化精神。”（靳尚谊）

“靳尚谊先生运用十九世纪后出现的潇洒的大笔触，用写意的手法画出了一个文人艺术家。在此，中国画的笔墨，人物的修养和格调，油画的表达语言被熔炼成一个整体。”（中华网）

“《一个朋友的肖像》将中国文化的含蓄内敛和欧洲古典主义风范完美的融合，展现出当代中国人物的精神风貌和内心世界。”（99艺术网）

“画这张画时，彭丽媛是中国音乐学院的研究生，我认为她的形象很有中国特色。这一次，我想尝试用平光画人物。 平光在西方肖像画中用得比较少，平光更具中国特色，但难度却增大。”（靳尚谊）

“有人说这张画有“蒙娜丽莎”的味道。“蒙娜丽莎”是西方肖像画的基本格式，我在画彭丽媛的动作时参考了这种格式， 背景的古典、隽雅与“蒙娜丽莎”虽然有相像之处，但我画的是中国的山水，又与中国的人物融在一起，画面单纯、强烈、浓厚，有力度。经过这次尝试，我对两种文化的互补性有了进一步的认识。”（靳尚谊）

“此作品是靳尚谊的代表作之一，也是“新古典主义”的经典作品。“新古典主义”借鉴法国的学院派古典绘画传统，造型凝练含蓄，笔法细腻柔和，色调恬静典雅，与笔触阔大的苏派油画有所不同。”（中央美术学院美术馆）

“与一般的肖像油画不同，《青年歌手》用了北宋山水画家范宽的《雪景寒林》做背景，在真实传神的西画笔触中又透露出中国传统的意象与韵味。靳先生别出心裁地将一个现代人物与中国北宋的山水画通过西方油画形式融为一体，使中国几千年的文化传统与现代生活相联系，色调把握和节奏控制处理得天衣无缝。”（龙轩美术网）

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詹建俊

“《飞雪》是詹建俊单纯的追求形式美的代表作品。它以具有东方特色的女性为对象，人物烈焰般红色衣服与冰雪飘零的雪原并置，迸发出强烈的色彩视觉对比。白色的纯净圣洁与红色的真挚热烈和谐并存……”（雅昌艺术家网）

“《飞雪》弱化了真实风雪景象三度空间的描绘，而以平面化的手法着意于画面精神与诗意境界的营造和音乐韵律美的追求。”（闻立鹏）

“在他的作品里，没有‘伤春’或是‘悲秋’，画中人物始终焕发出不可穷尽的欢快与力量。”（水天中）

 

“詹建俊在《回望》一画中，把长城蜿蜒之势和重山的激越之势作了相当充分的描写。此画在色彩上用朱砂加以夸饰，使之与灰白的城墙相辉映，这种沈厚的基本色调，反映著一种对旧时代和历史陈迹的感慨。”（北京文艺网）

“其构图气势之宏大，浪漫想象之奇特，写意性笔触之奔放，表现性色彩之浓烈，均为同类题材的绘画作品所罕见。詹建俊所画的长城，其意境的基调不是苍凉悲壮，而是雄奇瑰丽。”（正一艺术网）

 

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张祖英

“他笔下的女人没有妩媚的，端庄有余，没有取悦的微笑和轻盈的姿态，正的有点超凡脱俗，在这些女人面前你不会想到“性”和轻薄……你会觉得她们可能思想锐利，但善解人意，一定在危难中和你同甘共苦，你会在他的笔下读懂他所看重的女人。”（戢遐龄）

“男人也一样，……张祖英的心里崇尚的是能够为社会奉献、克尽职守、百折不回、能够顽强生活的人生品格。似乎没有什么个性，有一种恒定抑或是永恒的东西在闪烁中定位。那是它想要捕捉的一些人的本性和所有人都会具有的一瞬间，善良、美好、真诚的一瞬间，介乎于纯真和神圣之间的人的一种净化的境界。”（戢遐龄）

“在张祖英的笔下，人物的呈现与他们所生活的那片土地紧紧联系在一起，在朴实而没有过多修饰的人物造型中，我们可以感受到每个人内心丰富的情感和鲜明的个性，同时又把不同年代的时代精神包含其中。”（凤凰艺术）

“《维吾尔族铁匠阿米尔》表达了凝重生活的一种现实感——关于生命存在的希望、西域男性强悍坚韧的力量。这样的精神很珍贵，却在作者大量的肖像画里具有普遍性，而这件作品表现得尤为突出。”（朝戈）

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何多苓

“当时的知青题材已经有很多人画了，我不想再继续画下去，便想在作品中发掘些新的东西，所以就把《青春》画得有种纪念碑的感觉，那个女孩从表情、动作到衣着都代表了我心中的知青形象，纪念碑的处理使作品看起来没有故事也没有情节。”（何多苓）

“画家用温情的笔勾画出女孩的美和魅力，但安排在近乎超现实的环境之中，组成令人陶醉的气氛。作品是抒情的，但又是哀伤的。画家的艺术具诗意的特质，重绘画性，是唯美、优雅、感伤……”（北京文艺网）

“这个荒原上的秀丽少女，从表情、动作到衣着都代表了他心中的知青形象，成了那个时代最动人的形象之一。……画中的人和景，包括那些含意朦胧的细节，使人产生广阔的联想：人和人的命运，青春、生命和宇宙，过去、现在和未来。”（抱节君）

“作品呈现的是著名当代女诗人翟永明，依靠在窗前，瘦削的脸庞，敏感的眼神，棱角分明而扎手，气息依然如故。在此幅作品中何多苓去掉了多余的场景，摒除了繁杂的空间，独取窗台这富有诗意的角度，来与诗人架起旷古而悠远的对话。”（海峡书画艺术网）

“《窗前的女人》画面细腻而又写实。场景选用的窗台也极具显现出何多苓受超现实主义诗歌的影响，把小翟那忧郁、尖锐乃至些许的固执，表现的精准到位。当月光从一侧倾泻在她的脸上，隐入深处的双眸，削白的面颊，冷冷地将自己陷入黑色的包围之中。”（海峡书画艺术网）

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杨飞云

“作品在造型感觉上接近欧洲古典油画的优秀传统，在表现的内容上却充满了中国元素。画中女孩在神情的刻画上宁静却不羞涩，大方不失含蓄，颇有当代女子的象征。”（新浪收藏）

“杨飞云的作品，给人的是清丽、悠远、静谧和安逸，那是一种经典之美。”（崔自默）

“他要表现充满青春和美丽的形象。同时他又把这种“美”进行了“理想式”的加工，使之呈现出一种静谧含蓄、而又可亲可近的抒情基调。画面中的人物往往被安置在全家塔式的稳定之中，姿态是安祥的，表情，动作是含蓄的，光线是柔和温馨的，背景或是单纯的整体色块，或是安置几组井然的静物摆设，整幅画面呈现出一种理想的抒情气氛。”（谷云）

其他作品（非本书收录）：

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王沂东

“王沂东的作品一直坚守着乡村题材和民间趣味。他对乡村生活的向往其实是对纯粹精神的赞美，他对农民的热爱实际上是对民间色彩的情有独钟……”（王兆军）

“王沂东的作品通常背景单纯，将西方古典油画的精湛技法与中国民族文化的审美意蕴融于一体，……红衣农家少女是他作品中经常出现的艺术符号，不过这张画中，通常单纯的雪地或纯色块背景变成了民俗色彩浓郁的被褥，加上光线的巧妙运用，令人耳目一新。”（新浪收藏）

其他作品（非本书收录）：

All pictures were taken by the author during his visit to The Met Fifth Avenue, New York. Texts sourced from exhibit label scripts.

Although best known for his visionary and mystical works, Vedder developed a lifelong interest in painting the Italian countryside during the 1860s while living in Florence. He associated with a group of artists known as the Macchiaioli, who eschewed academic practice and drew inspiration directly from nature. Probably painted in Rome in the 1880s, Cypress and Poppies reflects the enduring influence of the Macchiaioli landscapes on Vedder, with its soft atmosphere and splashes of bright color.

Boboli Gardens in Florence were designed in the mid-sixteenth century for the Medici court. Sargent’s depiction of a sculpture by Giovanni Battisca Caccini of a figure playing a pipe, set against lush foliage, is a study of contrasting light and shadow. He employs layers of dark pigments of varying opacity to suggest depth and shadow in the background, and renders the sunlight filtering through the branches with pale-hued pigments. He depicts the pietra serena (a light-colored Tuscan limestone) of the statue with warm tones applied in transparent washes.

Lucca, a charming Renaissance walled city in Tuscany, where Sargent spent the autumn of 1910. Here, Sargent uses a low vantage point to set off the richly carved urn against a brilliant blue sky. He enlivens a static subject by placing the urn close to the top edge of the composition and depicting the vine of vivid pinkish blue blossoms as if it is cascading from the urn, using feathery brushstrokes.

Sargent’s interest in geometric of the scene, with its numerous horizontal and vertical divisions, is apparent in the carefully ruled underdrawing visible at the left. The proximity of the building’s facade to the picture plane is underscored by the precise rendering of the bright white, carved spiral stone column at the left in contrast to the recession of the dark corridor. By leaving the illuminated area at the rear of the sotto portego ambiguous, Sargent evokes the tangle of streets and passageways so characteristic of Venice.

A picturesque charm has long been associated with Giudecca, attracting artists for many centuries — both Francesco Guardi and Joseph Mallord William Turner painted view of it. However, their images almost always include recognizable landmarks. In his rendering, Sargent avoids identifiable Venetian monuments in recording the characteristics of a typical neighborhood. The inclusion of sailing vessels invoke the city’s historical importance as an Adriatic port.

For the focal point of this watercolor, Sargent chose the relatively obscure yet scenic eleventh-century tower of the Church of San Barnaba. He positioned himself close to the water to present the view looking down the Rio de San Barnaba toward the Grand Canal. Sargent’s watercolors are admired for their fluid spontaneity, evident here in his rendering of the rippling water of the canal as it reflects the nearby architecture and bright sunlight.

All pictures were taken by the author during his visit to The Met Fifth Avenue, New York. Texts sourced from exhibit label scripts.

Public Parks

The Parc Monceau in the elegant eighth arrondissement was among the older Parisian parks targeted for renovation and unveiled in 1861. Monet lived a few blocks away from this intimate park. At first he adopted a horizontal format, as in the views he painted of London’s Green Park (1870-71), but for the second group he used a more unusual vertical format, perhaps inspired by Japanese woodcut prints.

Monet takes in the park’s curving paths on a sunny afternoon. He skimmed lightly over the figures of park-goers, blending them in with enveloping vegetation, filling the canvas with little patches of color that approximate the texture of foliage and the flicker of light.

Like Monet, Caillebotte was drawn to the renovated Parc Monceau. He inserted a path the beckon viewers into the picture and a bench to invite them to linger. A solitary Parisian gentleman, achieved with  just a few quick strokes, suggests the urbanity of the site.

Later in his career, Pissarro — the least cosmopolitan of the Impressionists — devoted successive painting campaigns to the landscape of modern Paris. In 1899 and 1900, he took leave of his home in rural Eragny to rent a large apartment high above the rue de Rivoli “opposite the Tuileries, with a superb view of the garden”. He painted two series of fourteen views each, including half a dozen from the same vantage point. Attentive to changes in the light and color of the grounds, the relative fullness of the trees, and the comings and goings of strollers at different times and seasons, he extracted the very nature of this site.

Renoir gravitated to more traditional motifs during his later career. In this autumnal view of the courtyard on the north side of the palace of Versailles, he paints the chestnut trees that line the allée in rich seasonal hues, while he accords sculpture a key role.

By the early nineteenth century, virtually every town, large or small, was graced with a promenade or public garden not unlike the one Pissarro painted in Pontoise. In this semi-rural, semi-suburban hamlet just northwest of Paris, a stroll in the park was a social event.

Monet studied the dramatic shapes and shadows formed by one of Fontainebleau’s most frequently painted and photographed trees, the Bodmer Oak, in preparation of his ambitious picture Luncheon on the Grass (1865-66). Using a palette of bright yellows, greens, and oranges to depict sunlight filtering through the trees, Monet painted this autumnal view just before he wrapped his visits to Fontainebleau in October 1865.

Floral Still Lifes

One of Cassatt’s rare still lifes, this painting was presumably made at the country house her family rented outside Paris. She placed her casually arranged bouquet on the windowsill of the greenhouse, close to the open air, in cool spring light.

Monet was praised for the “brio and daring” of his technique when the picture was shown at the 1882 Impressionist exhibition. Such qualities seem to have resonated with Paul Gauguin six years later, when he was even more dazzled by the suite of Sunflowers Van Gogh has painted as a decoration for his room in Arles.

By the summer of 1887, Van Gogh had updated his drab Dutch palette by painting flowers and come into his own as an original colorist. He made the dried blooms and stalks of the tall tournesols the focus of four works, magnifying their ragged heads, where flame-like sepals halo the seed destined to yield next year’s flowers.

Monet painted more than twenty floral still lifes between 1878 and 1883, fixing his sight on generous displays of a single type of flower at the height of bloom as opposed to mixed bouquets. A perennial favorite was the exotic chrysanthemum. In painting the small, pearly mums of late summer with petal-size dabs and dashes, Monet created a shimmering effect that is reflected on the polished tabletop, mirroring his concurrent infatuation with the watery surfaces of the Seine.

Caillebotte did not develop an interest in floral subjects until the 1880s, when he acquired property in the Parisian suburb of Petit-Gennevilliers. He found inspiration enough to shift his focus from urban scenes of bourgeois leisure to his own backyard. In redirecting his gaze to the plants he had nurtured from the ground up — such as this thicket of homegrown chrysanthemums, seen from an intimate and provocative vantage point — he continued to create what one critic hailed as “impromptu views that are the great delights in life.”

Although Degas once expressed his aversion to scented flowers, he nodded to current fashion by portraying a woman seated beside an enormous bouquet of asters, dahlias, and other late-summer blooms. The gardening gloves and water pitcher on the table suggest that the sitter had gathered and arranged flowers from the garden glimpsed through the window.

The extraordinary range of hues in which chrysanthemums could be cultivated caught the eye of Renoir. Probably gathered from the garden of his patron Paul Bérard at Wargemont, in Normandy, they must have emboldened the artist to test his overheated palette. “When I painted flowers,” he said, “I fell free to try out tones and values and worry less about destroying the canvas.”

Attentive to botanical accuracy, Delacroix brought a sense of realism to his works that was soon to become the province of photographers. And for younger painters, he set an influential precedent for how high-key color and freewheeling paint strokes could contribute robust vibrancy to a subject often too daintily treated.

Reportedly Manet’s favorite flower, peonies were introduced to France in the early nineteenth century. They grew in abundance in the artist’s garden in the Parisian suburb of Gennevilliers. Considered the epitome of luxury, the voluptuous flowers were a perfect vehicle for his sensuous brushwork and virtuosic handling of subtle color harmonies.

Private Gardens

During the summers of 1881 to 1884, spent with her family in the village of Bougival, just west of Paris, she often painted the garden of their rental house with its wrought-iron gate, tall hollyhocks, and dense foliage. The figures emerging from the verdant surroundings may be Morisot’s five-year old daughter, Julie, and their maid, Pasie.

Cézanne’s affection for his family’s estate, Jas de Bouffan, near Aix-en-Provence, is reflected in the many views he painted of the property over a quarter century. He pictured this prospect along the road that led from an eighteenth-century house to its landscaped gardens, charting the symmetry of the massive chestnut trees and often including the stone washing trough and large square pool for collecting water. A sense of cool tranquility prevails in the artist’s depictions of the garden that afforded him refuge from the challenges of life in Paris.

Monet was in his twenties when he began to setting up his easel in sunlit gardens. While spending the summer of 1867 with his family on the Normandy coast, he painted his aunt’s garden in the seaside resort of Sainte-Adresse, near the port of Le Havre. The manicured oasis of standard roses and bedding geraniums at her villa made a stunning setting for the artist’s sidelong portrait of his father, Adolphe, a prosperous merchant.

After Monet established his own bourgeois household in rented properties in the Paris suburb of Argenteuil between 1871 and 1876, he began to garden in earnest, making his flower-filled backyards the subject of more than thirty canvases. The artist planted a central flower bed in a walled circular space: gladioli and hollyhocks soar above nasturtiums and geraniums to provide burst of colors at laddered levels, in accord with the current fashion for mounded combinations of annuals and perennials. The hollyhocks grew taller than Monet’s wife, Camille, whose painted from dissolves in shadows, submitting to the primacy of flowers and foliage.

With bemused sunlight, Bonnard pictures here a bucolic summer day at the family estate in Le Grand-Lemps, near Grenoble, adopting a high vantage point that offers a glimpse of five of his offspring and their pets cavorting amid the assorted greenery of vines, shrubs, and trees spread over luxuriant lawns.

Garden Portraits

Manet painted his wife in the sunlit greenery of their seasonal residence in Bellevue. Much of her face is hidden beneath the broad rim of hat, and her figure melds with the background realized in bravura strokes of ocher, blue, and emerald green.

One of Cassatt’s first and most dazzling plein-air pictures, this portrait of her sister Lydia debuted to praise at the 1881 Impressionist exhibition. Lydia is placed along a diagonally receding walkaway, bordered by plants, inviting comparison with Morisot’s somewhat later picture of a sitter absorbed in her knitting. Cassatt rendered her frail sister’s features with sensitivity, using freer brushwork to describe her stylish dress and still more vigorous handling for the foliage of gladioli, roses, and coleus leading to the greenhouse.

In this slice-of-life view, Morisot suspends descriptive detail to create a portrait of her time, making a bold fashion statement of sorts: her sitter sports the latest style of dress and is shown knitting in a garden typical of the period, with a gravel path and flowering roses. The elegant chairs suffice to define the private setting. Morisot probably painted the work in Bougival, where she spent the summers of 1881 to 1884, perhaps enlisting her daughter’s nanny as model.

At the time when artists were churning out sentimental images of women in gardens for the annual Salons, Morisot introduced invention where tired stereotypes left off. She magically transformed the interior into a place out of doors, opening it to her balcony and bringing roses and hydrangeas into the company of a flower-bedecked hat and the floral upholstery of a tufted settee. Her approach led one critic to comment in 1880: “She grinds flower petals onto her palette, in order to spread them later on her canvas with airy, witty touches.”

An echo of suitors in Garden of Love paintings from an earlier era. No less traditional is the presentation of the half-acre walled garden. Yet its bright red zonal geraniums are clustered in a corbeille, a basket-shaped flower bed that had recently become as much a fixture in French parks as the bench. Both the parklike setting and Camille’s smart ensemble ascribe to the latest fashion. Still, the sitter telegraphs sadness amid the sunlit blooms.

During the summer of 1874, Manet paid a visit to the Monet family. Finding them enjoying a leisurely afternoon in their garden, he set up his easel to paint in the open air. Renoir, who arrived just as Manet was starting to work, borrowed materials to paint the same scene from a closer spot. Looking to capture the moment, neither artist ignored the yard’s wandering chickens, Manet placing the rooster, hen, and chick as avian counterparts to Monet, his wife Camille, and son Jean. At some point of that day, Monet took a break from tending his flowers to make a picture of Manet painting in the garden.

All pictures sourced from external links as Neue Galerie New York does not allow visitors to take photos. Notes from the museum audio guide.

The first president of Czechoslovakia. Setting him against the backdrop of Prague and Vltava river. Extraordinary brushwork. Shortly after Kokoschka finished this painting, the Nazi called it ‘degenerate’ and he fled to London. Tomas Masaryk died in 1937 and this painting became an elegy for this loved president.

Here beckmann portraits real people: intellectuals, politicians, and businessmen. This is an elegant party – there is singer at the background but no one pays attention.The guests don’t seem to enjoy themselves; only the couple at lower left seems to be connected to each other. The main aspect of this painting is isolation.

The style and implication of this painting would have been unacceptable to the Nazis and clearly the artist painted it for himself. Has a scientific fiction in it. The barren room, the door that goes nowhere, and the empty frame on the wall. Perhaps this an artist studio but the productivity has been totally gone.

Oelze drew a variety of sources for this unsettling composition: the use of contemporary photography, combined with traditional European landscape painting – the genuine strategy of surrealism. MoMa bought this painting in 1940.

All pictures without external links were taken by the author during his visit to The Met Breuer, New York. Texts sourced from exhibit label scripts.

Though he was enjoying considerable professional success and increasing recognition in Germany by 1906, at this time his private life was plagued by anxiety, alcoholism, and despair, all of which led to his breakdown just two years later. Munch captures here his sense of acute loneliness and melancholy.

The seventy-seven-year-old artist, looking grim, stands next to a window at his house at Ekely on a winter day. Munch divided the canvas into the icy-cold, snow-covered landscape seen through the window and the rose-tinted warm interior on the left. He spent the final years of his life here at Ekely.

Trees from a dark mass along the coastline, and the diagonal fence creates space and depth. Heeding French symbolism, Munch presents landscape as an expression of mood.

Munch moved to Saint-Cloud, just outside Paris, in 1890. There he broke from naturalism and embraced French Symbolism, which favors emotional experience over objective observation. In this second version of the motif that he initially painted in Saint-Cloud three years earlier, a solitary figure sits near a window at night.

This work belongs to a group of winter views from Munch’s veranda at Ekely, his estate on the outskirts of Oslo. Light from the house creates shadows of the two figures who look out over the dark, snowy landscape. On the horizon shine lights from the city, while bright stars dance in the bluish sky.

Munch referred to the second half of his life as a “battle just to keep myself upright.” With hollow eyes and a somber expression, the stooped figure of the artist, in his house at Ekely at night, elicits feelings of restlessness and loneliness.

This work is a precursor to the first version of Munch’s famous painting The Scream (1893). In fact, the artist later referred to it as “the first Scream.” The dramatic diagonal perspective of the railing emphasizes the figure’s isolation and despair.

The third of six versions of The Sick Child, made between 1885 and 1927. Critics cared less for the motif than the artist’s embrace of an experimental, expressionistic technique, which involved the layering of short brushstrokes that seem to quiver with anxiety.

Munch used a radical technique of layering paint and then scraping away the color. He regarded The Sick Child as a breakthrough in his work, moving away from realism and Impressionism toward pure expression.

The most technically experimental example of the five paintings and two prints of this subject. Paint has been sprayed all over the surface, and only the body’s outline, face, hair, and halo have been treated with a brush. The delicate pale-blue and purple pigment form other halos around sensuous woman.

A revisit to his work in 1894 as part of his Frieze of Life series. A woeful man holds his head in his hands while a siren-like woman, dressed in red and white, exhibits her sensuous body. Behind them, a log has partly turned to ashes. Here, Munch depicts the flowering and passing of love.

The model Annie Fjeldbu bows her head while standing in front of a wicker chair in Munch’s studio. Unlike in other paintings, she has thrown off her gown and robe, displaying her naked body. The vertical format of the canvas accentuates her elongated pale nude body, which dominates the canvas.

This is the artist’s first full-length self-portrait and one of only three in which he shows himself with the tools of his trade. Wearing a dark painting smock, he looks confidently at the viewer.

Based on museum audio guide. All pictures linked from public sources (e.g. Wikipedia, artsy.net, oceansbridge.com). The number of each painting corresponds to the actual item number in the museum.

563 The Little Street – Vermeer’s hometown. So realistic almost like a photograph, various materials in precise but convincing manner. Window gives depth. No other artists paint simple city scene in such fondness and precision.

575 The Milkmaid – Vermeer is a perfectionist. Sparse surroundings diverted by the focal point – the milkmaid and her colorful dress. Window broken, bread scattered etc. light everywhere in the room.

541 Self Portrait as the Apostle Paul – Rembrandt at age of 55. Light from above – the story from Bible. Ability to capture the inner state of his figures. A typical late work of Rembrandt.

523 The Wardens of the Amsterdam’s Drapers’ Guild – Viewed from a lower standpoint. Have they just finished? Or just started their meeting? The man on the left is standing up or sitting down?

500 The Night Watch – Disorderly arrangement, makes this painting so unique. Dark background, putting main figures in spotlight. Dramatic, it’s a group in action. Gestures of the guards also capture our attention.

473 Winter Landscape with Ice Skaters – 17th century. Vibrant ice winter scene. Everyone in motion, falling and getting up again. To fit all, Avercamp raised the viewpoint and muted colors in the background. Nearly 200 figures. His winter scenes even at high demand in summer.

Interiors of a Protestant, Gothic Church – Emanuel de Witte is a master of perspectival church interiors. However he is not depicting reality, composing from parts of various existing churches.

Distant View of the Meadows – Back then not everyone was enthusiastic about such unadorned landscapes but now it is considered masterpiece of early 19th century painting, precisely because of its modern and original version.

The Canal at ‘s-Graveland – High vantage point possibly from the window of Herman Waller’s country house, the paintings’ commissioner.

Portrait of Lizzy Ansingh – Contrast between light and dark conveys intimacy. Swift vigorous brushstrokes. Schwartze enjoyed great success with her fashionable society portraits.

The Voorstraat Harbour in Dordrecht – Witsen is a master of tranquil city view. Real passion for detail, worn bricks. Suppressing any signs of life, emphasize everlasting stillness of the old city.

373 A Windmill on a Polder Waterway – Landscape without narrative, human and animals in secondary place. Put emphasis in depicting the clouds as well as its reflection in the water.

363 Girl in a Kimomo – Japanese was fashionable, artist couldn’t resist. At least twelve different version. No distinction between foreground and background, mimicking Japanese woodcut pattern which the artist admired.

349 The Singel Bridge at the Paleisstraat in Amsterdam – Use photo as source. The woman at the front seems out of focus, almost knock onto us. Just another ordinary day. The footsteps on the snow, in a few colorful rough brushstrokes. Woman lift her skirt, dog barking.

Based on museum audio guide. All pictures copied from Van Gogh Museum’s official website. 

1883-1885: Van Gogh admired 19th century French peasant painters like Millet, Breton, etc very much. He made up his mind at the age of 27 (1880). From then to 1883 Van Gogh settled in Nuenen and started painting idealized peasant life. He prepared more than one year before ‘The Potato Eaters’ that later made him famous.

Here are a few examples, including works from other painters who also depicted and idealized peasants’ life.

The Cottage (1885): The huge overhanging roof captivated him – in Van Gogh’s view, roof is like nest, made of all kinds of materials, keep human safe. We also notice there are two doors, which indicates two families under one roof. The painting is set at dusk, the time when peasants return from the entire day of hard work. In addition, there are trees overarching the roof, protecting people inside.

Head of a Woman (1885): It’s all about brushstrokes. Expression is more important than a correct rendering. 

Still Life with Bible (1885): On the side of the painting, beside Bible, it is Zola’s novel – Bible of modern life. Painted one year after his father’s death, Van Gogh used two books to symbolize different worlds of his and his father’s.

The Potato Eaters (1885): This painting is filled with dark colors, even on people’s faces; this is the color of the earth – dignity of farmers. Steam rises from the platter and you could almost smell it. Van Gogh has worked a long time on this painting. Over multiple drafts, figures have shifted but the center was always around their hands. However, the publication reaction to this painting was mixed. He even received a shocking response from his friend which treated this work as a caricature.

1885-1886: Practice and practice, due to the lukewarm reaction of The Potato Eaters. Van Gogh went to Antwerp to receive training and was further inspired by the 17th-century masters (portraits).

1886-1888: Van Gogh moved to Paris. He Learned from impressionists and then developed his own expressive styles.

Manet – The Jetty of Boulogne-sur-Mer: The seascape from the founder of Impressionim, Manet, was anything but traditional. The sailing boat is largely concealed. There are also bold division of picture plane and marked cropping. This could also be found in Van Gogh’s work.

In the Cafe: Agostina Segatori in Le Tambourin (1887): The figure is Van Gogh’s friend as well as lovers. Like the one in Henri Toulouse-Lautrec’s work (above), the girl is likely a prostitute as we see cigarettes and beer on the table. Proper ladies did not drink or smoke in a cafe.

Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat (1887): The blue and orange pattern in the background is, don’t be surprised, science, which was based on the newest optic theories at the time. In adopting this method, Van Gogh tried to make his colors as intensive as possible.

Garden with Courting Couples (1887): Despite the lack of facial features, this painting expresses the poetic scene of young couples, with increased intensity by dash colors and the combination of foreground and background. Van Gogh here is experimenting colors – there are colors that complement each other just like man and wife. And looking from farther distance, the colors get blended together.

Boulevard de Clichy (1887): This is nearby where the brothers (Vincent and Theo) lived.

Trees and Undergrowth (1887): The painting has no center or focus – a very modern idea. The plane, from edge to edge and corner to corner, is covered by these dots. Van Gogh seemed very delighted being surrounded by it and all the colors he seized in this work.

1888-1889: Van Gogh left Paris and moved to Arles, a quieter place.

The Pink Orchard (1888): Van Gogh loved blossoms, representing new hope and new way for him to pursue art.

The Pink Peach Tree (1888): This is one of the three works painted and presented together. This format was inspired from Japanese graphic art.

The Langlois Bridge (1888): Van Gogh applied a simple composition in this painting to convey Provence’s essential beauty and its “the clearness of atmosphere.”

The Bedroom (1888): This colorful painting was mean to offer people comfort. Van Gogh was using colors to express emotions.

Field with Irises near Arles (1888): The painting is all about light and colors, with a meadow full of yellow buttercups, a ditch with iris plants, town in back ground and a strip of blue sky.

Fishing Boats on the Beach (1888): This painting reveals Van Gogh’s passion in Japanese art, indicated by the clear contrast of the boat’s outline and the clarity he wanted to achieve.

Sunflowers (1889): The flowers almost seem to glow. Here we see all different kinds of essentially one color and could certainly be surrounded by the feeling of power. The paints are so thick to give its weight. Van Gogh liked things to run down, to be a bit rough and worn, which was like real life – you could see some of the flowers are dying. This work was served as a welcome for Gauguin to Arles and the artist Ppainted five different versions all with dazzling light. Van Gogh wanted to proclaimed himself as the painter of sunflowers.

1889-1890:

Almond Blossom (1890): Here we see a turquoise sky. Where was he standing? After the good news of Theo’s newborn child, this work was painted as a gift to the couples. Van Gogh depicted blossoms in great precision, some in bloom while others are still in bud.

Butterflies and Poppies, Giant Peacock Moth, Roses (1890): Van Gogh presented a close look at ordinary things, including the pale roses. The exploration of universal beauty is the key of Van Gogh’s art. He always wanted to convey his certain way of looking to the audience.

Irises (1890): This painting is strong and animated, elegant and powerful. It was so thickly painted that it took a month to dry.

Copies after Millet (1889): This copy of Millet’s famous work are re-presented with colors of Van Gogh’s own invention. This is like a musician interpreting the composer’s work.

Landscape at Twilight (1890): There are green and black leaves, as well as yellow light full of energy. The foreground is full of long sweeping diagonal strokes. What is the subject of this painting? The strokes themselves, which represent energy and life of nature.

Wheatfield with Crows (1890): The wheat field is as big as sea. The painting is filled with extreme loneliness. This was painted during the last week of Van Gogh’s life though not being his last work. There are a few more which were more optimistic.

Tree Roots (1890): Van Gogh is here studying tree roots, with its twisted forms. The painting was unfinished. It is the last painting of Van Gogh.

All pictures without external links were taken by the author during his trip to National Gallery in Oslo, Norway. Texts sourced from National Gallery’s official English website. 

Werenskiold studied in Munich and Paris before he returned to his home country in mid-1880s. Thereafter, depicting rural and folk life of Norwegians became the key theme in his painting. This painting is a study in green, from the grass in the foreground to the trees and further the hillside in the background.

Peasant Burial has been considered as a principal work of Norwegian art. Its naturalist theme and the bright lighting indicates it was most likely painted outdoors. The picture raises several questions, such as who is the deceased, who is the woman presented, and who is the man reading a book?

Krohg used realist approach as well as size and composition to bring to light contemporary social issues: the center figure is a prostitute while Albertine, the name and the main figure of Krohg’s novel Albertine, is seen further. The painting deals with the compulsory medical exam that prostitutes had to subject themselves to.

Like Munch, Krohg lost both his sister and mother at his young age, and this painting may well be a source of inspiration of Munch’s Sick Child (1886). The dying girl is heavily foregrounded, allowing viewers to feel as though they are in the same room with her. The girl herself expresses no sorrow or despair.

Church’s interior played a crucial role in Backer’s art. She studied in Munich and Paris where she lived for ten years. Backer is considered to be an early Impressionist. In this painting, Backer captures the variously illuminated surfaces as the sunlight filters into the interior of the church. Also the view from inside the church and out into open creates a striking perspective.

The title of this painting, Blue Interior, alludes Backer’s ambition to depict the impact of daylight on the coloring and lighting of an interior, mirroring Monet and other Impressionists’ interest in lighting effects.

Swedish artist Anders Zorn manages to capture the play of the light against skin, water, and stone with his broad, rapid brushstrokes. The naked woman depicted allows her body to be warmed by the blazing sun as she peers out into the distance. Zorn was the foremost Impressionist in Scandinavia during his times and here presents an independently Nordic reply to the bathing scenes by Cezanne, Renoir, and others.

The stools have been casually pushed aside and the people have presumably gone indoors. The door remains ajar and reflects in its window the landscape. There is a tension in the painting between the foreground’s colorful wealth of detail and the background’s simplified shapes and tones. The painting can be seen as a homage to the luminous Nordic summer nights. Like many other Sohlberg’s works, the painting is devoid of people.

Henrik Sorensen was one of the most distinctive artists in Norway before and after WWII. He received training largely abroad, including Académie Matisse in Paris. This work was painted after his stay in Paris and is a fine example of his more “moderate modernism”. The woman seems both present and somewhat distant.

Cabaret is considered Krohg’s principal work. One year before this painting he stated in an interview that he was “influenced by this Picasso fellow”, also citing Cézanne, Matisse, and El Greco as key sources of inspiration. There are five figures crowded in this painting. The three grey-white, slender female nudes in the foreground contrast sharply with the murky background and the two frantically playing guitarists. The painting may also be an homage to Paul Gauguin, who included small, symbolic scenes with animals in some of his paintings.

The painting is highly complex in regard to form, color, and content, and many consider it to be the political manifesto of Arne Ekeland, who was a communist. The three figures – a priest with a collar, a military man in uniform, and a representative of the moneyed interests – can be seen as symbolizing the capitalist society that Ekeland wanted to topple. Beyond Italian Renaissance art that the painter had seen on his trip to Italy, he was also inspired by German expressionism, French cubism, Byzantine art, etc.

Viewed in Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York in Fall 2013.

Based on museum audio guide. The number of each painting corresponds to the actual item number in the museum.

200. Time is a River without Bank

Up till now I still think of this painting by Chagall in his early period as the most poetic and romantic one in this exhibition. Perhaps this is also why the museum placed it at the front of the hall. In this painting, we see a wide and peaceful river which of course represents Chagall’s hometown; while the flying fish is his father. Chagall himself and his wife, Bella, which are the only two “live” figures in the picture, sit at the corner, holding each other and cherishing the moment being together. This painting is about time, memory and loss, as said by the commentary, which I cannot agree more. Time is like a river, which is always moving and never stops. The grandfather clock in the middle, which is a more obvious symbol of time, in my opinion, is more of a implication of the objectiveness about time and we as human beings have to sit aside to either embrace or withstand the memory and loss that the times brings to us.

201. The Lovers

To understand this painting, it is important to know that bouquet was rare in Russia but plenty in Paris back in 1930s. This helps us understand the inner passion and spiritual energy that drive Chagall to grow and grows his flowers to essentially the whole canvas. The background color of this image is similar to the last one, and also from the lower right-hand side we see the houses the sheep representing Chagall’s hometown and his nostalgia while living in Paris and enjoying his sweet life at the same time. The contrast between these two color palettes and the emotions behind them make this bouquet look so special and joyful.

202. Untitled (Old Man with Beard)

203. Study for the Revolution

204. Solitude

205. The Fall of the Angel

206. Obsession

208, Exodus

209. Calvary

210. Descent from the Cross

211. Christ in the Night

212. The Flayed Ox

213. Soul of the City

214. The Wedding Candles

Based on museum audio guide. The number of each painting corresponds to the actual item number in the museum.

651. The Lost Jockery

The black curtains on the sides of the canvas remind us what we see behind is actually something not real (even surreal?). In the center of the “stage”, we have Magritte (should be himself, right?) riding a horse, seems running very fast but looks like not going anywhere. The standing “trunks” is actually bilboquets – a French toy and Magritte repeatedly used this form in his early works.

652. Portrait of Paul Nouge

Paul Nouge was a Belgian composer and he was a close friend of Magritte. In this painting Magritte challenged the convention view that portrait should be singular. The two Pauls look almost identical but with tiny differences – the shades of foreheads, one’s hand was cropped out of the canvas, etc. We believe from Magritte’s view, neither of them is Paul Nouge and both are representations.

653. The Secret Player

Again, we see the curtain and bilboquets. But here in front of us is an even weird and surreal world, with two players and a woman in a closet whose size is smaller than usual. What is interesting about this work is – it seems there are two sources of light. Obviously one is coming from left to the right (you can tell from the reflection of the bilboquets) and the other one, which sheds light on the woman’s face, is less to be aware of. This is a painting without a narrative and we can only explore the meaning and the truth simply by looking at it.

655. The Titanic Days

This one is disturbing – not only because it shows a man fighting with a woman but more than that we see the two bodies are forced to be in one plane. The three-dimension conventional pictorial space is destroyed.

656. Attempting the Impossible

Magritte and his wife. This can be regarded as the most literal interpretation of what a painter does – just apply paints – there is nothing more mystical, mysterious, and metaphysical about it. This also reflects the Surrealists’ attack on painting as a medium itself at the very beginning and what Magritte was trying to bring us here is the initial state of painting, without being commercialized, related to religion or something else, just paint. On another perspective, this painting also reminds us of Pygmalion, the Greek mythological character that brings his beloved sculpture to life.

657. The False Mirror

Unfortunately this is the only one painting that I knew before I came to this exhibition (but not knowing it is from Magritte). The caption of this work makes us to think about, and problematize that optical vision is limited. What you see is not necessarily reality – inner vision, hallucination, and dream may provide us as real as what we see in external phenomena – this plays an important role in Surrealism and the relationships between dream and reality, vision and illusion, what we see and what we do not see, are among the central issues that the Surrealist painters wanted to address.

658. The Eternally Obvious

Personally I think this is the most “magical” work in this exhibition and what you actually see is definitely beyond the five pieces of female torso. It simply ignites your imagination and brings about the inner desire to connect these disjoint pieces and even to create . Each individual piece may also represent a radical and violent act in terms of creation – the cropped and closeup view of a particular part of a female’s body – to some sense it looks like a photograph rather than a painting. It interestingly illustrates the relationship between these two and somewhat the fear that photography as mechanical reproduction is threatening the role of painting.

660. Elective Affinities

One of the several works that I cannot understand well. Magritte are trying to depict some form of illusion here because the positions of the edges of the cage are self-contradictory.

661. The Light of Coincidence

This one is my favorite since there are so many interpretations of its meaning, and the line between truth and illusion so blurred here. One cannot really tell if we are seeing a painted female torso in the frame, or instead a sculpture which is illuminated by the candle. The vivid light and shades of the torso is driving us to discover the truth and puzzling us at the same time, with the help the candle, which then represents illumination. Human is illuminated by arts, just like the torso is illuminated by the candle. This simple and complex work illustrates how paintings are created and how arts tell or do not tell stories and communicating ideas.

662. The Interpretation of Dreams

One interesting thing about this work is the English rather than French words under each of the objects (thought only the bottom right is correct). The mismatch between the objects and the meanings of the words reveals the complexity how we as a view gather information from a painting.

663. Clairvoyance

Magritte himself is present in this painting, illustrating what his daily work looks like and what he thinks about his work and art itself. Painting is about reproduction – it tells us the truth but also suggests multiplicity. There is no relationship between the egg and the bird and it is something else which is beyond the simply realistic and mechanical reproduction that connects this two objects together.

664. Not to Be Reproduced

The caption of this work is interesting – not to be reproduced. Perhaps this is why the figure behind the mirror refused to turn around his face to us? This hence poses the question on the role of painting as means of reproduction. The figure behind the mirror represents the hidden potential behind our everyday life. More often than not, life and truth is not about what we see but what it is concealed.

665. On the Threshold of Liberty

It is hard to imagine what you will really feel if you walk into a room like this. This painting plays with our expectations. One thing to note is that the texture in each plane (for example, the female torso and the wood next to it) and Magritte has applied quite different techniques to achieve that.