SUBJECT OF

ART
Alyza P. Caculitan
STILL-LIFE

Sunflowers, 1888 by Vincent van Gogh

The sunflower paintings had a special significance for Van Gogh:

they communicated ‘gratitude’, he wrote. He hung the first two in
the room of his friend, the painter Paul Gauguin, who came to live
with him for a while in the Yellow House. Gauguin was impressed
by the sunflowers, which he thought were ‘completely Vincent’.
Van Gogh had already painted a new version during his friend’s stay
and Gauguin later asked for one as a gift, which Vincent was
reluctant to give him. He later produced two loose copies, however,
one of which is now in the Van Gogh Museum.
PORTRAIT

GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING by Dutch artist Johannes

Vermeer

Girl with a Pearl Earring represents a young woman in a dark

shallow space, an intimate setting that draws the viewer’s
attention exclusively on her. She wears a blue and gold turban,
the titular pearl earring, and a gold jacket with a visible white
collar beneath. Unlike many of Vermeer’s subjects, she is not
concentrating on a daily chore and unaware of her viewer.
Instead, caught in a fleeting moment, she turns her head over
her shoulder, meeting the viewer’s gaze with her eyes wide and
lips parted as if about to speak.
 ANIMALS

"The Kongouro From New Holland" by George Stubbs (1772)

Depicting a kangaroo, it is the first painting of an Australian animal in

Western Art, along with a painting of a dingo—Portrait of a Large Dog
—also by George Stubbs. It is part of the collection of the National
Maritime Museum in Greenwich, London. The work was
commissioned by Joseph Banks and based on the inflated skin of an
animal he had collected from the east coast of Australia in 1770 during
Lieutenant James Cook's first voyage of discovery. It also seems to be
based on Sydney Parkinson's drawing of a kangaroo; Parkinson was
Joseph Banks's botanical illustrator on the first voyage of James Cook.
It depicts the animal sitting on a rock and looking over its shoulder
with a backdrop of trees and mountains.
MYTHOLOGY

Pallas and the Centaur (1482) by Sandro Botticelli

Pallas was the Titan god of war and battle and is the name chosen
to be accompanied with the Centaur in Sandro Botticelli’s painting
from 1482, Pallas and the Centaur. The woman in the picture is
called Camilla, and her fingers are entwined in the Centaur’s hair.
The Centaur seems to be submissive to her, which is a
representation of the Centaur’s uncontrolled passion for beautiful
women.

Camilla is holding a halberd, which is a large weapon that is

carried by guards. This weapon held by Camilla infers that she is a
guard who has taken the Centaur prisoner for shooting his bow.
 FIGURE

DAVID By Michelangelo

David is a masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture created between

1501 and 1504, by the Italian artist Michelangelo. It is a 5.17-metre
(17.0 ft) marble statue of a standing male nude. The statue represents
the Biblical hero David, a favoured subject in the art of Florence. It is
possible that the David was conceived as a political statue before
Michelangelo began to work on it. Certainly David the giant-killer
had long been seen as a political figure in Florence, and images of the
Biblical hero already carried political implications there.
HISTORY

Liberty Leading the People by Eugene Delacroix

Delacroix started painting after witnessing the violent escalation

of protests against a set of restrictive ordinances that Charles X
issued on July 26, 1830. For three days, later known as les Trois
Glorieuses (July 27–29), working- and middle-class citizens set up
barricades in the Paris streets and fought the royal army. Unable
to contain the insurrection, Charles X soon abdicated. Louis-
Philippe, the so-called Citizen King, took the throne and created a
constitutional monarchy. Historians speculate that Delacroix’s
dependence on royal commissions prevented him from taking part
in the rebellion outright, but he was nonetheless moved when he
saw insurgents raise the Tricolor, the French national flag, on
Notre Dame, a turning point in the rebellion.
LANDSCAPE

Le printemps (1660-64) by Nicolas Poussin

The classical painter Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665)

produced a deeply erudite and profound painting,
fundamental in the history of art. He is notably the
inventor of the “ideal landscape” where man is
intimately linked to nature, portrayed in a majestic
and grandiose way. Inviting to delight, it offers an in-
depth reflection on the place of the son of Adam
within the divine immensity.
SEASCAPE

THE GREAT WAVE OFF KANAGAWA BY HOKUSAI

The Great Wave was created around 1831 as part of a series of

woodblock prints called Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji (Fugaku
Sanju-roku Kei). Hokusai (2004), a book written by the Italian
professor of East Asian Art, Gian Carlo Calza, offers a general
introduction to Hokusai’s works, looking at a chronologically
arranged overview of his life and career. The collection of
monographs by distinguished Western and Japanese scholars
display’s wide research and keen discernment of present studies
on Hokusai, while the abundant illustrations, amounting to over
700 in total, allow the readers to explore the fascinating world of
Hokusai.
CITYSCAPE
Paris Street, rainy day, 1877 by Gustave Caillebotte

“The Boulevard Montmartre at Night” by Camille Pissarro (1897,

London, National Gallery), Impressionist painters were also attracted
by the innovative elements of the modern city, especially those related
to the railway world. Thus, rail stations became a central part of the
Impressionist “iconography”. And among them, the Saint-Lazare
Station (“le Gare Saint-Lazare”) fulfilled all the impressionist
ambitions. The sensational “Le gare Saint Lazare (Saint Lazare
station)” (1877, Paris, Musée d’Orsay) by Claude Monet, was admired
even by critics of that time, something unusual in the Era of
Impressionim. The aforementioned Gustave Caillebotte was another
painter who was clearly fascinated by the railway world, as it can be
seen in one of his most famous paintings, “The Bridge of Europe”
(1876, Musée du Petit Palais, Geneva).
 WAYS OF
02 PRESENTING
ART
REALISM

The Gleaners by Jean François Millet

The painting shows three slave gleaning the wheat, as the

two slaves picks and collects the wheat the third one tie
them up up together. this shows how different the life of
low rank to the upper classes.
ABSTRACTION

Full Fathom Five by Jackson Pollock

The abstract is the assortment and shows

randomness of the composition it also show the
anxious and dark mind of humanity.
DISTORTION

On this image it looks like the

man is fading away. It can mean
that he is slowly dying or he is
slowly being forgeten by
someone.
SURREALISM

The persistence of memory by Salvador Dali

As we can see in the art it looks like the clocks

are melting. This art is showing that time can
melt or we are wasting our time n many possible
ways